nez: the real turkish delight
march 2020 • 3 episodes (2 deleted) • (was) over 1 million
shunned by my conservative parents, nez was a huge star when i was a kid, and her relentless sexuality captured the imagination of many teens, especially her belly dancing and the shots of her butt from a music video, “sakın ha”. however, her fame only lasted a few years, and then she almost disappeared from the public eye.
people remembering her only in relation to her butt and sexuality was bothering me. meanwhile, her old songs were gaining traction in istanbul’s queer night scene, and i thought there was a good story to be told.
she rose to fame in 2002, “the last secular year”, when erdoğan’s party won the election - so she also had the quality of nostalgia that belonged to a bygone era.
the research process
i had a drag queen friend who was a huge fan of hers, and through them we had a chance to have an interview with her. due to legal sensitivity of her life, we never disclosed this information and only put the information that she gave, supported by evidence, in the video.
doing all these with evidence required extensive research, so episodes 2 and 3 were released together 8 months after the first episode. while doing this, i was hoping for it to create some sort of a me-too movement in the turkish music industry. the stories of sexual abuse were long known, but the perpetrators were never put in the spotlight for their works - or simply no one cared.
the complete series
episode 1: “sweat comes out”
exploring:
- her rise to fame, the reasons for her success
- her connection to the uzan holding, which is one of the biggest holdings in turkey
episode 2: “getting complicated” (deleted)
exploring:
- investigation into sexual predator and “evil genius” producer erol köse
- downfall of uzan holding and his political rivalry with erdoğan
- köse’s involvement and whistleblowing
episode 3: “dissolution” (deleted)
exploring:
- erol köse productions and the singers in the company
- sexual harassment allegations and cases against erol köse
- systemic abuse in the entertainment industry
censorship note: in just two days both episodes 2 and 3 gained over 200k views, but due to nez’s request and the copyright claims and weird emails we received from köse, we had to delete the episodes. to this day the episodes are not found online despite high demand.
personal reflection
however, these episodes were not only about nez, but about the recent political history of turkey and sexual abuses many people have endured in the entertainment industry. despite my sadness over their deletion, i am happy that one of the survivors of abuse commented under the video, thanking us for bringing the injustices as best as we could. i still have a personal connection to nezihe to this day.
tags: music industry, celebrity culture, 2000s turkey, sexual abuse, censorship, documentary series