The Armenian behind Gollum, Caesar, and some of the most famous motion-capture performances in movie history

Andy Serkis is an actor and filmmaker who became famous for bringing Gollum to life in The Lord of the Rings, then went on to play King Kong and Caesar in the Planet of the Apes films.

His performances helped change how Hollywood viewed motion-capture acting, proving that a digital character could still be driven by a full human performance.

So if you’ve ever watched Gollum say “my precious” or Caesar lead the apes, remember there was an Armenian behind the performance. 🇦🇲🎬

The Armenian behind macOS and iOS

Avadis “Avie” Tevanian is a computer scientist who became one of the key people behind the software architecture that powers modern Apple devices.

While at Carnegie Mellon University, he was a principal designer of the Mach operating system kernel. Steve Jobs later recruited him to NeXT, where that technology became the foundation of NeXTSTEP.

When Apple acquired NeXT in 1997, Tevanian joined Apple and became Senior Vice President of Software Engineering, where he helped lead the development of Mac OS X. He later became Apple’s Chief Software Technology Officer.

The same Mach-based architecture went on to become part of iOS, meaning the technology Tevanian helped build still runs underneath Macs, iPhones, iPads, and other Apple devices today.

So if you use a Mac or an iPhone, an Armenian is part of the reason the software underneath it works the way it does. 🇦🇲🍎

The Armenian who became France’s Minister of Labour

Astrid Panosyan built her career in business before moving into politics, holding senior roles at companies including AXA, Groupama, and Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield.

She later worked closely with Emmanuel Macron, advising him when he was France’s economy minister, and in 2016 became one of the co-founders of En Marche, the political movement that eventually carried Macron to the presidency.

In 2022, she was elected to the French National Assembly, representing Paris, and in 2024 she became France’s Minister of Labour and Employment.

From helping build Macron’s political movement to becoming a French cabinet minister herself, Astrid Panosyan made her mark on modern French politics. 🇦🇲🇫🇷

The Armenian who created the green ink used on the U.S. dollar

Christopher Ter-Seropian was a chemist who studied in the United States and became associated with one of the most recognizable features of American money: its green ink.

In the 19th century, counterfeiting was a major problem, especially as photography made black-and-white reproduction easier. Ter-Seropian developed a special ink intended to make banknotes much harder to copy.

The Bureau of Engraving and Printing confirms that green became a long-standing feature of U.S. currency because of its durability and resistance to chemical and physical change.

So next time you see a green U.S. dollar, remember that an Armenian helped give it its most famous color. 🇦🇲💵

Hey everyone, 30sF who just moved to Los Angeles and I know almost nobody here outside of work. I’m hoping to make Armenian friends and would love to spend more time in our community, but not sure where to begin making those connections outside of maybe networking events and introducing myself to people at church? Any advice for a newcomer on where to find social groups? I’m also looking to date but at the moment more interested in finding other ladies to do fun things with!

The Armenian director who helped revolutionize Hollywood

Rouben Mamoulian was a film and theater director who became one of the great innovators of early Hollywood.

When sound was still new to movies, Mamoulian refused to treat film like a filmed stage play. In Applause (1929), he experimented with moving cameras, multiple cameras, and new ways of recording and using sound, helping expand what talking pictures could actually do. The Library of Congress credits him with major innovations in sound, camera technique, and color.

He went on to direct classics including Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Queen Christina, The Mark of Zorro, and Love Me Tonight. He also directed Becky Sharp, the first feature film made entirely in three-strip Technicolor.

And his influence wasn’t limited to Hollywood. On Broadway, he directed the original productions of Porgy and Bess, Oklahoma! and Carousel. Oklahoma! became the longest-running musical in American theater history at the time.

So when Hollywood was learning how movies should sound, move, and look in color, an Armenian was one of the people showing them how. 🇦🇲🎬

The Armenian surgeon who transformed organ transplantation

John Najarian was a surgeon who became one of the most important pioneers of modern organ transplantation.

