Yıldız Kenter

Theater and cinema actress, director (b. 11th October 1928 in Istanbul- d. 11 November 2019, Istanbul). Her original name is Ayşe Yıldız. The theater player Müşfik Kenter is her brother and Şükran Güngör, who is also a theater player, is her husband. She grew up in a wealthy family environment where books are read and music is listened frequently. Her English mother Olga Cynthia, who came to and settled in Turkey in 1920, changed her name as Nadide Kenter when she took the citizenship of the Republic of Turkey. Her father was the Turkish diplomat Ahmet Naci Kenter… Her maternal grand-father had a theater group who staged the plays of Shakespeare in England. When Yıldız Kenter decided to become a theater actress at the age of eleven, she entered the conservatory with the help of his father, kept as a secret from her mother. Among her teachers, there were the most famous poets, writers and theater players of the period such as Carl Ebert, Nurettin Sevin, Mahir Canova, Cahit Külebi and Sabahattin Ali. She finished the Ankara State Conservatory High Section by skipping a grade.

Yıldız Kenter worked in Ankara Devlet Tiyatrosu (T.N. Ankara State Theatre) for eleven years. She won the scholarship of “Rockefeller” and she made studies on new techniques in acting and the education of acting in American Theatre Winng, Neighbourhood Play House and Actor’s Studio. After that, she was appointed as a teacher in the Ankara State Conservatory. She left Devlet Tiyatrosu and worked almost one year with Muhsin Ertuğrul (1959). She founded the Community of “Kent Oyuncuları” in Istanbul, together with her brother Müşfik Kenter and her husband Şükran Güngör. She accomplished continuous studies in the United States of America and in England on the “changing educational methods” and “acting methods”. She opened the own building of the Kenter Theater (1968) and staged many plays here as a director and actress. She staged English and Turkish plays in countries such as the Soviet Union, the United States of America, England, Germany, Netherlands, Denmark, Canada, Yugoslavia and Cyprus. The artist, who performed in more than one hundred plays, has directed as many plays and displayed her success in this field. She put her signature under important successes both as a player and as a director and she performed unforgettable interpretations.

Prof. Yıldız Kenter also worked as the Head of Department and teacher of the Ankara State Conservatory, the Istanbul Municipality Conservatory and the Department of Theater at the State Conservatory of the Istanbul University. The artist also gave lessons of theater at Koç University.

Yıldız Kenter got on the stage in many plays of famous local and foreign theater writers. Her following plays are watched with a big admiration by the Turkish audience:

12. Gece, Finten, Yağmurcu, Çöl Faresi, Öfke, Salıncakta İki Kişi, Nalınlar, Ayak Takımı Arasında, Pembe Kadın, İnsan Denen Garip Hayvan, Üç Kız Kardeş, Çiçu, İçerdekiler, Oturma Odası, Günden Geceye, Seneye Bugün, Yürüyen Geceyi Dinle, Bodrumdaki Pencere, Harold ve Maude, Babalar ve Oğullar, Cyrano, Arzu Tramvayı, Savunma, Uzaklar, Bir Çift Kanat, Van Gogh, Şafak Yıldızları, Sevgili Yelena Sergeyevna, Maskeli Süvari, Kuvayı Milliye Destanı, Fehim Paşa Konağı,  Konken Partisi, Çok Uzak Fazla Yakın, Ramiz ile Jülide, Nutuk, Maria Callas, Gece Mevsimi, Salıncakta İki Kişi, Ben Anadolu, Anna Karanina, Hep Aşk Vardı , Sırça Kümes, Martı and Nükte.

 In the cinema, she was also well-liked with her movies; Vatan İçin (1951), Ağaçlar Ayakta Ölür (1964), İsyancılar (1965), Pembe Kadın (1966), Yaşlı Gözler (1967), Anneler ve Kızları (1971), Elmacı Kadın (1971), Fatma Bacı (1972), Ablam (1973), Kartal Yuvası(1974), Kızım Ayşe (1974), Bir Ana Bir Kız (1974), Zulüm (1983), Hanım (1988), Güle Güle (1999), Büyük Adam Küçük Aşk (2001), Sen Ne Dilersen (2005), Beyaz Melek (2007).She was watched by a wide audience in the following television series: Uğurlugiller (1990),Aşk ve Gurur (2002), Saklambaç (2005).

Yıldız Kenter was selected as “the Woman of the Year” in the year 1962 because of the services she gave to the theater. She was deemed worthy of the award of “Altın Portakal” for three times as a cinema actress. She received the award of “Adalaide Ristori” by the Italian Culture Association in Roma in 1984. She was selected as the “Best Actress” with her role in the movie “Hanım” in the Corsica-Bastia Film Festival in the year 1989. She was also deemed worthy of more than fifty awards in the following years. She has a memory book named Hep Aşk Vardı (2003). 

REFERENCE: Mustafa N. Özön - Baha Dürder / Türk Tiyatrosu Ansiklopedisi (1967), Niyazi Akı / Çağdaş Türk Tiyatrosuna Toplu Bakış / 1923-1967 (1968), Metin And / Cumhuriyet Dönemi Türk Tiyatrosu (1983), Atilla Dorsay / Türk ve Dünya Sineması Ansiklopedisi (Turhan Gürkan ile, 1983), Ömer Ayhan / Siyah Beyaz Bir Öykü (Türk Sinemasının 1960’lı yıllardan günümüze kadarki yılları, 2001), Yıldız Kenter / Hep Aşk Vardı (2003), Alim Şerif Onaran / 20. Yüzyılın Son Beş Yılında Türk Sineması (2005), Agah Özgüç / Türk Sinemasının Kadınları (2008), İhsan Işık / Ünlü Sanatçılar (Türkiye Ünlüleri Ansiklopedisi, c. 5, 2013), Dikmen Gürün / Tiyatro Benim Hayatım - Yıldız Kenter'in Hayatı (2015), İhsan Işık / Resimli ve Metin Örnekli Türkiye Edebiyatçılar ve Kültür Adamları Ansiklopedisi (12. Cilt, 2019), Yıldız Kenter hayatını kaybetti!  (sabah.com.tr, 17.11.2019)