Şehsuvar Aktaş

Şehsuvar Aktaş

Actor · born 1964

Hasan Duru in the series Mezarlık

Profile

Birth date1964
BirthplaceAnkara
ProfessionActor, Stage actor, Translator

Filmography / Projects

Şehsuvar Aktaş — Biography

Şehsuvar Aktaş was born in Ankara in 1964, an only child to a civil-servant mother and an air-force NCO father, and grew up in the Yenimahalle district. He discovered theater in his last year of middle school in a staging of Molière's The Imaginary Invalid, then went on from the Charles de Gaulle French Lycée in Ankara to graduate from the Theatre Department of Ankara University's Faculty of Language, History and Geography, later completing a master's and, in 1997, a doctorate there; he taught at the Anadolu University State Conservatory from 1989 to 1991.

He married actress Ayşe Selen in 1988, and in 2000 the couple founded the theater company Tiyatrotem, in which he has appeared in more than thirty productions including "Bir Kabare Akşamı", "Muhteşem Serseri" and "III. Riçırd Faciası". Alongside acting he is a prolific literary translator, having brought dozens of books into Turkish, among them Michel Foucault's Society Must Be Defended, Alfred Jarry's Ubu Roi and Molière's Tartuffe.

His screen career, which began in the late 1980s, includes the films Hiçbiryerde and Kabadayı as well as television roles in Benim Annem Bir Melek and the Eyyvah Eyvah film series. In recent years he has become known for playing Hasan Duru in the Netflix series Mezarlık.

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Their work through different eyes

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

Şehsuvar Aktaş's filmography splits into two veins. Returning as İrfan in the Eyyvah Eyvah films and as Sedat in İnşaat and İnşaat 2 shows sequels leaning on a familiar face. Polis Cezmi in Hiçbiryerde and the prosecutor in Yazgı are where he enters the harsh, quiet worlds of auteurs such as Tayfun Pirselimoğlu and Zeki Demirkubuz. In my view the second vein carries the weight.

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

Şehsuvar Aktaş's type is the man from the small or middle ranks of the state: a policeman in Hiçbiryerde, a prosecutor in Yazgı, a police chief in Fatma. In my view these parts together build the ordinary and often distant face of bureaucracy; Hikmet Asil in Şahsiyet can be read as an extension of that line of authority.

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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