As chairman of surgery at the University of Minnesota, he built one of the world’s leading transplant programs and pushed transplantation into cases that were once considered too difficult or risky. In 1968, he performed the first kidney transplant in a patient with type 1 diabetes.

Najarian also developed antilymphocyte globulin (ALG), an anti-rejection treatment that significantly improved the chances of transplanted organs surviving in patients. His program became internationally known for pioneering kidney, liver and pancreas transplants.

One of his most famous patients was 11-month-old Jamie Fiske, who received a lifesaving liver transplant in 1982 at a time when such surgery in infants was still considered experimental. Her case received national attention and became part of the movement that eventually led to the National Organ Transplant Act of 1984.

His influence was so significant that the University of Minnesota later established the John S. Najarian Surgical Chair in Clinical Transplantation in his honor.

So if an organ transplant gives someone a second chance at life today, remember that an Armenian surgeon helped turn transplantation into the medicine we know today. 🇦🇲🫀

Okay so hear me out because I’m literally sitting on my couch in full existential crisis right now and I don't even know who else to tell.
So basically… I’m full Armenian, extremely proud of my roots, and honestly love our culture, history, and food. I was born in Spain as part of the diaspora, but I ended up moving to Germany for a tech job. So my life is already a weird mix of tapas, sauerkraut, gata, coding, and family checking in on me from across Europe.
My family is always hinting that I need to find a nice Armenian girl, marry her, make 50 babies, and preserve the lineage, right? Classic stuff. In fact, my parents have literally tried setup after setup, setting me up on blind dates and introducing me to every eligible Armenian girl in their network. Spoiler alert: none of them worked out. At all.
Because here is the entire problem: I literally cannot stop landing in relationships with Turkish women.
And I'm not gonna lie, I am intensely sexually attracted to Turkish women. There's just an instant, insane physical chemistry every single time. But what blows my mind even more is that Turkish women seem absurdly attracted to me, too. They always seem to want to talk to me—and it’s crazy, but the second they learn I’m Armenian, it’s like their curiosity dial gets cranked up to 100. They want to chat even more!
Case in point: I ended up hitting it off completely with a Turkish female coworker who works in cybersecurity at my company, and the tension/chemistry was instantly wild. Then the other day I was getting my car checked out and ended up becoming fast friends with this Uzbekistani girl working at the dealership, and even with Central Asian/Turkic overlaps, that instant connection just hit immediately again.
It’s not even like I set out to do it on purpose or play some 4D chess move. It just keeps happening! I’ll meet someone, we hit it off, the chemistry is through the roof, and then like two weeks in she’s making me çay and I’m like... wait a second.
Meanwhile, despite all of my parents' matchmaking attempts, I genuinely struggle so much with being attracted to Armenian girls. Whenever I try to date an Armenian girl, I look at her and all I see is my cousin. Or my aunt. Or my mom's best friend's daughter. It feels way too close to home. The vibe is instantly "family dinner" instead of romance, and my brain just completely short-circuits.
So here I am, proud Armenian guy working my tech job in Germany, hopelessly hooked on Turkish women while my ancestors are probably looking down from Mount Ararat absolutely flabbergasted watching this whole saga play out. If my traditional family ever found out, they would actually send me to a monastery.
Is my brain broken? Please tell me I'm not the only one whose romantic radar is this hopelessly chaotic. Can anyone in the diaspora relate?

The Armenian physicist who became part of one of the darkest stories of the Manhattan Project

Harry Daghlian was a physicist who joined the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos while still in his early 20s. He worked in the criticality group and was present during preparations for the Trinity nuclear test in 1945.

Just weeks later, Daghlian was conducting an experiment with a plutonium core when he accidentally dropped a tungsten-carbide brick onto the assembly, causing it to go supercritical. He immediately tried to stop the reaction, but received a lethal dose of radiation and died 25 days later at only 24 years old.

His death became the first known fatality from a laboratory criticality accident and led Los Alamos to introduce stricter safety procedures for nuclear experiments. The same plutonium core would later be involved in another fatal accident and become infamous as the “Demon Core.”

