Mahmoud Ali

Mehmood Ali (29 September 1932 – 23 July 2004), popularly known simply as Mehmood, was an Indian actor, singer, director and producer, best known for playing comic, serious, emotional and versatile roles in Hindi films. During his career spanning more than four decades, he worked in over 300 Hindi films and was known as Bollywood's Original Bhaijaan. Mehmood received 25 nominations for film awards, 19 for 'Best Performance in a Comic Role', while the awards started in 1954, awards for the best comedian category started only in 1967. Prior to that Mehmood also received 6 nominations for 'Best Supporting Actor'. Mehmood Ali was born on 29 September 1932. He was the second of the eight children, and eldest son to Latifunnisa and film and stage actor/dancer Mumtaz Ali, who was a huge star of the 1940s and 1950s cinema in Mumbai. Mehmood had an elder sister and six younger siblings. His sister, Minoo Mumtaz, was also a successful dancer and character actress in Bollywood movies. His youngest brother, Anwar Ali, is also an actor as well as a producer of such movies as Khud-daar and Kaash. As a child, he worked in Bombay films like Kismet. He later had a number of odd jobs, selling poultry products and working as a driver for director P. L. Santoshi. Santoshi's son, Rajkumar Santoshi, would later cast him in the film Andaz Apna Apna (1994). Many of Mehmood's film songs were sung by Mohammad Rafi. Mehmood would go on to perform small roles in films such as Do Bigha Zameen, C.I.D., and Pyaasa. He later began taking on larger roles. He then ruled from late 50s to 70s as a Big Superstar, both as an actor and filmmaker. In the period from 1958-1979 he gave many hits, superhits and blockbusters as main lead, parallel lead, 2nd lead and supporting roles. And also did many Special Appearances & Cameos. And during that period he gave break to many artists in the industry like - R.D. Burman, Rajesh Roshan, Aruna Irani, Amitabh Bachchan and many more. In the 1980s, Mehmood's starts doing less movie and during that time other comedy actors like Jagdeep, Asrani, Paintal, Deven Verma and Kader Khan shot to prominence. Between 1990 and 1999, he made a handful of movies, but most of them were either shelved or made no impression. He acted as Johnny in Rajkumar Santoshi's Andaz Apna Apna (1994). It was his last well-known film. Mehmood married Madhu Kumari in 1953; the two divorced in September 1967.