Nazan Kesal

Nazan Kesal — Biography

Nazan Kesal was born on 28 March 1969 in Manisa and graduated from the Theatre-Acting Department of the Faculty of Fine Arts at Dokuz Eylül University in 1991; she is a Turkish stage, film and television actress and director. Between 1996 and 2004 she worked as both actor and director at the Diyarbakır State Theatre before moving to the Bursa State Theatre, also performing with independent companies such as Ankara Sanatevi, Tiyatro Ayna and Tiyatro İstanbul.

She entered cinema through Nuri Bilge Ceylan's Uzak (2002) and travelled to Cannes with his Climates (İklimler, 2006), a role that also won her the Best Supporting Actress award at the Antalya Golden Orange festival; she later won Best Actress honors at the Istanbul Film Festival for Hair (Saç, 2010) and at the Ankara International Film Festival for Daire (2014). On television she is best known for playing Fazilet Çamkıran in Fazilet Hanım ve Kızları, and has also appeared in series such as Bir Zamanlar Çukurova, Halka and Çocuk.

Married since 2005 to fellow actor Ercan Kesal, with whom she has a son, Kesal continues to tour her one-woman play Yaralarım Aşktandır across Turkey and has recently appeared in new films such as Su Yüzü (2025) and Acı Kahve (2025).