Vakhtangov was born to an Armenian[2] father and a Russian mother in Vladikavkaz, Terek Oblast (now the capital of Northern Ossetia).

Vakhtangov was greatly influenced both by the theatrical experiments of Vsevolod Meyerhold and the more psychological techniques of his teachers, Konstantin Stanislavski and Leopold Sulerzhitsky, and the co-founder of the MAT Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko.

His productions incorporated masks, music, dance, abstract costume, avant-garde sets as well as a detailed analysis of the texts of plays and the psychological motivations of its characters.

The German theatre practitioner Bertolt Brecht argued that Vakhtangov's approach was "the Stanislavski-Meyerhold complex before the split rather than its reconciliation".

The later part of his career took place at a high point of Russian theatre, amidst the Bolshevik Revolution and Civil War.