Atom Egoyan

Atom Egoyan
Egoyan at the Third Golden Apricot Film Festival, February 11, 2007
Born	Atom Yeghoyan (1960-07-19) July 19, 1960 (age 56) Cairo, Egypt
Alma mater	University of Toronto
Occupation	film director, stage director, screenwriter, producer & actor
Years active	1984–present
Spouse(s)	Arsinée Khanjian
Children	1
Website	http://www.egofilmarts.com/

Atom Egoyan, CC (born July 19, 1960) is a Canadian director (of stage and film), writer, producer and former actor. Egoyan made his career breakthrough with Exotica (1994), a film set primarily in and around the fictional Exotica strip club. Egoyan's most critically acclaimed film is the drama The Sweet Hereafter (1997), for which he received two Academy Award nominations, and his biggest commercial success is the erotic thriller Chloe (2009).

His work often explores themes of alienation and isolation, featuring characters whose interactions are mediated through technology, bureaucracy or other power structures. Egoyan's films often follow non-linear plot structures, in which events are placed out of sequence in order to elicit specific emotional reactions from the audience by withholding key information.

In 2008, Egoyan received the Dan David Prize for "Creative Rendering of the Past". Egoyan later received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award, Canada's highest royal honour in the performing arts, in 2015.

Egoyan was born Atom Yeghoyan (Western Armenian: Աթոմ Եղոյեան) in Cairo, Egypt, the son of Shushan (née Devletian) and Joseph Yeghoyan, artists who operated a furniture store. His parents were Armenian-Egyptians, and he was named Atom to mark the completion of Egypt's first nuclear reactor. In 1962, however, his parents left Egypt for Canada, where they settled in Victoria, British Columbia and changed their last name to Egoyan. Atom and his sister, Eve, now a concert pianist based in Toronto, were raised by their parents in British Columbia.