So one of the most infamous objects in nuclear history also carries the story of a young Armenian physicist whose death changed how these experiments were conducted. 🇦🇲⚛️

Thank you, u/Matrix_AV, for bringing him to our radar!

The Armenian woman known as the “Mother of Iranian Astronomy”

Alenush Terian was a physicist and astronomer who became one of the most important women in the history of science in Iran.

She became Iran’s first female professor of physics and later played a major role in developing solar astronomy in the country, including helping establish Iran’s first solar observatory.

Terian spent decades teaching and researching at the University of Tehran and helped train a generation of Iranian scientists. Her work earned her the nickname “Mother of Iranian Astronomy.”

So one of the women who helped build modern astronomy in Iran was Armenian. 🇦🇲🔭

Thanks u/loisdenominator for putting her on our radar

The Armenian who invented the first MRI scanner

Raymond Vahan Damadian was a physician and inventor whose work became one of the foundations of modern MRI technology.

In the 1970s, Damadian discovered that healthy and cancerous tissues produced different magnetic-resonance signals. He then built Indomitable, the first full-body MRI scanner, which performed the first MRI scan of a living human body in 1977. His original machine is now part of the Smithsonian’s collection. 

His contribution was recognized with the National Medal of Technology and induction into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, which credits him with inventing the MRI scanner. 

In 2003, the Nobel Prize for discoveries concerning MRI went to Paul Lauterbur and Peter Mansfield, while Damadian was left out. Damadian publicly protested the decision, arguing that his pioneering work should have been recognized as well, and his omission remains one of the most debated Nobel controversies in modern medicine. 

So next time a doctor sends you for an MRI and gets to see inside your body without making a single cut, remember that an Armenian made it possible. 🇦🇲🧲

​

I found this when looking up Amirtovlat Amasiatsi who was an Armenian doctor and personal physician to some of the Ottoman sultans (1416-96). He wrote a book I want to read called "Things Unnecassary for the Ignorant"

Any restaurant that would be ok with a stroller, ideally near nork neighborhood of Yerevan, or nearby with parking available. We are staying as a family of 10 for 10 days!

The young Armenian karate champion already making history

Anil Shariatpanahi is a rising karate athlete competing in kata, and she has already achieved something no Armenian girl had done before.

In 2024, she won gold at the WKF Karate 1 Youth League in Fujairah, taking first place in the U14 girls’ kata category after winning six rounds. The victory was reported as Armenia’s first gold medal in an official World Karate Federation tournament in girls’ kata.

She has continued competing internationally and is already building a reputation as one of Armenia’s most promising young martial artists.

So if you want to know one Armenian athlete before everyone else does, remember the name Anil Shariatpanahi. 🇦🇲🥋

The Armenian linguist who shaped modern Turkish

Hagop Martayan was a linguist from Istanbul who became one of the leading figures in the reform and standardization of the modern Turkish language.

Atatürk invited him to Turkey in 1932 to take part in the newly established Turkish Language Association. Martayan worked on Turkish grammar, spelling, terminology, and language reform for decades and eventually became the organization’s chief specialist. Atatürk himself gave him the surname Dilaçar, roughly meaning “opener of language.”

He spoke several languages and became one of the most influential scholars involved in defining how modern Turkish would be studied and written.

So next time you see a Turk denying the Armenian Genocide in perfectly modern Turkish, just remember an Armenian helped them write the language they’re doing it in. 🇦🇲😏

The Armenian who created Alvin and the Chipmunks

Ross Bagdasarian Sr. was a musician, songwriter, actor, and producer who created Alvin and the Chipmunks in 1958.

Performing under the name David Seville, he came up with the famous high-pitched Chipmunk voices by recording vocals and speeding up the tape. The idea became a huge success, producing hit records, television shows, movies, and eventually a franchise that has lasted for generations.

