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Ercan Kesal
Photo: Wikimedia Commons · Nevit Dilmen (talk) · CC BY-SA 3.0

Ercan Kesal

Actor · 67 years old

İdris Koçovalı in the series Çukur

Profile

Age67
Birth dateSeptember 12, 1959
BirthplaceNevşehir
ProfessionActor
Eye colorBrown
EducationEge University Faculty of Medicine
SpouseNazan Kesal
Zodiac signVirgo

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Ercan Kesal — Biography

Ercan Kesal is one of the few people in Turkish cinema who came to it from medicine: a regular presence in Nuri Bilge Ceylan's films, a screenwriter and a published author. Wider audiences know him as İdris Koçovalı in the series Çukur, and in recent years he has also appeared in productions such as Veliaht and The Things You Kill.

After graduating from Ege University's medical school in 1984, he spent years as a primary-care physician in Keskin, Balâ and the surrounding villages, and later pursued academic work in psychology and social anthropology. In 2002 he took a small part in Uzak and went on to act full-time, with Üç Maymun, Vavien, Küf, Yozgat Blues, Hükümet Kadın and Bulantı along the way. For Yozgat Blues he won best actor at the Golden Boll and Istanbul film festivals. He also turned to writing: he co-wrote Bir Zamanlar Anadolu'da with Ebru and Nuri Bilge Ceylan, a script nominated for best screenplay at the 2011 Asia Pacific Screen Awards. He also wrote and directed Nasipse Adayız, adapted from his own book, and played the lead.

On television he appeared in Kayıp Şehir and İçerde. As an author he has published books including Peri Gazozu, Evvel Zaman, Cin Aynası and Aslında.... He is married to the actress Nazan Kesal.

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Reactions

You can pick up to 3 reactions.

Their work through different eyes

Cinephile Looks at script, editing and directing choices; keeps a distance from formula films.

Ercan Kesal's weight in cinema comes from his relationship with Nuri Bilge Ceylan: he started with Uzak, played Servet in Üç Maymun, and in Bir Zamanlar Anadolu'da he is both the Muhtar and a co-writer of the script alongside the Ceylans. In my view what matters is that the actor feeds the film's local texture with a writer's eye; the Muhtar brings provincial reality into a prosecutor's and a doctor's night.

Action & Thriller Fan Puts pace, tension and set pieces first; little patience for slow drama.

In Çukur, Ercan Kesal's part, İdris Koçovalı, is credited as voice only; he lends weight to the mafia clan's world without being seen. He also appears in the crowded casts of the action series İçerde and Veliaht. For an action fan, in my view, the worth of these jobs lies less in pace than in the gravity he adds to a series' world; his finer playing from the Ceylan films is hard to find here.

History & Society Lens Asks about the period, the social background and what the work reflects.

In Bir Zamanlar Anadolu'da the Muhtar is the man where the official order meets the village, a local counterpart to the film's night-long talk of bureaucracy, guilt and death. In my view Ercan Kesal plays him without exaggeration, with the weight of an ordinary man. That he plays Dr. Kemal Güner in Nasipse Adayız, which he wrote and directed himself, and that the film won Best Film awards, shows the view found an audience of its own.

These are not reader reviews: they are short editorial takes on this person's screen work, written from different viewer perspectives with AI assistance. Reader comments are below.

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