Sibel Kekilli (born June 16, 1980 in Heilbronn, West Germany) is a German actress of Turkish descent.
She began acting in adult movies; her first non-porn film role was as the co-star of Fatih Akin's acclaimed 2004 movie Gegen die Wand, released under the title Head-On in English-speaking countries. It was reported at the time that she got the break because the casting director couldn't find any non-porn Turkish-German actresses who were willing to do the nudity and (simulated) sex scenes required for the part. In 2006, she was in both the Turkish coup film Eve Dönüş as an official's wife and the Holocaust film Der letzte Zug as a Jewish woman on her way to a concentration camp. She won the Best Actress Lola for her role in the 2009 film Die Fremde.
She was quite upset when the German press began to report on her pornographic past around the time she started winning acting accolades, equating it to a "smear campaign". Due to this, her parents disowned her. She has also indicated domestic abuse occurred often in her family, but didn't go into detail.
She gained wider attention in 2011 when she began playing Shae, Tyrion Lannister's Camp Follower-turned-mistress, in Game of Thrones. She also has become a regular on German crime series Tatort playing investigator Sarah Brandt.
Roles
- Gegen die Wand (Head-On) (2004) as Sibel
- Kebab Connection (2004) as the Italian girl
- Winterreise (2006) as Leyla
- Fay Grim (2006) as the concierge
- Der letzte Zug (The Last Train) (2006) as Ruth Zilbermann
- Eve Dönüş (2006)
- Pihalla (2009)
- Die Fremde (When We Leave) (2009) as Umay
- The Inspector and the Sea (2010) as Ivonne Baumann
- Mordkommission Istanbul (2010) as Fatma Benli
- Tatort (2010-2017) as Sarah Brandt
- What a Man (2011) as Nele
- Game of Thrones (2011-2014) as Shae
- Bruder: Schwarze Macht (2017) as Sibel
- Bullets (2018) as Madina Taburova
Tropes
- The Danza: She shares her first name with the protagonists of Head-On and Bruder: Schwarze Macht.
- Non-Specifically Foreign: In the first season of Game of Thrones, her character Shae, who was a native Westerosi in the books, is only identified as "foreign" to account for her Mediterranean appearance and distinctly German accent. She is confirmed to be from the Free City of Lorath in the second season, likely because the only other Lorathi character in the series, Jaqen H'ghar, is played by fellow German actor Tom Wlaschiha.
- Typecasting: Although born and raised in Germany, she was often cast in foreign roles in her early career due to her Turkish family's background, which she was not very happy about. She has managed to break out of this typecasting in more recent years and now often plays characters of German origin.
- You Look Familiar: She had a guest appearance on Tatort before becoming a regular.
