Zia Mohyeddin was born in Lyallpur, now known as Faisalabad, Pakistan in 1933 and after training at RADA from 1953 - 1955, he played leading roles in the principal theatres of Pakistan between 1956 - 1957. His first London stage appearance was as Dr Aziz in A Passage to India at the Comedy Theatre, although it had toured prior to its West End run, as one review in The Times makes clear: "Since Miss Santha Rama Rau's version of A Passage to India was presented at the Oxford Playhouse, roughnesses in the production have been smoothed away; and the performance at the Comedy reflects clearly and excitingly a remarkably sensitive and faithful rendering of the novel...Mr. Zia Mohyeddin could hardly improve on his original performance as the exuberant and sincere Aziz whose social excesses, springing from the contemptuous indifference with which his advances are met, culminate in personal disaster." (21 April 1960). Mohyeddin reprised the part in New York in 1962, becoming the first Asian actor to have his name appear on a Broadway marquee.