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HENNING BROCKHAUS
ae
Architecture & Entertainment January 2017
The Scenographer
PiER luiGi PiER’Alli
THE SCENOGRAPHER
A vAluABlE REfERENCE
ivAN STEfANuTTi SOuRCE fOR All
HENNiNG BROCkHAuS PROfESSiONAlS Of STAGE- AND
ROBERT wilSON SCREEN-CRAfT
fRANCO ZEffiRElli AND fOR EvERyONE wHO
PiER luiGi PiZZi APPRECiATES A quAliTy
williAm kENTRiDGE PuBliCATiON PACkED wiTH
ROBERT lEPAGE NEwS, ExCluSivE iNTERviEwS,
RiCHly illuSTRATED iN-
DANTE fERRETTi
DEPTH ARTiClES AND
williAm ivEy lONG COvERAGE Of iNDuSTRy
mARiA BJORNSON EvENTS.
kEN ADAm info and subscription requests to:
AlEJANDRO luNA subscription@thescenographer.org
JOSEf SvOBODA
AlEx mCDOwEll
DANilO DONATi
MARIA BJORNSON
GABRiEllA PESCuCCi
milENA CANONERO
PiERO TOSi
luCiANO DAmiANi
AllAN STARSki
Guy HENDRix DyAS
EZiO fRiGERiO...
and many, many other great
set and costume designers
known and loved throughout the world.
CONTENTS
Henning Brockhaus and Josef Svoboda
Photo by Antonio Tabocchini

9 The Roots Of Drama


Aesthetics In The Work

19
Of Henning Brockhaus
by Carla Moreni

Reflections of a Symbolic
and Musical Drama
by Valentina Escobar

THE SCENOGRAPHER
Winter Edition 2015

HENNiNG BROCkHAuS
my Theatre

Publisher
Study Centre Scenic Arts, Ltd. London.
Editor in Chief/Art Director
Graphic Design: Paolo Felici.
Ha collaborato a questo numero:
Carla Moreni, Valentina Escobar,
Maria Harman.
Translations: Maria Harman.
Photos: Antonio Tabocchini,
Rocco Casaluci, Giacomo Orlando,
Luciano Romano, Corrado
Lannino. Binci Fotografia Jesi,
Francesco Squeglia, Corrado Maria
Falsini.

Special Thanks: Macerata Opera


Festival, Fondazione Pergolesi
Spontini Jesi.

Photo cover:
Lohengrin by R. Wagner

All artistic material and photos


published is the sole property
of the authors cited.
(All rights reserved)
©2015 The Scenographer.
HENNING BROCKHAUS
MY THEATRE Photos by Antonio Tabocchini

LA TRAVIATA

LA TRAVIATA, music by Giuseppe Verdi. Direction by Henning Brockhaus.


Stage design by Josef Svoboda. Costume design by Ulisse Santicchi. Lighting design by Vannio Vanni.
Sferisterio, Macerata Opera Festival. 28th opera season, 1992.
LA TRAVIATA
Photos by Antonio Tabocchini

LA TRAVIATA, music by Giuseppe Verdi. Direction by Henning Brockhaus.


Stage design by Josef Svoboda. Costume design by Ulisse Santicchi. Lighting design by Vannio Vanni.
Sferisterio, Macerata Opera Festival. 28th opera season, 1992.
Photos by Antonio Tabocchini

LA TRAVIATA
LA TRAVIATA, music by Giuseppe Verdi.
Direction by Henning Brockhaus.
Stage design by Josef Svoboda.
Costume design by Ulisse Santicchi.
Lighting design by Vannio Vanni.
Sferisterio, Macerata Opera Festival.
XXVIII stagione lirica, 1992.
THE ROOTS OF DRAMA AESTHETICS
IN THE WORK OF HENNING BROCKHAUS
by Carla Moreni

