Actor Branko Knezevic Dies at 75, Funeral Tuesday

Actor and director Branko Knezevic died on Sunday, September 27, 2026, at age 75, after a short illness. The news was reported by b92.net and the portal gminfo.rs, both of which said he died that morning.

Knezevic was one of the best known names on Gornji Milanovac’s cultural scene. He was born in the town in 1952, where he finished high school before going on to study architecture in Belgrade. Before turning to theater, he sang in the choir of Radio Television Serbia and in the “Branko Krsmanovic” choir, later renamed “Obilic”.

Career at Milanovacki Teatar

As a film and stage actor, he appeared in the 2003 film “Profesionalac” (The Professional) and in the play “Dr Suster”, directed by Dusan Kovacevic. In 2006 he took over as president of the Artistic Council of Milanovacki Teatar. He went on to stage more than 20 productions there, drawing on works by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, Dusan Kovacevic, Moliere (Jean Baptiste Poquelin) and Slawomir Mrozek. For years he was also one of the key figures behind organizing and selecting the program for the international theater festival “Takovske Cveti”.

For his role as Luka Laban in “Profesionalac”, he received the national honor “Milivojev stap i sesir” (Milivoje’s Staff and Hat) in 2019, at an acting ceremony in Pozarevac. His biography also includes the world’s most prestigious theater award, the “Golden Nika”.

In July 2022 he was named best actor at “Bosphorus Agones”, a festival of ancient art held in Crimea since 1826. He won the honor for his roles as Svetlovidov and Socrates in “Swan Song, Socrates’ Defense and Death,” a play built from the combined texts of Chekhov and Plato. That made him the only actor from southeastern Europe ever to win the award.

Knezevic also tried his hand at writing. He published his first book, “Hronika od crvenog sedefa i druge price” (Chronicle of Red Mother of Pearl and Other Stories), in 2019, followed by a second, “Hronika jednog tumaranja” (Chronicle of a Wandering), this year. Both were published by “Grafoprint” of Gornji Milanovac.

Alongside his work as director and actor, he spent decades as the dramaturge of Milanovacki Teatar. It was “Swan Song, Socrates’ Defense and Death,” combining texts by Chekhov and Plato, that brought the town beneath Rudnik mountain an international honor few provincial theaters in Serbia can claim, since the “Bosphorus Agones” award had never before gone to an actor from southeastern Europe.

Memorial service and funeral on Tuesday

A memorial for Branko Knezevic is scheduled for Tuesday, September 29, at 10:30 a.m., at Milanovacki Teatar, the theater to which he devoted much of his career. The funeral will follow the same day at 1 p.m., at the Gornji Milanovac city cemetery.