Simon Abkarian was born in Paris and moved to Beirut, Lebanon, at the age of nine. In Los Angeles, a Commedia dell’arte mask workshop led by Georges Bigot provided him with an introduction to the Théâtre du Soleil, where he found early acclaim in three unforgettable productions by Ariane Mnouchkine : L’histoire terrible mais inachevée de Norodom Sihanouk, roi du Cambodge and L’Indiade by Hélène Cixous, and Les Atrides by Euripides and Aeschylus. He went on to perform in productions directed by Paul Golub, Sylviu Purcarete, Laurent Pelly, Peter Brook, Antoine Campo, Simon Mc Burney and Cécile Garcia Vogel and won the Molière Award for Best Actor for his role in Irina Brook’s Une Bête sur la lune. He formed a core group of actors united by a commitment to research, creation and exchange and has directed productions including Peines d’Amour Perdues by Shakespeare (1998) at the Théâtre de l’Epée de Bois, L’Ultime Chant de Troie based on a work by Aeschylus, Euripide, Sénèque, Parouir Sevac (2000) at the MC93 in Bobigny, Titus Andronicus by Shakespeare at the Théâtre national de Chaillot (2003), Projet Mata Hari-Exécution by Jean Bescos at the Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord and the TNT de Toulouse (2010-2011).
In 2008, he wrote and directed “Pénélope ô Pénélope”, awarded the Syndicat de la critique’s prize for Best Play at the Théâtre National de Chaillot, which toured France, Beirut and Madrid. In 2013, he wrote and then directed Le Dernier jour du jeûne at the Théâtre du Gymnase in Marseille and the Théâtre Nanterre-Amandiers. He went on to write L’envol des cigognes, the concluding instalment of the Pénélope ô Pénélope – Le Dernier jour du jeûne trilogy, which premiered in 2017. He has acted in films directed by Cédric Klapish, Marie Vermillard, Michel Deville, Xavier Durringer, Atom Egoyan, Jonathan Demme, Robert Kechichian, Serge Lepéron, Frédérique Balekdjian, Sophie Marceau, Thomas Vincent, Ronit and Shlomi Elkabetz, Jean-Pierre Sinapi, Sally Potter, Robert Guédiguian, Martin Campbell, Eric Barbier, Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud, Karim Dridi, Philippe Haim, Jean-Michel Ribes, Hervé Hadmar and Gilles Banier.
In January 2025, Simon Abkarian will create Se reconnaîtront-ils? alongside Marie-Sophie Ferdane especially for the Théâtre Nanterre-Amandiers.