Childhood and youth

Bayan Mukhitdenova was born on 9 January 1974, in the city of Uralsk in the family of sound engineer Maksat Zailagievich Mukhitdenov and actress Gulzhamal Aidarovna Mukhitdenova. He comes from the genus Mascar of the Bayuly tribe of the Junior zhuz. According to her, she "dreamed of becoming an artist since childhood," but her mother was against it and wanted her to become a teacher. Bayan entered the Pedagogical Institute, but after three years of study, in secret from her parents, she transferred to the Faculty of cinema

First fame and career in journalism

The first fame came in 1993, when the film "Station of Love" (kaz. Mahabbat beketi), where Mukhitdinova played the beloved of the main character.^[2] After the first success, a long period of oblivion followed. In 1994, at the age of 20 Bayan Mukhitdenova married Bakhytbek Yesentayev and took his surname.

After graduating from the Faculty of Television Journalism of KazGU, Alaguzova got a job as a news journalist and worked for 7 years until she opened her own television program "Yellow Salon" on the Tan TV channel.^[3] After the closure of the Tan channel, Alaguzova was the host of the program "On the Hairpin" on the NTK TV channel for two years.^[4]

Career as a producer

In 2006, Bayan Esentayeva became the producer of the KeshYou group. Other similar projects followed. Being a laureate of the competitions "Zhas Kanat" and "Voice of Asia", Bayan recorded two songs in 2008 — "ABC of Love" and "Shine". In addition, she was for some time the editor-in-chief of the magazines Collection and "Gashyktar Alemi". In 2010, Bayan Esentayeva's company Shine Production made the film "Cocktail for a Star", where she played one of the roles. In 2011, a sequel to this film was shot — "Cocktail for a star 2".^[5]

In 2013, Bayan Esentayeva played the main role in the film "Beware, cow!". In 2014, the Kazak Aruy project was launched, the Lashyn group appeared, its ward Zhanar Dugalova won the Turkvision Song Contest, the series Makhabbaty Zhүregіmde was released, together with Eric Tastambekov, the Cafe Central coffee shop was opened. At the end of 2014, she took the 21st place (30th place in 2013) in the list of "50 most influential women of Kazakhstan" according to the publication "Power".^[6]

At the end of 2015, Bayan Esentayeva announced her intentions to relocate her projects from Alma-Ata to Astana, where the Shine Hall creative center with a mini-theater, a children's creative center and a recording studio should open in September 2016.^[7]

In May 2016, it became known that Bayan Esentayeva will play one of the roles in the film directed by Askar Uzakbayev "Glamour for fools". Filming was supposed to begin on 26 May and last a month, and the premiere of the film is scheduled for autumn.^[8]

On 25 December 2017, the television series "Kozy Korpesh-Bayan Sulu" came out, the producer of which was Bayan Alaguzova, who was filmed in a picturesque place of the Almaty region – on the Assy plate of Enbekshikazakh district and in Almaty.^[9] An open letter was published on Qazaquni.kz, demanding to remove the television series "Kozy Korpesh – Bayan Sulu" from the national TV channel. Viewers did not like the inconsistencies in the film, as well as the fact that there was no casting for the role of the main character. The management of Qazaqstan TV channel was forced to make a promise not to repeat the series on the air.

On 7 March 2018, producer Bayan Alaguzova presented a film called "Sisitai", directed by Ernar Nurgaliyev. And Bayan played one of the main roles in it – the infamous producer Alice Maksutovna.^[10]

Incident with her husband

On 10 June 2016, Yesentayeva, along with her husband Bakhytbek Yesentayev and his nephew, left Almaty by car. During the trip, Yesentayeva's husband, who was intoxicated, began beating his wife. On the way, Bakhytbek Yesentayev dropped off his nephew, who was driving a car, at one of the gas stations and continued to beat Bayan, stabbed her four times.^[11] Esentayeva's daughter, who arrived at the scene, managed to stop her father and took her to the Talgar district hospital with a closed craniocerebral injury, paraorbital hematoma, penetrating knife wound of the abdominal cavity with through injuries of the large and small intestines, retroperitoneal space.^[12] According to the lawyer Bakhytbek Yesentayev, the conflict occurred on the grounds of jealousy, the husband intended to keep Yesentayeva in the family in this way. A year before the incident, Bayan Esentayeva described her husband as a loving but very jealous man, and called the first ten years of marriage "war".

After the detention of Bakhytbek Yesentayev, the judge appointed him a preventive measure in the form of detention for 2 months (until 10 August), a pre—trial investigation was launched against him under Article 106 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan — "Intentional infliction of serious harm to health", then the case of Yesentayev was reclassified to Article 99, part 1 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan – "Attempted murder."^[13] The case was transferred to the specialized criminal court of the Almaty region. The trial took place in the city of Kaskelen in a closed mode.^[14]

4 months after the incident, Bayan Esentayeva, through her representative in court, announced that she had forgiven her husband. She asked to mitigate his punishment and not to deprive Bakhytbek Yesentayev of his freedom.^[15] Despite this, on 3 November 2016, the specialized interdistrict Criminal Court of the Almaty region sentenced Esentayeva's husband to 9 years in a high-security colony under Article 99 of Part 1 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan "Attempted murder".^[16] According to the other two articles — "Violent acts of a sexual nature" and "Rape", Bakhytbek Yesentayev was acquitted, since the sperm sample taken from the victim Yesentayeva according to the results of molecular genetic examination belonged to another man. The verdict was announced behind closed doors, Bayan Esentayeva herself was not present at the trial. On 12 July 2022, the Kapshagai City Court granted Bakhytbek Yesentayev's request for parole.^[17]

Second marriage

On 22 January 2017, Bayan Yesentayeva announced that she had "accepted a marriage proposal" from a well-known businessman Tursengali Alaguzov (kaz. Tursyngali Alagozov).Earlier, the Kazakh press had already published rumors about the love relationship between Esentayeva and Alaguzov.^[18]

On 7 December 2017, Bayan Yesentayeva and Tursungali Alaguzov registered their marriage.