Hyder met Joan Bradshaw, an Irish Catholic Liverpudlian, in the early 1950s and they lived in Karachi, Pakistan, for a decade.
[1][better source needed] Jaffrey grew up in London and was educated at Dulwich College between 1986 and 1991, alongside actors Rupert Penry-Jones and Chiwetel Ejiofor.
[1][2] Jaffrey's initial career aspiration was to become a Royal Air Force pilot and he passed the entrance exams for it and went on to study English and Drama at Manchester University with the intention of gaining a degree to join officer training.
In his final year at Manchester, he worked with Royal Shakespeare Company chief associate director Gregory Doran, which he has cited as one of the things that led him to apply for Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and eventually go on to become a professional actor.
From this, he went on to land the leading role in Andrew Lloyd Webber's production of A. R. Rahman's Bombay Dreams at the Apollo Theatre, London, directed by Steven Pimlott.
[3] He won rave reviews for his performance, with the BBC hailing him as "the most exciting new leading man to emerge in a London musical since Hugh Jackman became an overnight star in the National Theatre production of Oklahoma".
During that time, he returned to the stage, playing Orsino in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night at the Albery Theatre, London, and was cast in the David Cronenberg film Eastern Promises.
[8][9] In 2019, Jaffrey played Ottoman Janissary Captain Sunal Demir in the historical romance drama film, Cliffs of Freedom.