In 1955, Dzhigarkhanyan was admitted to the Sundukyan State Academic Theatre. He studied in director Armen Gulakyan's (hy, ru) class until 1958. Beginning in his first year at the Sundukyan Theatre, he started acting at the Stanislavski Russian Theatre of Yerevan. He remained there for over 10 years, until 1967. At Armenia's only Russian theater, he played around 30 roles, most notably as Vanya Kudryash in "The Storm" by Alexander Ostrovsky, Sergey in "An Irkutsk Story" by Aleksei Arbuzov, Actor in "The Lower Depths" by Maxim Gorky. "From the beginning of his stage career, Dzhigarkhanyan has demonstrated an awesome versatility, succeeding in a wide variety of roles in the classical and contemporary repertory, including Shakespeare, Tennessee Williams, and modern Russian authors.