DIRECTOR BIOGRAPHY​ - Can Merdan Doğan

Can Merdan Doğan (1987, Ankara/Turkey) is a writer, director, and playwright. He studied at Ankara University Theater Department and completed his master’s at Kadir Has University Cinema and TV in Istanbul. Dogan was nominated for 'playwright of the year' at the Journal of Theatre Awards in 2013 for the play 'I Played Games with My Dad When I Was a Kid, which won the Afife Award for the year's best actress in a musical comedy. His first feature film, Arabesque Underground (2014), in which he worked as a screenwriter and assistant director, premiered at the Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival and won 5 other awards in Turkey. His short movie Stiletto (2021) premiered at the 65th BFI London Film Festival’s short film competition and won the “Best International Short Film” award at the Dublin International Film Festival. The film has been to over 20 film festivals in Germany, The Netherlands, South Korea, and Turkey and won several awards. The film will be airing on Canal + France next year. Most recently, he has been pursuing his PhD. in Media, Theater, and Popular Culture in Germany and writing his debut film Backstage. He is interested in queer cinema and hybrid forms of storytelling.