Pakistani actor-producer Humayun Saeed, who plays surgeon Dr Hasnat Khan in The Crown’s latest season, says it was an opportunity to play a man everyone at home knows as the Princess’ real love
On a four-day visit to Pakistan in 1991, Diana visited the Khyber Rifles Regiment, part of the Frontier Corps, at Minchi Point in Pakistan. Pics/Getty Images
Diana Spencer had many loves. The last one, she crossed over on to the other side with. But, they say that Dr Hasnat Khan, a Pakistani heart surgeon working at the Royal Brompton Hospital in London in the mid 1990s, was more; he was “the love of her life” according to her closest friends. In fact, the Princess of Wales herself is said to have described him as “Mr Wonderful”.
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“Diana wanted to marry him. In fact, she was willing to accept Islam and meet his parents.” Pakistani actor and producer Humayun Saeed is speaking to us over a video call from London, where he is attending the premiere of hit web series, The Crown, season 5. “They didn’t show every detail [in the series], but it is true [that she met his parents in Pakistan]. Her close friends, with whom we [the actors] interacted, knew this story.”
Close friends of the Princess of Wales told Saeed and the team that she was willing to embrace Islam if needed after meeting Khan
The Netflix original drama is based on the award-winning play, The Audience by showrunner Peter Morgan, and chronicles the life of late Queen Elizabeth II from the 1940s. This season, which follows the most turbulent times in the lives of the British royal family, focussing mainly on King Charles III (then Prince Charles) and his wife, late Diana, sees the couple meeting for the first time at Royal Brompton Hospital where Diana is spending regular time with the patients, without making it a media spectacle. Dr Khan finds this endearing. “He realises that Diana genuinely cares about helping people; that’s what he liked most about her,” says Saeed, a resident of Karachi. “From what I read, watched and researched on him, Dr Khan was a kind-hearted person and a thorough professional who was busy helping others. He wasn’t after Diana’s fortune or fame. In a world where everyone wanted something from her, he liked her for her kindness. It seems that it was the same with her; she wanted someone to look after her, appreciate her for the person she was. Dr Khan offered that.”
But like it is with most tragic loves, the pair parted when he couldn’t handle being in love with a celebrity. Popular with the media, Diana was opinionated. “He backed out because he was a private person, not comfortable being under the spotlight; he didn’t want the world to interfere in his relationship with her.”
An archival image from the 1990s of Dr Hasnat Khan on the outskirts of London
Although, a known name on the Pakistani acting scene, Saeed makes his international debut with this show. His last outing on television was in the drama, Meray Paas Tum Ho, rated the “best serial ever made” in the neighbouring country. The Crown, he says, happened after his manager reached out to him about an international show, although he wasn’t aware that it was for The Crown until he was selected.
“In the UK and Pakistan, everybody is aware of Dr Hasnat Khan. They say, if she ever really did fall in love, it was with Dr Hasnat. It was a great opportunity to bring him to life,” he thinks.
A fan of the series, Saeed says he has watched all four seasons, and is grateful to now be an insider. Screenplay writer Peter Morgan gets a special mention. “The preparation for the shoot is extensive and they emphasise a lot on detailing. For instance, my hair was trimmed and flattened to mimic his. I’d sometimes mess with it using my fingers. But the make-up person was alert, and would come by to fix it immediately. Since I was playing a doctor, I spent a couple of days, figuring how surgery is done, focussing on the movement of the hands and so on; I watched real-life surgeons although I had to do that in a blink-and-you-miss-it scene,” he says.
The emphasis is always on rehearsing. On his first day on set, Saeed shot a scene with Elizabeth Debicki, who plays Diana, inside a room as he tells her how an incision is made when he performs a heart surgery. “They asked the both of us how we would like to do the scene, and we rehearsed.” Once they agreed that she would sit down on the couch when performing, the pair enacted the scene end-to-end in the presence of the director. Once he okayed it, the team was called into the room and the actors were asked to perform again. “This process,” Saeed explains, “improves dialogue delivery. Usually, sets are chaotic, but here, there was silence, as if everyone was speaking into the other’s ears. No chatting, only focused work. And I think that has yielded results.”
Debicki, the Australian star, with whom he had most of his scenes, Saeed remembers as disciplined. “After a break, I’d try my best to be the first to reach the set, but she was always already there. She’d often praise my work, which I initially thought was to make me comfortable, but she did that in interviews later too,” he smiles.
The challenge for Saeed was that he thinks in Urdu-Hindi and must make the extra effort to express himself in English. “It was new but interesting for me to work with a new set of people in a foreign language. Back in Pakistan, I am also a producer, so most of the directors are friends. I usually know everyone on set. There, I was out of my comfort zone, making it a learning experience.”
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