In 1959, named World Refugee Year, Brynner was appointed as special consultant for the United Nations’ High Commissioner for Refugees. The unsalaried – or rather, $1-a-year – position involved visiting refugee camps in Europe and the Middle East to do photography, radio, television, and film work in order to bring attention to the experiences and plight of refugees worldwide. At this point, Brynner was having something of a sabbatical from film work after earning $1 million from Solomon and Sheba, his first marriage having recently disintegrated and him having relocated back to Europe. The ambivalence that Brynner voiced about his film career and loss of privacy early on found an outlet in lending his fame to a humanitarian cause, while also broadening his star image – otherwise steeped in exotic macho magnetism – towards the issues of human rights and cosmopolitan ethics of care. As journalists put it, Brynner's work with the UNHCR made it possible to see him as more than a ‘cranial gimmick,’ rebranding him as ‘a humanitarian with a sense of humor, a poet with a flourish’ instead.

Brynner's work with the UNHCR continued till the end of his life, paving the way for the organization's many later collaborations with film stars. In the late 1970s, he also became an internationally recognized advocate for the rights of Romani people, lobbying the UN in particular.