Müşfik Kenter

Müşfik Kenter — Biography

Müşfik Kenter was a versatile Turkish artist, one of the central figures of the Kent Oyuncuları company he founded with his elder sister Yıldız Kenter, who worked on stage, in film and in voice acting. He is remembered above all for the solo play Bir Garip Orhan Veli, in which he played the poet Orhan Veli and which ran for more than twenty-five years. He held the title of State Artist. He died in Istanbul on 15 August 2012.

He began in theatre in 1947 in the children's section of the Ankara State Theatre, graduated from the Ankara State Conservatory with high honours in 1955 and joined the State Theatres. He left in 1959 and moved to Istanbul; after working with Muhsin Ertuğrul he founded the Site Theatre in 1960-1961 with Şükran Güngör and Kâmran Yüce, which became Kent Oyuncuları in 1962. The group put all its savings into the project and raised support through an Anatolian tour and a seat-selling campaign, completing the Kenter Theatre building in 1968. After retiring he headed the theatre department at Haliç University and served as general artistic director of the Bakırköy City Theatre.

In film he appeared in Murtaza and Sevmek Zamanı (1965) and Hayallerim, Aşkım ve Sen (1987), and won the best supporting actor award at the 1966 Antalya Film Festival for playing Hakkı in Bozuk Düzen. On television he was seen in the series Yorgun Savaşçı and Avrupa Yakası, and he voiced Grand Master Oogway in Kung Fu Panda and the title character in the series ALF.