Tahir Nikšić

Tahir Nikšić was born in Mostar, in what was then the People's Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina within Yugoslavia, on 12 June 1950. He completed primary school in Mostar, then a vocational school for apprentices (Škola učenika u privredi), and retrained at the city's Electro-Mechanical School Centre. He went to work at the Soko factory in Mostar.

Alongside his factory job he discovered the stage. In 1969 and 1970 he attended the internal drama studio of the National Theatre Mostar. The Mostar Theatre Festival later honoured him as the first actor to perform in a production of the Mostar Youth Theatre (Mostarski teatar mladih) in the mid-1970s.

After the Mostar drama studio, Nikšić moved to Sarajevo to study acting. He was part of the first generation of students in the acting group of the Department of Literature, Performing Arts and Librarianship at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Sarajevo, and graduated in 1976. (English Wikipedia gives 1975; the National Theatre Sarajevo and Bosnian press give 1976.)

Nikšić joined the drama company of the National Theatre Sarajevo (NPS) in 1974, while still a student, and stayed with it for the rest of his working life. Over five decades he played a very large number of roles, including Alyosha in "Braća Karamazovi" (The Brothers Karamazov), Karl the fool in "Vojcek" (Woyzeck), Filip Trnavac in "Putujuće pozorište Šopalović", Ahmet Šabo in "Tvrđava" (The Fortress), Himzo in "U Zvorniku ja sam ostavio svoje srce" and Kumek Šestinar in Krleža's "Kraljevo". Other productions remembered by the theatre include "Bjesnilo", "Duplo dno", "Omer-paša Latas", "Revizor", "Majka", "Kidaj od svoje žene", "Prvi put s ocem na izbore", "Cokule", "Memoari Mine Hauzen", "Put oko svijeta", "Višnjik", "Princip G", "Nastojnik", "Dama s kamelijama", "Ajax", "Derviš i smrt", "Dantonova smrt", "Orlando Furioso" and "Nathan mudri".

In 1987 he played Laertes in Slobodan Šnajder's "Gamlet", directed by Sulejman Kupusović. The NPS production was shown that year at Sterijino pozorje, the leading Yugoslav theatre festival.

During the war and the siege of Sarajevo he served as artistic director of the NPS Drama company from 1993 to 1995, and from 20 December 1994 to 31 July 1995 he was acting general manager of the theatre.

On television Nikšić appeared in TV Sarajevo's "Teversenove bajke" and in the series "Porobdžije", "Tale", "Kože", "Misija majora Atertona", "Priče iz fabrike" and "Sarajevske priče". In 1995 he acted, alongside his daughter Narda, in "Svjetlosti Bajrama", a TV BiH drama made in besieged Sarajevo and described in archive uploads as the first Bosnian and Herzegovinian television drama.

His films include "Svi moji prijatelji", "Izvor", "Dani AVNOJ-a", "Provincija u pozadini", the 1988 television film "Inat" directed by Faruk Sokolović, and "Krivda". He is best known to younger audiences as the prisoner Vlado in Dino Mustafić's "Remake" (2003) and as the uncle Osman in Srđan Vuletić's "Ljeto u zlatnoj dolini" (Summer in the Golden Valley, 2003).

He also worked widely in radio, in poetry programmes, dramatisations of novels and many radio plays.

From 2002, at the invitation of the Faculty of Humanities of Džemal Bijedić University in Mostar, Nikšić taught in the faculty's new acting department and guided its first two generations of students to graduation. Colleagues remembered him as someone who held out a hand to young actors: Mediha Musliović recalled that he welcomed her when she first entered the theatre as a student.

Nikšić had a daughter, Narda Nikšić, who appeared with him in the 1995 television drama "Svjetlosti Bajrama". His granddaughter Ema and son-in-law Hamdija Salihbegović attended his commemoration with Narda. Details of a spouse have not been made public. Colleagues described him as gentle, supportive and quiet, "the quiet soul of the theatre", as Federal Television put it.

At the 48th Mostar Theatre Festival (Festival autorske poetike) he received the "Svjetlost Mostara" (Light of Mostar) award, recognising him as the first actor to perform in a Mostar Youth Theatre production in the mid-1970s. In 2022, during the centenary of the National Theatre Sarajevo, he was among the distinguished members of the Drama company presented with a plaque. The NPS said he received many further recognitions and awards for his contribution to theatre.

Nikšić belonged to the generation of actors that shaped several decades of Bosnian and Herzegovinian theatre. He was among the first graduates of Sarajevo's university acting programme, a constant presence on the NPS stage for over fifty years, a leader of the theatre during the siege, and a teacher who helped found a new generation of actors in his native Mostar. Director of the Drama Riad Ljutović called him a recognisable face of the theatre and, above all, a human role model and dear friend to the end.

Tahir Nikšić died on 4 September 2026, aged 76; the National Theatre Sarajevo announced his death that day. The cause of death was not made public. Some outlets (Klix.ba, Blic) described him as in his 77th year. A commemoration took place on the stage of the National Theatre Sarajevo at 11:00 on Monday 7 September 2026, with speeches by Mediha Musliović, Miki Trifunov, Minka Muftić and Riad Ljutović. His dženaza (Islamic funeral prayer) was held at the Ravne Bakije cemetery in Sarajevo, according to Federal Television.