ABOUT
Michael has built an international career in classical and modern theatre, musicals and opera across diverse cultural and linguistic creative environments.
Recent theatre directing credits include Noël Coward’s Bitter Sweet at Bard Summerscape staring Sian Phillips, the world premiere of Peter Nichols’ Lingua Franca (Finborough Theatre, London and 59E59 Theater, New York), Amadeus for Maltz Jupiter Theater, Our Class for the Roma Teatro Festival, Tom Stoppard’s Artist Descending a Staircase (Old Red Lion), Glyn Maxwell’s Mimi and the Stalker (Theatre 503), Le Mariage by David Lescot and Fragile! by Tena Stivicic (Arcola Theatre), Hortensia and the Museum of Dreams by Nilo Cruz (Finborough Theatre), Change of Heart (New End), Twelfth Night (Haugesund Festiviteten, Norway), The Marys (Southwark Playhouse and Yvonne Arnaud, Guildford), A Perfect Ganesh by Terrence McNally (Gielgud Theatre), The Seagull and Two for the Seesaw (Old Fire Station, Oxford), Scenes from an Execution, White Chateaux and The Stronger (Minerva Theatre, Chichester).
Recent award-winning opera credits include the world premiere of Carlisle Floyd’s opera Prince of Players at the Houston Grand Opera and Florentine, Tosca for Opera Wroclaw, Fredrick Delius’ Koanga which opened the National Opera House during the 2015 Wexford Opera Festival. Other recent work includes the acclaimed productions Der Schauspieldirektor and Le Rossignol (Santa Fe Opera), La Rondine and The Kiss (St Louis Opera Theater), Magic Flute (Chicago Opera Theater), Iolanta and La Bohème (Yale Opera), Statkowski’s Maria and Hubicka (Wexford Opera Festival), Maria (Gdansk Opera/Solidarity of the Arts Festival), Manon (Cape Town Opera), Cavalleria Rusticana, I Pagliacci, Lucia di Lammermoor as well as Tosca, Madama Butterfly, L’Elisir d’Amore, Don Pasquale (State Theatre, Pretoria) among others.
The theatre associate directing credits the famed production of Pirandello’s Absolutely!(perhaps) directed by Franco Zeffirelli starring Dame Joan Plowright in London’s West End, the Royal Shakespeare Company’s The Tempest with the RSC Artistic Director Michael Boyd, and Chichester Festival Theatre’s Heartbreak House with BAFTA-winning director Christopher Morahan as well as Peter Wood’s revival of Sir Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia.
Musical theatre work includes Company (Oxford Playhouse), Last Song of the Nightingale (New End Theatre and tour – starring a double Olivier-Award winner Tracie Bennett) and the British premiere of Stephen Sondheim’s Anyone Can Whistle (Bridewell Theatre – starring double Olivier-Award winner Janie Dee and Paula Wilcox). Self-devised and adapted pieces include Kurt Weill’s Last Train From Berlin (Chichester Festival Theatre) and Cy Coleman’s Seesaw (Bridewell Theatre).
His associate directing credits in opera include The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden’s The Queen of Spades starring Karita Mattila under Francesca Zambello and Glyndebourne Festival Opera Katya Kabanova with Nikolaus Lehnhoff and Carmen with David McVicar starring Anne-Sophie von Otter.
He directs regularly at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London School. He has also directed at the Royal College of Music, Birmingham Conservatoire, Yale Opera School and Rose Bruford.
VIDEOS
reviews
"We are particularly
honored to offer our audiences the brilliant
directorial work of Michael Gieleta, whose
experience directing multilingual opera and
stage productions will bring our production of Amadeus to new heights."
"Michael Gieleta's revival of the play, originally written for radio but transferred seamlessly to the stage, makes a virtue of the cramped space."
"Michael Gieleta’s direction for Cherub Theatre ... Strongly recommended."
FRAGILE! REVIEW
The Times
September 13, 2007
Jeremy Kingston at Arcola, E8
“A real find, this latest play from the Croatian writer Tena Stivicic, now playing to packed houses at the Arcola Studio. Previous work has been translated for productions by Paines Plough and at the Royal Court, but this is her first play written in English, and it shows an acute ear for the subtleties of language that hint at more than the words are apparently telling.
Her ear is also alert to the way the English language is imperfectly spoken by those not born to it. None of her characters is English, and, with the exception of a troubled would-be artist from New Zealand and a reckless war journalist from Norway, all come from Eastern Europe, mostly from those parts of it that used to be Yugoslavia.
They have fled by various means to London, where they dream of success, or, at the very least, of finding some peace from the demons that drove them here. A would-be singer from Zagreb, a would-be comedian from Belgrade, a would-be human being from Bosnia whose route to England took her by way of slave brothels in Italy and Finland. The audience listened to Catherine Cusack’s precise account of this journey in an appalled silence.
The changes that exile forces upon them are charted over a couple of years. Some approach the beginnings of success, others not, or in nasty ways that show the trauma of the past throwing a lifelong shadow forward. Significantly, the young comedian (Joseph Garton) gets his first gig by telling atrocity stories from the Bosnian war.
Scenes overlap or are played concurrently but even when the actual place – bar? hostel? airport? – is uncertain, our uncertainty chimes with that of the characters, floundering in a confusing city. Michael Gieleta’s direction for Cherub Theatre catches this quality well and his cast (only one of whom seems to be from Eastern Europe) are quite exceptionally convincing, with Rayisa Kondracki hauntingly brave in her eventual defeat. Strongly recommended.”
"Michael Gieleta’s direction for Cherub Theatre ... Strongly recommended."
"“Michael Gieleta’s production can contend to be the top cultural even of the season”
PIK.wroclaw.pl
"
"“Michael Gieleta’s direction…is supremely effective”
Newsweek
"
"“Everything in it…will change the level opera in Poland, giving it a new quality.”
It just had to end up with a standing ovation.”
Naszeblogi.pl
"
"“a phenomenal pleasure for all the senses directed with a virtuosity by Michael Gieleta.” Broadway World "
