Dar is actually a half Iranian/half American white boy created in Tehran. He’s moved more than eighty times. He escaped the Iranian Revolution with, basically, taking along only the clothes he was wearing. He also found himself in an insane cult.
And through each and every crazy matter whatever has happened, against outrageous odds, he has become successful in daily life & in Hollywood, for nearly thirty years. This he calls is ‘The Art of Being Dar’.
He’s guest-starred on NCIS: Los Angeles, Scandal, This’s Us, Criminal Minds, Mistresses, Supergirl, Bosch, Silicon Valley, Trust many, Adman, and so much more. He’s now starring in the award-winning pilot for the tv series, Actions and words.
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Here’s Some of Our Conversation with Dar Dixon
So, Dar I personally do know your story, your humble beginnings and all that you went through as a child. And I obviously realize that it helped you prepare for a better life. In fact, I found your personal story so inspiring that I would like you to first tell the audience all about it from the beginning.
Dar Dixon: Wow that’s a mouthful how about I make that like a little thumbnail… So, I’m half Iranian, I’m half American. I was born in Tehran so; Farsi is my first language. Iranian music my first music, Iranian food, Iranian art…sound, smells, taste, touch the…whole thing.
I came to the United States when I was about two years old, we moved in my family like… turned out looking back probably every two and a half or three years which is a lot!
And I sat down one night and it was one of those nights I couldn’t sleep and my mind started going how many times did I move and I counted. While I was in my family mom dad my brothers and I that it was around 30 or 40 times. And then on my own after that, it was over that so I’ve moved over 80 times.
Woah! That’s truly astonishing… so, how did the U.S treat you?
Dar Dixon: I’ve got three brothers, I’m the oldest all three of my brothers are gay men so we’ve got these white boy faces but these very Iranian names, right? Like Dar Dixon, my first name is Daryush, my last name is Bijarci.
So, I’d go to a new school and I’m let’s say five six seven eight nine whatever years old and they go Duh… Dooh… Duriji. They were like what kind of a name is that? You’re weird… my brothers would get all that but then since they were gay they would get even more bullying and stuff like that.
So, I always had to take care of that which means even though, I’m not a fighter but my father would tell me I had to go up use my fists and stuff so I fought way more than I wanted to because my brothers would get bullied.
We went back to Iran just before I became a teenager when I was 12. My dad had gotten a great job with the Iranian government and we were going to just live there forever.
It was great everything was wonderful until it wasn’t, when it wasn’t most people won’t remember this but as I say I’m probably a little bit older the Iranian revolution happened in 1977.
It came to a full head in 1979 when the students overtook the U.S embassy and they took the Americans in the embassy hostage and since then America and Iran are not on such good terms.
So, that made my life in this country really complicated, when I came back, we had to escape the revolution… it was a whole thing, right.
That must have been a spine-chilling experience with great uncertainties? How did you cope up with those times?
Dar Dixon: I’ll tell you the last nutshell of that, escaping the revolution I hope no one ever goes through anything like that in life ever… it was really horrible, we were really lucky we got out alive but we didn’t have a single penny to our name, just the clothes on our backs, and it took my father another year or so before he was able to escape.
And I thought every day I was a teenage boy you know…you can’t talk when you’re 15. You don’t know how to form your thoughts and feelings as a man in this world, it’s certainly not encouraged to talk about your feelings.
Of course, especially when you’re like my dad’s going to get killed and so that left a little bit of a mark and I was 15 when that happened. I graduated high school, went to college for about a year but I just couldn’t really focus on anything and so I stopped going to school.
I got caught up in this pseudo-religious doomsday cult and that took about 20 years of my life. But I’m here I worked my way out of that brainwashing, that situation… easily the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.
The thing that really kind of helped me through that… one of the main things for me is my art. Which is acting and writing, performing, producing so I just dove into my career and I kind of put it on hold I didn’t get started in this business until I was 28 years old which is incredible…. it’s been a lifesaver and a game-changer to me and here I am it’s almost 26 years later.
These days Dar is operating behind the scenes to produce his personal podcast, titled “The Art of Being Dar‘. He shared the creative process of performance art in his style; his learnings from the film and television industry, businesses, advertising, sales, as well as the lessons he’s learnt in life.
With many years of expertise in Hollywood as a Producer, Director, Writer, and Actor. Having over 300 credits under the belt, IMDb mentions 46 though, his resonant, rich, and deep voice has graced the TV screen on several of probably the hottest shows.
Check out Dar’s incredible life story, in the interview above… we talked about some really serious topics, but the man’s got an insane sense of humour, you’ll love it!