Barrie Kosky [1] (born 1967 in Melbourne) is an Australian theatre and opera director. [2]

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Biography

Barrie Kosky is the son of Jewish émigrés from Europe. He said that seeing Steven Berkoff and Lindsay Kemp were two pivotal moments in his childhood. ^[3]

Kosky attended Melbourne Grammar School where he directed his first play. Among many other later famous Australian artists, he also worked ath the St Martins Youth Arts Centre. In 1985, he then began studies in Music History at the University of Melbourne. ^[4]

Career

In 1989 Kosky directed the Australian premiere of Michael Tippett's The Knot Garden (reduced version) at the Melbourne Spoleto Festival. In 1990 he formed the Gilgul Theatre ^[5] which staged The Exile Trilogy in 1993 (The Dybbuk , Es Brent , Levad ) at the Belvoir St Theatre; Kosky was artistic manager of the Gilgul Theatre until 1998. Other notable productions with the Gilgul Theatre where The Wilderness Room and a stage adaptation of The Operated Jew .

For the Victorian State Opera he directed in 1991 The Marriage of Figaro and The Barber of Seville . In 1993 he directed the premiere season of Larry Sitsky's opera The Golem for Opera Australia which was also released on ABC Classics. Also in 1993 he directed Goethe's Faust I and II for the Melbourne Theatre Company, and Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex for Opera Queensland.

In 1996 he directed Nabucco (recorded on DVD by ABC Television. ^[6]) and The Flying Dutchman for Opera Australia, a work which he revisited in 2006 at the Aalto-Musiktheater in Essen, Germany. Also in 1996, Kosky was appointed director of the Adelaide Festival of Arts, at 29 years the youngest person ever appointed to that position. Following that appointment, the 50-minute documentary Kosky In Paradise examined his ideas and creative motivations. ^[7]

In 1997 he directed Molière's Tartuffe in Christopher Hampton's translation at the Sydney Theatre Company (STC). In 1998 he directed Mourning Becomes Electra for the STC, and King Lear for the Bell Shakespeare Company's touring production. In 1999 Kosky directed Alban Berg's Wozzeck for the Sydney Opera House. In 2000, Kosky directed Ted Hughes' adaption of Seneca's Oedipus a the Sydney Theatre Company.

From 2001 to 2005 Kosky was co-director of the Schauspielhaus Wien, a small theatre venue (280 seats) for contemporary German plays in Vienna. ^[8] There he directed Euripides' Medea with the Australian actress Melita Jurisic ^[9]); the production was nominated for the Nestroy-Theaterpreis (Nestroy Theatre Prize). He also directed there The Tales of Hoffmann , Macbeth in an all-female version, ^{[10] [11]} and Boulevard Delirium with Paul Capsis which toured around the world for several seasons, including Australia where it won a 2006 Helpmann Award. His staging of Claudio Monteverdi's L'Orfeo at the Innsbrucker Festwochen für Alte Musik under the musical direction of René Jacobs was also shown at the Berlin Staatsoper Unter den Linden; that production was broadcast on German TV by RBB/arte. ^[12] Also in 2005, Kosky directed Wagner's Lohengrin for the Wiener Staatsoper.

In 2006 he directed with Tom Wright ^[13] the eight-hour play The Lost Echo –based on Ovid's Metamorphoses and Euripides' The Bacchae – for the Actors Company at the STC; the play won five Helpmann Awards. ^[14] In the same year, Kosky directed in Germany The Flying Dutchman at the Aalto-Musiktheater in Essen, Britten's Midsummer Night's Dream at the Theater Bremen and revived Le Grand Macabre for Graz.

In 2007 Kosky presented his Vienna production of Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea , a strongly modified version of the original opera, at the 2007 Edinburgh Festival. ^[15] In that year, he also directed Peter Grimes for the Staatsoper Hannover, and Tristan und Isolde for the Aalto-Musiktheater in Essen which received a nomination for the Faust Award.

In January 2008, he directed at the same house Mahagonny which received boos during and after the performance, unfavourable reviews, and played before half-empty houses. ^{[16] [17]} In April 2008 Kosky was participant in the "Towards a Creative Australia" stream at the Australia 2020 Summit. In July 2008 he directed the premiere of Liza Lim's opera The Navigator at the Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts as part of the Brisbane Festival 2008, a work which Lim had developed during her stay in Berlin; Kosky had also directed her earlier opera The Oresteia (1993). The Navigator was also presented as part of the Melbourne International Arts Festival. In September 2008 Kosky directed Euripides' The Women of Troy with Melita Jurisic and Robyn Nevin in an adaptation by himself and Tom Wright at the Sydney Theatre Company. In August 2008 Melbourne University Publishing published an essay by Kosky, On Ecstasy (ISBN 978-0-522-85534-0). ^[18] In October 2008, Kosky presented his stage adaption of the Edgar Allan Poe short story "The Tell-Tale Heart" at the Melbourne International Arts Festival.

Following several productions in the past at the Komische Oper Berlin, including Le Grand Macabre (2003), The Marriage of Figaro (2005), Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride and Kiss Me, Kate (2007) (broadcast on German TV 3sat in 2008), Koskie has been appointed Chief Director at the Komische Oper commencing in the 2012/2013 season.

Notes

References

1. Barrie Kosky's name is sometimes misspelled as Barry Kosky, Barrie Koski, Barrie Koskie.
2. Kosky also plays the piano, as he did in his production of Monteverdi's ''Poppea''
3. Toby Creswell, Samantha Trenoweth: ''1001 Australian You Should Know'', Pluto Press, p.137, ISBN 9781864033618
4. From operatic epic to understated horror
5. At the Gilgul, Kosky worked with the set designer Peter Corrigan on many productions; this collaboration continued later, e.g. on ''Oedipus Rex'', ''Nabucco'', ''Lear''.
6. Verdi — ''Nabucco'' / Opera Australia, Jonathan Summers (1996) {{ASIN|B0015NR2FC}}
7. ''Kosky In Paradise'' (Screen Australia)
8. Schauspielhaus Wien — Geschichte und Archiv (in German)
9. Jurisic also played in Kosky's ''Poppea'' and many others of his productions.
10. Kosky had staged a ''Macbeth'' during his university years in Melbourne with Libbi Gorr in the title role
11. Bryce Hallett: Kosky to head Berlin opera house, The Sydney Morning Herald), {{Date|2008-06-26}}
12. {{Imdb title|1277959|L'Orfeo|(2007)}}
13. Kosky and Tom Wright have worked together on several projects; their collaboration started when both where at Melbourne University.
14. Helpmann Awards Winners 2007
15. Edinburgh: Chilling interpretation of a savage classic
16. Jüdische Volksoper?
17. Viele Zuschauer, wenig Geld — Die Saison 2008/09 in Oper und Ballett
18. In this collection of four essays (more are planned), Kosky was the only one not primarily a writer; the others were David Malouf, Germaine Greer and Blanche d'Alpuget.