Nik Xhelilaj

Kreshnik Xhelilaj (born 5 March 1983) known professionally as Nik Xhelilaj, is an Albanian actor. He began his international career with the movie The Sorrow of Mrs. Schneider, directed by Piro Milkani and Eno Milkani and was the leading actor in three critically acclaimed Albanian films, of which two entered in the List of Albanian submissions for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 2008 and 2009. Nik has collected several "Best Actor" Awards in various international film festivals. Biography Nik Xhelilaj was born in Tirana, on 5 March 1985 in a family originally from south Albania, his father was born in Vlorë and his mother was born in Tepelenë. Both of his parents are high military officers by profession. Thus, at the age of 14, also thanks to his father's interest, he went to Istanbul to follow the military high-school. But his new path did not last more than 7 months and he decided to give up on the pursuit of the military career and to come back to Albania. Eventually he engaged with other young artists into the "Sirea Film" projects, with movie directors Leonard Bombaj and Alfred Trebicka, who advised him to compete and sign up for the Fine Arts Academy. Firstly Nik was a candidate for the Faculty of Law, where he did not win.