Reşit Gürzap

Reşit Gürzap — Biography

Reşit Gürzap was an actor whose career ran from the operetta and comedy stages of the İstanbul City Theatre into Turkish cinema, where he appeared in more than sixty productions, and he also worked as a voice actor. He is remembered for pasha and officer roles in historical films and for decades of stage work; he died in Istanbul in the summer of 1990.

He grew up in Kadıköy in a family frequented by stage actors and writers and attended the Yüksek Deniz Ticaret Okulu, the maritime commercial college. He began as an amateur, worked at Kadıköy Süreyya Opereti in 1928, and in 1934 joined the İstanbul Şehir Tiyatrosu, making his debut as David in the operetta Deli Dolu. At the city's operetta company he took part in productions such as Lüküs Hayat, Saz Caz, Leblebici Horhor, Şen Dul and Yarasa, and his stage repertoire also included İki Efendinin Uşağı, Cimri, Macbeth and Scapin'in Dolapları.

His film career began in the 1940s with Kızılırmak-Karakoyun (1945). He played a factory director in Yanık Kaval, Çandarlı Halil Pasha in İstanbul'un Fethi and Colonel Rıfat Bey in Allaha Ismarladık, and also appeared in Çıldıran Kadın. Later credits include Doksan Dokuz Mustafa in the 1950s and Afife Jale in the 1980s. In his last years he turned to television programmes such as Şeker Sokak, Hanımlar Sizin İçin, Komedi Sanatı and Eski Toprak. His son Can Gürzap also became a stage and film actor, and his second wife was Alev Gürzap. He was buried at Zincirlikuyu Cemetery.