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Navin Chowdhry

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Navin Chowdhry
Born (1971-11-22) 22 November 1971 (age 52)
Bristol, England
Alma materImperial College London
OccupationActor
Height173 cm (5 ft 8 in)

Navin Chowdhry (born 22 November 1971)[1] is an English actor. He may be best known for his main cast roles in Teachers and A Touch of Cloth, and his role as Nish Panesar in the BBC soap opera EastEnders (2022–2024).

Early life

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Chowdhry is of Indian origin. He was born and brought up in Bristol, England.[2] He is the son of Simi Chowdhry, a well-known female activist. In 1994, he graduated from Imperial College London with an upper second class honours degree in biochemistry.[3]

Career

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At age 16, Chowdhry made his acting debut in the 1988 film, Madame Sousatzka with Shabana Azmi and Shirley MacLaine.[3]

His next major role was as I.T. teacher Kurt McKenna in the successful comedy show Teachers in 2001–2003,[2] and is also well known for playing PC Sanjay Singh in Dalziel and Pascoe. He also appeared as a possible rapist in Judge John Deed.

Chowdhry appeared in Waking The Dead, Series 3, Episode 3, entitled "Breaking Glass", opposite Trevor Eve and Sue Johnston. In the episode, he portrays the psychologically affected "Rainman". He then starred in the Channel 4 drama series NY-LON as Raph.[4]

On 30 October 2005, he appeared on stage at the Old Vic theatre in London in the one-night play Night Sky alongside Christopher Eccleston, Bruno Langley, David Warner, Saffron Burrows and David Baddiel. In 2005 he made a guest appearance in Doctor Who, then starring Christopher Eccleston as The Doctor where he was strangled by a Slitheen in the episode Aliens of London. In 2006, he appeared in the BBC Three drama series Sinchronicity, playing Mani.

In 2009, he appeared in two episodes of the Channel 4 series Free Agents and featured in Skellig. In 2010, he starred in the BBC television pilot Reunited, playing Danny.[5]

Chowdhry has also produced projects such as the award-winning short film "This Bastard Business" and a short play entitled Mashed.[3]

He played Anwar in the critically acclaimed 2015 BBC TV series Doctor Foster and in 2016 he played Sonny Desai in Series 18's first episode of Midsomer Murders.

Chowdhry portrayed Nodin Chavdri in the 2017 film Star Wars: The Last Jedi.

In 2019, he appeared in Sarah Rutherford's play "The Girl Who Fell" at Trafalgar Studios.[6]

In 2022, Chowdhry began playing the previously unseen and imprisoned Nish Panesar in EastEnders.[4] Nish, a manipulative psychopath, first appeared during the final stages of his 20-year prison sentence and was released shortly thereafter. Navin, as Nish, has now officially left Eastenders with his last episode being on the 31st of October 2024, the day of Halloween.

Filmography

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Film

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Year Film Role Notes
1988 Madame Sousatzka Manek Sen
1990 King of the Wind Agba
1993 The Seventh Coin Salim
1994 The Dove's Lost Necklace Hassan
1998 Surviving Sabu Amin Short
2000 Skin Deep Norman TV film
This Bastard Business Vinod Short
2001 Landmark Jaswinder Short
2002 Bhangra Heads Hari TV film
2004 Seafood Naveen Short
2005 Red Mercury Asif
2007 A Chaat in the Park Mahir Short
2008 Ny-Lon Raph TV film
2009 Skellig' Mr. Watson TV film
2010 Reunited Danny TV film
2015 I Love NY Ishan
2016 Ferried Ahmed Short
2017 With Love from Calais Nav Short
Star Wars: The Last Jedi Resistance Cargo Pilot

Television

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Year Title Role Notes
1993 London's Burning Rasheed 1 episode
1994 Schwarz greift ein Rawi Episode: "Blinde Wut"
1995 Crown Prosecutor Raj Kapoor 1 episode
1996 Casualty Zaf Episode: "Land of Hope"
Gulliver's Travels Prince Munodi 1 episode
1997 The Ruth Rendell Mysteries Amal Episode: "The Double"
Insiders Jonathan Mason Episode: "Offending Behaviour"
Dalziel and Pascoe PC Sanjay Singh 4 episodes
2000 City Central Tim Anand Episode: "History"
2001 Judge John Deed Colin Gee Episode: "Rough Justice"
On A Life's Edge Peter TV short
2001–2003 Teachers Kurt McKenna Regular role
2002 Animated Tales of the World Pawel Episode: "The Flower of Fern"
2003 Waking the Dead Rainman Episode: "Breaking Glass"
2004 NY-LON Raph Mini-series
2005 Doctor Who Indra Ganesh Episode: "Aliens of London"
New Tricks Sergeant Pushkar Guha Episode: "Family Business"
The Golden Hour Dr. Naz Osbourne Mini-series
2006 Sinchronicity Mani Series regular
2009 Free Agents Raz 2 episodes
2010 Five Days DC Bilal Choudry 2 episodes
2011 The Body Farm Parvez Khan 1 episode
2012 Mr Blue Sky Rakesh Rathi 3 episodes
2012–2014 A Touch of Cloth DC Asap Qureshi Series regular
2013 The Job Lot Sunil Mitesh 1 episode
2014 Babylon Adeel Mini-series
2015 Doctor Foster Anwar 3 episodes
2016 Midsomer Murders Sonny Desai Episode: "Habeas Corpus"
2017 The Replacement Kieran Mini-series
The End of the F***ing World Tony Regular role
2018 Next of Kin Dr. Kareem Shirani Regular role
Our Girl Inspector Chowdhrey 4 episodes
2019 Death in Paradise Andy Spriggs Episode: "Wish You Weren't Here"
Thunderbirds Are Go Cameron Episode: "Chain Reaction"
2020 McDonald & Dodds Pete Wattal Episode: "The Fall of the House of Crockett"
Out of Her Mind Steve 2 episodes
2021 Trying Deven Recurring role
2022–2024 EastEnders Nish Panesar Regular role

References

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  1. ^ Navin Chowdhry. Hollywood.com. Retrieved 2012-07-18.
  2. ^ a b "Teachers". channel4.com. Channel4.
  3. ^ a b c "Navin Chowdhry plays Mani". bbc.co.uk. BBC. 11 July 2006.
  4. ^ a b "Navin Chowdhry who plays Raph in the trans-atlantic drama NY-LON joined us for a webchat after the show". NY-LON- Channel4.com. 28 October 2004. Archived from the original on 10 September 2005.
  5. ^ Pettie, Andrew (30 June 2010). "Reunited: with the type of long-lost friends you'd rather leave behind, review". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 18 July 2010.
  6. ^ Cashell, Eleni (5 September 2019). "Claire Goose and Navin Chowdhry announced for the Girl Who Fell". officiallondontheatre.com.
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