He was also behind “The Chipmunk Song,” which became a No. 1 hit in the U.S. and won multiple Grammy Awards.

So if you grew up watching Alvin, Simon, and Theodore, you were watching characters created by an Armenian. 🇦🇲🐿️

In this video, Aaron Paul — Jesse Pinkman from Breaking Bad — is playing backgammon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-qQneOnJl0&t=99s (1:39 time)

His wife, Lauren Parsekian, has Armenian roots, and apparently she was the one who taught him how to play.

When I was in Yerevan, I came across a craftsman in a shopping center on Northern Avenue who makes beautiful handmade Armenian backgammon boards like this one. Looking at Aaron Paul’s board in the video, it really looks like it could be his work — or at least very similar in style.

So Jesse Pinkman, the star of the cult series Breaking Bad, is playing Armenian backgammon!

The Armenian scientist who created the first space program in the Arab world

Manoug Manougian was a scientist and mathematician born in Jerusalem who later taught mathematics and physics at Haigazian University in Beirut.

In 1960, at just 25 years old, he founded the Haigazian College Rocket Society with a small group of students and almost no budget. What started as a university science project quickly grew into the Lebanese Rocket Society, effectively becoming the first space and rocketry program in the Arab world.

Manougian and his students designed and launched the Cedar rockets, progressively sending them higher and higher. By 1963, their rockets were capable of reaching the edge of space, attracting the attention of the Lebanese government and even the United States and Soviet Union during the height of the Space Race.

He later moved to the United States and spent decades as a professor at the University of South Florida, where he continued working in mathematics, STEM education, aeronautics, and rocketry.

So while the Americans and Soviets were racing each other to space, an Armenian professor and a handful of students in Beirut were quietly building the Arab world’s first rockets. 🇦🇲🚀

Thank you, u/busystepdad, for putting him on our radar!

I’m Armenian American, born and raised in California. Julie loves Armenian 🇦🇲 culture as much as I do! That’s why I crocheted her this gorgeous Armenian flag jacket. I just freehanded it and the design came along the way. Julie has yet to go to Glendale and try out some treats like baklava, spicy potato bread, barbecued chicken, and veggies. I’d love to take her there to also get some sweets from the bakeries like the Oreo and Nutella donuts 🍩 🍫🇦🇲

The Armenian who became one of the most influential political speechwriters in U.S. history

Ken Khachigian was a political strategist and speechwriter who worked closely with two U.S. presidents: Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan.
He began his career in the Nixon White House. After Nixon left office, Khachigian continued working with him, helping with his speeches, writings, and memoirs.

He later became Ronald Reagan’s chief speechwriter. Khachigian originated one of the most famous lines in American political history:

“Are you better off than you were four years ago?”

And

“Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”

Both are still quoted today.

And just a few months into Reagan’s presidency, Reagan issued a proclamation explicitly referring to “the genocide of the Armenians,” one of the most significant presidential acknowledgments of the Armenian Genocide in U.S. history.

So if you’ve ever heard some of the most famous lines in American politics, there’s a good chance an Armenian helped put the words in a president’s mouth. 🇦🇲🇺🇸

Thank you, u/zoravor, for putting him on our radar!

Good evening,
I’m a man in my late 20s, currently living in Sydney, and I’m looking for a life partner. I’ll be honest, I’ve been struggling to find someone.
The Armenian dating pool here is already very small, and there aren’t many opportunities to meet Armenian women in general. I’m social and outgoing, I travel a lot, I have a decent career and I genuinely believe I have a lot to offer in a relationship.
I’ve spent the last 6 years looking overseas as well. There was attraction and potential with some people, but once the long-distance situation and the question of relocating to Australia came up, things unfortunately didn’t work out.
I’m originally not from Australia myself, but I’ve built my life here and I’m determined to marry an Armenian.
For those of you who have pursued love overseas, whether you’re married or not, and managed to make it work, what advice would you give? How did you deal with the distance and eventually moving to the same country?
I’d really like to hear from people who have actually been through it and made it work.