"Noor"

[Al-khiyal]

'Subversive' Turkish TV series shakes Arab world

BEIRUT, August 26, 2008 -- With his strawberry blond curls, blues eyes and engaging smile, Mohannad is setting the pulses of millions of Arab women racing in a television series critics claim is scandalising traditional Muslim values.

Despite being branded "subversive" and "anti-Islamic" by a top Saudi Muslim cleric, millions of viewers from Beirut to Algiers tune in up to three times a day to watch the Turkish-made soap opera, "Noor", dubbed into Arabic.

The series tells the story of Mohannad and his equally stunning wife Noor as they wrestle to reconcile the conflicting pressures of traditional and modern worlds.

"I love it because it is as glamorous as the foreign soap operas (American and Mexican) we sometimes watch," said Cairo resident Safaa Abdel Hadi, a self-confessed Noor addict.

"But at the same time the family in 'Noor' is Muslim and they have similar traditions and customs, so we relate to them much more," she added.

"They are a bit like us," said Lebanese Christian housewife Ibtissam Issa. "I really like their belief in tradition and their loyalty to the family."

Noor tells the story of a young mother who abandons her family home to start a new life with her baby and the story of another woman who becomes pregnant out of wedlock - issues frowned upon in the conservative Arab world.

"We must not fool ourselves into thinking that because they are Muslim they are like us. The show reflects Western culture and problems, not our own," said 34-year-old Nadia Abdel Rahman of Egypt.

In order to protect the sensibilities of conservative Arab and Muslim viewers, the production company, Sama, which provides the voice-over, has deleted intimate scenes considered to be "inappropriate".

Nevertheless Saudi Arabia's Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Aziz al-Sheikh, head of the country's highest religious authority, issued a fatwa against the series.

He branded it "subversive", "anti-Islamic" and decreed that any channel which broadcasts the series is "an enemy of God and his Prophet".

Ironically, the programme is aired by Saudi satellite channel MBC which last spring arranged a dinner banquet in Dubai in honour of the two main actors, prompting fans of the soap to go wild.

Producers Sama also won over a wider audience by using for the voice-overs everyday Arabic, rather than the more ceremonious classical version of the language.

A Syrian dialect, which appeals to viewers thanks to past popular television series, was used to dub Mohannad and Noor, known respectively in real life as Kivanc Tatlitug and Songul Oden.

Tatlitug has proved such a hit with female viewers that Arab television have carried reports of that a number of jealous husbands have filed for divorce from their wives.

Fatwa or not, "Noor-mania" is running riot.

From the souks of Tunis to the markets of east Jerusalem, T-shirts bearing pictures of the glamourous couple, Mohannad and Noor, are selling like hotcakes.

In the Israeli-occupied West Bank town of Nablus, several coffee shops have been renamed Noor and Mohannad in tribute to the soap's two lovebirds, who in the original Turkish show are called Gumus and Mehmet respectively.

"I sell more than 500 photos of the stars of 'Noor' each day, particularly ones of Mohannad. The girls are mad about him," said Hussein, a Syrian street vendor near Syria's Damascus University.

A travel agency in the northern Israeli town of Nazareth has even cashed in on the phenomenon by offering trips to Turkey, which include a visit to a mansion on the banks of the Bosphoros where the series is filmed.

"Noor" drew more viewers than the Beijing Olympics in Beirut, where cafe and restaurant owners have put up big television screens to ensure that their customers, and staff, can get their daily fix.

"Such series reflect how the lives of Arab people are torn between modern life and their traditions," said Lebanese sociologist Melhem Shaul, who specialises in the media.

"Somehow these shows help ease the anguish that grips us," Shaul added.

"Women who work but are oppressed by their husbands or male chauvinists who are forced to be on an equal footing with women, can identify with the characters."

For Suheir Farraj, a Palestinian film director, "Noor portrays young liberated Muslims, and viewers here seem to want to aspire to that, and that reality."

[Al-khiyal]

Un homme répudie sa femme, amoureuse d’un acteur turc

Samedi 30 Août 2008 -- Un Algérien a répudié sa femme qui avait exprimé le souhait de passer une nuit «même en rêve» avec le héros du feuilleton turc Nour, qui tient en haleine depuis trois mois les spectateurs algériens, rapporte le quotidien arabophone Ech-chourrouk. L'homme de 40 ans a répudié sa femme après l'avoir entendue exprimer son admiration envers Mohannad, héros de ce feuilleton doublé en arabe et diffusé par la chaîne satellitaire saoudienne MBC.

Selon le journal, la femme, qui vit dans la région de Sidi Bel Abbès, a confié au cours d'une conversation avec une voisine qu'elle "souhaitait passer une nuit avec l'acteur même en rêve car elle était amoureuse de lui et le considérait comme le chevalier de ses rêves". Une violente dispute s'en est suivie entre la femme et son mari jaloux qui a demandé immédiatement le divorce.

Le feuilleton Nour, qui raconte les péripéties d'un jeune couple turc tiraillé entre tradition et modernisme et dont le dernier épisode doit être diffusé samedi soir, a été à l'origine de plusieurs divorces en Algérie, selon le journal. L'acteur Kivanç Tatlitug, alias Mohannad - blond, yeux bleus, sourire ravageur - est devenu la coqueluche de nombreuses femmes algériennes qui cessent toute activité lors de la diffusion de la série à 19H30, l'heure du dîner.

[Al-khiyal]

Algerian spurns wife who dreams of affair with Turkish soap star

ALGIERS (AFP) — An Algerian man has spurned his wife for fantasising about an affair with the star of a Turkish soap opera which has riveted audiences here all summer, the Arab daily Ech-chourrouk reported Saturday.

The 40-year-old man reportedly demanded a divorce after his wife confided in a neighbour that she would like to have an affair "if only in her dreams" with Mohannad, hero of the soap "Nour."

The serial, which is dubbed into Arabic and broadcast by the Saudi satellite television MBC, has attracted a huge following, to the extent that Algerian women refuse to leave their television sets after it begins at dinner time, at 7:30 pm

According to the newspaper, the woman in the Sidi Bel Abbes region, 440 kilometres (260 miles) west of Algiers told her neighbour she would like to spend a night with the actor, even in her dreams, because she had fallen in love with him and considered him her ideal man.

Her disgruntled spouse found out and immediately demanded a divorce.

The Turkish soap opera, which has had Algerians on the edge of their seats, follows the ups and downs of a couple torn between traditional and modern values.

According to the paper, the television series has already caused several marriage breakdowns in Algeria.

The actor who plays Mohannad, 24-year-old blonde and blue-eyed Kivanc Tatlitug, has become the idol of Algerian women to the chagrin of their menfolk.

[Al-khiyal]

[gn4dz]

hadou houma mohannad et nour elli m'habline enass ....ça sera pour quand Al Halka al Akhira? dans 499 jours?

[Bent_Bladi]

dunno but they better stop it before ramadan... it's getting ridiculous... i thought when i got back to the states i'd be away from it but heck - people here are just as crazy as people there =S

[Bent_Bladi]

OMG!!! TODAY WAS THE LAST EPISODE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FINAL-FREAKIN-LY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

they're gonna have another turkish show during ramadan though... =/