In May 2004, Usman along with Preacher Moss and Azeem Muhammad (later replaced by Mohammed Amer in 2006) launched a comedy tour titled Allah Made Me Funny.
[15] He also co-wrote and produced a feature-length documentary/concert film based on the live tour, which was theatrically exhibited at Landmark Theatres in over a dozen top US markets in 2008.
Allah Made Me Funny toured 30 U.S. cities during its first year, and also in Canada, Europe, Malaysia, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and the Middle East.
[11] Usman and his comedy have been covered by over 100 major world media outlets,[15] including The New York Times, The Economist, CBS Sunday Morning, CNN Headline News, and a whole episode of ABC Nightline.
[19] In 2008, CNN aired an hour-long special, entitled America's Funniest Muslim, on its Turkish affiliate, which included both performance clips and an extended Q&A session with Usman.
In June 2013, Usman featured on an interfaith special, What's So Funny About Religion?, alongside Lewis Black and Mohammed Amer, which was broadcast on the CBS Television Network.
[22] In February 2017, Usman appeared in the recurring role of Kkyman Candahar in the Amazon original series Patriot, created, written, and directed by Chicago screenwriter and producer Steven Conrad.
[29][30] Usman's character comedy includes "Sheikh Abdul, the radical imam", who intersperses vitriolic lectures with announcements about double-parked cars and meetings to re-elect the mosque committee that has remained unchanged for 37 years.
There is also "Uncle Letmesplainyou", an antique Muslim who barely speaks English, has crazy political views and a voracious desire to share them, elbowing others aside to embarrass the community in television interviews.
[13] Usman is an artist and an activist and was a co-founding board member and director of The Nawawi Foundation, an Illinois non-profit dedicated to contemporary Islamic research[31] and private Muslim think tank.
In 2009, Usman was listed as one of The 500 Most Influential Muslims by Georgetown University's The Prince Alwaleed Center for Muslim–Christian Understanding and Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre of Jordan.
[10] In the spring of 2020, it was announced on his personal Instagram account that he is now married to visual artist Jennifer Hoffman Usman (f/k/a Jen Jackson),[39] a graduate of The King's Foundation School of the Traditional Arts.