‘Sinners’ producer makes history as first Armenian American immigrant nominated for best picture

The vampire epic Sinners made history in more ways than one this year with its Oscar nominations.

The film’s 16 total nominations broke the previous record of 14 set by All About Eve and later matched by Titanic and La La Land. It also marked the first time that an Armenian American immigrant — Sev Ohanian — was nominated for best picture.

Ohanian produced Sinners, along with writer/director/producer Ryan Coogler and producer Zinzi Coogler.

LAist News host Julia Paskin spoke with Ohanian about Sinners and how making funny YouTube videos about his Armenian parents helped kick off a creative partnership with his fellow USC film school classmate Ryan Coogler.

Below are highlights from the conversation and an extended version of the interview is available here.

On Sinners as ‘the final exam of filmmaking’

Ohanian says he describes Sinners as like “the final exam of filmmaking,” with some more common challenges and others that were more unique.

That included casting: “Ryan knew from the very beginning [that] he wanted to find almost like a young unknown talent who would be great at acting, great at singing, could play guitar, [...] someone who had a youthful face, but a voice that was far beyond his years, which, how do we even find that? Is that something that people put on their resumes?”

With the help of casting director Francine Maisler (also nominated for an Oscar in the Academy’s first year bestowing a casting award), they found newcomer Miles Caton.

Then there were challenges unique to shooting in the swamps of Louisiana. Ohanian says there were “I think 6,042 mosquitoes at any given day. There was that one time an alligator literally showed up on set. Thankfully, it was all taken care of. Everyone was safe.”

How the Armenian American community in LA helped him launch his film career

Growing up, Ohanian says he loved the idea of making a career in filmmaking but was daunted.

“I had this idea that to be a filmmaker, you’ve gotta have connections and resources and knowledge, things that will be passed down. But as an Armenian American immigrant,” Ohanian says, “those are not things that were part of my community.”

He put the idea of filmmaking as a career to the side, but after making some YouTube videos about his Armenian parents for fun, “they blew up. Armenians all around the world were sharing them. They were going viral. And I ended up writing a movie called My Big Fat Armenian Family,” inspired by My Big Fat Greek Wedding. 

He screened the movie at Glendale High School, got the word out to the Armenian American community, and people showed up and paid to see it.

"That experience, beyond the success of it on the financial level,” Ohanian says, “the fact that my community responded to something that I thought of, that I shot with my friends, it kind of made me realize that those things that I thought were necessary — connections and resources and knowledge — I had those this whole time in my community. That's what got me into USC where I started doing it for real.”