Nikos Koutelidakis

Nikos Koutelidakis (1942) is a director. He was born in Athens and began his career in cinema in the 1960s, initially as an assistant director to Dimis Dadiras, Vasilis Georgiadis, Grigoris Grigoriou, and Errikos Thalassinos, among others. He was also assistant director on Theodoros Angelopoulos’s film Days of ’36 (1972). He made his directorial debut in 1973 with his short film The Last Rehearsal (based on his own screenplay) and received the award for best debut director at the Thessaloniki Greek Film Festival. The film was also shown at the Oberhausen and Rio de Janeiro festivals. In 1980, he directed the documentary film A Documentary, which was awarded at the Drama Short Film Festival. His television career began in 1973 with the series Restless Youth on EIRT, written by Karolos Brousalis. Since then, he has directed telefilms and dramatic and comic fiction series, including television adaptations of books such as the novels Mrs Doremi by Lilika Nakou, The Last Grandchildren by Tasos Athanasiadis, Wedding List by Dionysis Charitopoulos, and Unlawful Love by Konstantinos Theotokis. In 1995, he directed for the first time in theatre the play Coloured Women by Vasilis Ziogas, a production that won the Best Director Award from the Society of Greek Theatrical Writers. The following year, he again directed the play Big Bang by the same author. In 2011, he directed the feature film The Christmas Tango, based on the novel of the same title by Yiannis Xanthoulis, which won three awards from the Hellenic Film Academy (for Music, Set Design, and Costume Design).