Hussein was born Waris Habibullah in Lucknow, British India, into a family of the aristocratic Taluqdar class,[4] and spent his early years mainly in Bombay.

[15] Other theatrically released films include Melody (1971), also known as S.W.A.L.K, with Jack Wild and Mark Lester, and Henry VIII and his Six Wives (1972), starring Keith Michell, Charlotte Rampling, and Donald Pleasence.

One British project was Intimate Contact (1987), a four-part drama for Central TV with Claire Bloom and Daniel Massey, portraying the experience of a couple where the husband has contracted and ultimately dies from AIDS.

[1] Hussein directed Sixth Happiness (1997), a film whose screenplay was written by Firdaus Kanga, the author of the semi-autobiographical novel Trying to Grow.

[18] Hussein is gay, lost a partner of twelve years to AIDS in the 1980s,[19] and discussed his own sexuality and the wider subject in a 2017 episode of the Doctor Who: The Fan Show.