Ahmet Civan Canova was born in Ankara on June 28, 1955 and died in Istanbul on August 20, 2022. In addition to being an artist who left his mark on theatre, cinema and TV series, he was also known as a playwright, screenwriter and director.
His father was the well-known theater actor Mahir Canova and his mother was Gündüz Sencer. Canova, who was raised by her grandmother after her parents separated during her childhood, met the famous actress Kartal Tibet during her mother's second marriage. In primary school, he played small roles in the "Radyo Çocuk Saati" program directed by his father on Ankara Radio; His stepfather also introduced him to movie sets.
After continuing his education as a boarding student at TED Ankara College, he graduated from Ankara College in 1973.
Canova, who started acting in the summer of 1974 with Yılmaz Güney's movie "Friend", enrolled in the Ankara State Conservatory Theater Department in the same period and took part in the movie "Nehir" directed by Şerif Gören in 1977. The artist, who graduated from the conservatory in 1979 and joined the State Theatre, performed in many plays at the Istanbul State Theatre.
While he portrayed various characters in his cinema career, he won the Best Supporting Actor award at the 43rd Golden Orange Film Festival for his role as a torturer cop in the movie "Homecoming" in 2006; In 2011, he was chosen as the Most Successful Actor of the Year at the Afife Theater Awards for his performance in the play "Bury the Dead".
Canova, who started writing in 1989 with the script called "Blind Meeting", succeeded in entering the top ten in the competition organized by the Ministry of Culture with this script. In 1994, he staged his play "Apocalypse Waters" and was deemed worthy of the İsmet Küntay and Avni Dilligil awards for this work. Then, he won the Cevdet Kudret Literature Award for "Curfew" (1997), and found a wide audience in the theater world with his works such as "Men's Toilet" (1999), "Wedding Song" (2002) and "Ful Yaprakları" (2005).
In 1996, he wrote the script of the TV series "Bizim Aile" and played the character "Ataç"; He also appeared in roles such as Artist Celal in "Çiçek Taksi" and Rahmi Gürpınar in "Paramparça". Canova, who married Açelya Akkoyun in 1998, ended this marriage in 2004.
He was born in Ankara in 1955. His father is theater actor Mahir Canova and his mother is Gündüz Sencer. His parents separated when he was young, and he was raised by his grandmother. His mother made her second marriage with actor Kartal Tibet. During his primary school years, he took small roles in Radio Children's Hour, directed by his father, on Ankara Radio.
His stepfather Kartal Tibet introduced him to film sets. After primary school, he studied at TED Ankara College as a boarding student.
After graduating from Ankara College in 1973, he started acting in Yılmaz Güney's movie 'Friend' in the summer of 1974, while he was preparing for the conservatory exams. In the same year, he enrolled in Ankara State Conservatory Theater Department. While he was a student, he starred in the movie Nehir (1977), directed by Şerif Gören.
He graduated from the conservatory in 1979 and joined the State Theater staff and started working at the Istanbul State Theatre, taking part in many plays. In addition to theater, the artist also took part in films. He started writing for the first time in 1989 by writing a movie script called Blind Date. This script entered the top ten in the script writing competition opened by the Ministry of Culture.
He wrote his first play, In the Waters of Doomsday, in 1994. This play was staged by Kenan Işık; İsmet Küntay was deemed worthy of the Best Writer Award and Avni Dilligil was deemed worthy of the Best Theater Writer Award. In his third play, Curfew (1997), which he wrote after the play titled Beyond Red Light, he ironically described a day spent by hotel guests who could not go out on a counting day.
He won the Cevdet Kudret Literature Award with this play. Canova's plays Men's Toilet (1999), which contains an absurd look at the world of men, the one-woman Wedding Song (2002), which she wrote based on her own marriage and tells the story of this marriage from the perspective of a young woman who marries a more mature intellectual man, and Full Leaves (2005), which deals with the isolated relationships of the internet age, were among her most performed plays.
Canova wrote the script of the TV series Bizim Aile in 1996 and played the character Ataç in the series. He played the roles of Artist Celal in the TV series Çiçek Taksi and Rahmi Gürpınar in the TV series Paramparça.
In 2006, he won the Golden Orange Best Supporting Actor Award at the 43rd Golden Orange Film Festival for his role as a torturer cop in the movie Homecoming, and shared the Best Supporting Actor Award at the 12th Sadri Alışık Cinema and Theater Actor Awards with İlyas Salman, who played the role of Cuma in the movie "Sis ve Gece".
Productions in which he took part
He took part in a total of 28 productions; 12 of the most well-known are listed.
- Çiçek Taxi (1995) — Celal Kıraç (2)
- Karadayi (2012)
- Shattered (2014) — Rahmi
- Atiye (2019) — Mustafa
- Three Kurus (2021) — Oktay
- Our Family (1996) — Ataç
- Night Walk (2004)
- Class (2008) — Şeref
- I Can't Live Without You (2010)
- Çeşm-i Bülbül (2006) — Hakkı
- Hobos (1982) — Kenan
- Missing Skirt (2007)
Production and imprint information was taken from TMDB.
