KARA SEVDA

Endless Love (Turkish: Kara Sevda, literal translation Dark Love) is a Turkish drama series produced by Ay Yapım and broadcast on Star TV between 2015 and 2017.It is directed by Hilal Saral and stars Turkish actors Burak Özçivit, Neslihan Atagül and Kaan Urgancıoğlu.

The series has become a milestone in the international history of Turkish series, being awarded by the International Emmy Awards for best telenovela in 2017,becoming the first and only Turkish series to win this award.In addition, it has also been the only Turkish series to become a finalist in these awards.

Similarly, Kara Sevda received the special jury award at the Seoul International Drama Awardsin Korea, where the director Hilal Saral and Burak Özçivit, one of the leading actors, traveled to collect the award.

Four years after the end of Kara Sevda, the series was awarded as "The Best International Soap Opera" in the Soap Awards France 2021.Burak Özçivit and Neslihan Atagül were the only Turkish actors nominated for "Best International Actor" and "Best International Actress" respectively.

According to Can Okan, founder and CEO of Inter Medya, the international distributor of the series, "words are useless when talking about the success of Kara Sevda".The novel has become the most watched Turkish series in the world, being broadcast in more than 110 countries with successful audiences and has been translated into more than 50 languages. Some countries where it has been broadcast are Turkey, Russia,Greece, Hungary, Morocco, France, Serbia, Romania, Germany, Iraq, Slovakia, Ukraine, Albania, Spain, Iran, Mexico, Bolivia, Panama, Uruguay, Ecuador, Slovenia, South Africa, Paraguay, Uzbekistan and the Philippines among others.

In its broadcast in the United States through Univision, it became the most watched foreign soap opera in the entire history of the country and the Turkish series with the highest audience, surpassing its main competitors. The love story remains the most watched fiction in Hispanic prime time with more than 2 million viewers every day and close to 4 million in its final episode, something that no other series has achieved. Currently, Kara Sevda remains the most watched Turkish series in the United States.

Such has been the overwhelming success of the series that in the Wax Museum of "Tashkent City Park" in Uzbekistan, two figures of Kemal and Nihan are exhibited, the main characters of the series, in the part dedicated to Istanbul.

Life and career

Kaan Urgancioglu was born on 8 May 1981 in İzmir, Turkey. On his father's side he is of Turkish descent and on his mother's side he is of Albanian and Syrian descent. He went to school at the Private Turkish College Secondary School and the American College.After graduating from highschool

he moved to Istanbul in 2000 and studied at the Marmara University's Finance Department.Kaan Urgancıoğlu started to study cinema as well as university education. He graduated after 7 years. In 2002, while still at university, he started to work as an actor on the recommendation of actress Demet Akbağ, a family friend.

Urgancıoğlu had his first role as the lead actor in a series based on the historical comic book Karaoğlan. He then had a role in the youth series Kampüsistan. He played in many popular series and films afterwards. In 2008 he went to the United States and studied acting there for 6 months.

He is best known for playing Emir Kozcuoğlu in Kara Sevda, one of the most successful Turkish series internationally and the only Turkish series in history to win the International Emmy Award for "Best Telenovela", along with two other international awards. He also starred in the Netflix original series Aşk 101, which premiered in 2020. In 2021, he began starring in Yargı and shared the leading roles with Pınar Deniz, with whom he had previously co-starred in Aşk 101.