Suzan Avcı

Suzan Avcı — Biography

Born in Bursa on 25 September 1937 to a Kazan Tatar father and a Crimean Tatar mother, Suzan Avcı lost her father to liver disease when she was six and moved with her family to Istanbul, where she went to work alongside her mother in a textile factory. Winning a magazine acting contest at thirteen brought no film role because her mother refused permission, and after marrying at fifteen and having a son, Mete, she began appearing on stage with the Muammer Karaca and Toto Karaca theatre companies. Entering cinema in the second half of the 1950s, she quickly became identified with the "vamp" image, playing formidable villainesses opposite the era's leading ladies; she caused a stir with Şehvet Uçurumları in 1962 and with a kissing scene alongside Sevda Nur in the 1963 film İki Gemi Yan Yana. She married screenwriter Erdoğan Tünaş, whom she met working on Turist Ömer Almanya'da (1966), in 1970, and their daughter Binnaz Avcı was born from the marriage; Avcı went on to appear in Kolsuz Kahraman, Acı İntikam, Fosforlu Cevriyem, Malkoçoğlu Cem Sultan and Acımak, cementing her status as one of Yeşilçam's most memorable femme fatales.