Aykut Oray

Aykut Oray — Biography

Ahmet Aykut Oray was born on 13 October 1942 in Üsküdar; because his grandfather worked as a tobacco expert, he spent his childhood in the Aegean region, attending primary school in Buca and Ödemiş and secondary school in Manisa. He graduated from Istanbul University's Faculty of Literature, department of Near Eastern languages and cultures, and completed a master's degree in Hittitology. He began acting in 1961 with the university's student theatre and turned professional in 1963, but stayed away from the stage for years after marrying, only returning to the screen in 1988 with Perihan Abla on Umur Bugay's invitation.

Widely recognized for playing the killer in the long-running series Bizimkiler, Oray also appeared in films such as Deli Yusuf (1975), Şarkıcı (2001), Şellale (2001) and Janjan (2007). He taught at Marmara University's film and television department and at the Müjdat Gezen Art Center, co-hosted a reality show with Yalçın Çakır in 1992, and headed a reality-news unit with him at Flash TV from 2003. In his later years he also entered politics as a member of the Republican People's Party. Married with two children and a Beşiktaş supporter, he died of a heart attack on 11 August 2009 in his hotel room in Köyceğiz while attending a film festival, and was buried at Çengelköy Cemetery.