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Arian Moayed is an Iranian-American actor, screenwriter, and director. Moayed received two Tony Award nominations for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his performances as an Iraqi gardener in Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo (2011) and a domineering husband A Doll's House (2023), and two Primetime Emmy Award nominations for his role as slimy private equity investor Stewy Hosseini in HBO's Succession.


Arian Moayed was born in Tehran, Iran. His father is a banker by profession. His parents emigrated from Iran in 1986. The family settled in Glenview, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, when Moayed was five years old. 

“For anyone to say, ‘This is how Iranians should be and do — that’s insanity,” Arian says. “I don’t want to tell you how to live in Kansas City. Like, I’m not going to tell Kansas City what barbecue is about.”

The Iranians in the cast of Waterwall's Hamlet have been joking, “Hamlet is so Iranian.” It’s true for us," says Arian. In that first moment when Hamlet comes to talk to Claudius and Gertrude, he’s fully intending to back to Wittenberg. But after they speak to him and beg him not to go, he says to her, “I shall in all my best obey you, madam.” That idea is very Iranian. It’s a form of politeness. We call it taarof; it’s a way of respecting your elders and doing what they ask even though it’s not what you want. You always have to give way. There are many moments like that in this play where you as a Westerner may see them one way, but Iranians look at them and go, “Oh shit, that’s Iranian.”

Another thing: You have to respect your mother. Trust me, no matter what you may have heard, the Iranian woman is the ruler of the household. If my mom said to me, “I need you to go pick up my laundry on 199th and Lex,” I would go and do it right now. Culturally we don’t know anything else. Bridging the gap between Western and Eastern, where both sides can see themselves—that to me is the greatest success.

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