Nubar Terziyan

Nubar Terziyan — Biography

Nubar Terziyan (born Nubar Alyanakziya; 16 March 1909, Istanbul – 14 January 1994, Istanbul) was a Turkish stage and film actor of Armenian descent. Born into an Ottoman Armenian family in the Kumkapı district, he attended the Dadyan Armenian primary school and continued at the Bezazyan Lyceum in Bakırköy, but had to leave school to help in his father's drapery shop.

He began acting semi-professionally in 1926 with the Gençler Temaşa Heyeti, a troupe he founded with friends, where he also handled décor, costumes and ticket sales. He moved into cinema in 1949, playing Agop in Efsuncu Baba, adapted from Hüseyin Rahmi Gürpınar's novel, and adopted the surname Terziyan after entering film. Without any formal acting training, he developed a distinctive improvisational style and became one of Yeşilçam's most familiar character actors, beloved for kindly fathers, gentle grandfathers and good-hearted shopkeepers. Over a career spanning about fifty years he appeared in more than four hundred and fifty films, ending with Yavuz Turgul's Aşk Filmlerinin Unutulmaz Yönetmeni in 1990. In 1993 he received the Cinema Labor Award at the Ankara International Film Festival. He never hid his Armenian identity, died at his home in Büyükdere, Sarıyer, and was buried in the Balıklı Armenian Cemetery.