WHILE HAVING TO CHOOSE AN IMAGE IN ORDER TO DESCRIBE


THE WORK OF HENNING BROCKHAUS BY USING A SYNTHETIC
AND SYMBOLIC APPROACH, MY THOUGHTS FLY IMMEDIATELY TO
THAT HUGE EXPANSE OF MIRRORED PANELS THAT BY DEGREES
SLOPE UPWARDS FROM THE STAGE TO BECOME THE INCREDIBLE
BACKDROP OF LA TRAVIATA, IN ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT
EDITIONS EVER STAGED LIVE, IN A JOINT DESIGN PROJECT WITH
JOSEF SVOBODA, FOR THE 1992 SUMMER SEASON AT THE
SFERISTERIO DI MACERATA IN ITALY.
THEREAFTER POPULARLY KNOWN AS THE “LA TRAVIATA OF THE
MIRRORS”, MANY THEATRES HAVE ADDED IT TO THEIR SEASON’S
PLAYBILL.
IN THAT SCENIC ACTION, FOR THE FIRST TIME, WE WERE ALL
SUMMONED AS EXTRAS IN THE PUBLIC CONDEMNATION OF
VIOLETTA, PAID WITH CONTEMPT BEFORE THE ASSEMBLED
GUESTS INFLORA’S SALON BY THE YOUNG ALFREDO WHO, NOT
SO LONG AGO HAD JOYFULLY SANG OF “BOLLENTI SPIRITI”,
ASSUAGED BY HER AMOROUS AND SAPIENT SMILE.

lEGGi l’ARTiCOlO READ THE ARTiClE


iN iTAliANO iN ENGliSH

9
LOHENGRIN Photos by Manolis Baboussis

LOHENGRIN. Music by R. Wagner.


Libretto by Arrigo Boito. Conductor: John Neschling.
Director: Henning Brockhaus. Assistent director and
Coreography: Valentina Escobar.
Stage design: Yannis Kounellis.
Costume design: Patricia Toffolutti.
Lighting design: Guido Levi.
Teatro Municipal de São Paulo - 2015.
LOHENGRIN. Music by R. Wagner. Libretto by Arrigo Boito. Conductor: John Neschling. Director: Henning Brockhaus.
Assistent director and Coreography: Valentina Escobar. Stage design: Yannis Kounellis. Costume design: Patricia Toffolutti.
Lighting design: Guido Levi. Teatro Municipal de São Paulo - 2015.
LOHENGRIN
LOHENGRIN
LOHENGRIN

LOHENGRIN. Music by R. Wagner. Libretto by Arrigo Boito. Conductor: John Neschling. Director: Henning Brockhaus.
Assistent director and Coreography: Valentina Escobar. Stage design: Yannis Kounellis. Costume design: Patricia Toffolutti.
Lighting design: Guido Levi. Teatro Municipal de São Paulo - 2015.
Otello
OTELLO. Music by G. Verdi.
Libretto by Arrigo Boito.
Based on W. Shakespeare’s tragedy.
Director by Henning Brockhaus.
Assistent director by Valentina Escobar.
Stage design by Nicola Rubertelli.
Costume design by Patricia Toffolutti.
Lighting design by Alessandro Carletti.
Teatro di San Carlo.
Naples - 2014.

Photos by Francesco Squeglia


Photo by Luciano Romano
Otello
OTELLO. Music by Giuseppe Verdi. Libretto by Arrigo Boito.
Based on William Shakespeare’s tragedy.
Director, Henning Brockhaus. Assistent director, Valentina Escobar.
Stage design by Nicola Rubertelli. Costume design by Patricia Toffolutti.
Lighting design by Alessandro Carletti. Teatro di San Carlo, Naples - 2014.

Photo by Luciano Romano


Il Prigionier
Superbo
Members of the cast with
Bunraku marionettes animated
by the puppeteers of the Teatro
Pirata company.
(Francesco Mattioni, Silvano
Fiordelmondo, Diego
Pasquinelli, Simone Guerro,
Cecilia Mancia, Lucia Palozzi).

IL PRIGIONIER SUPERBO. Music by G. Battista Pergolesi.


Musical drama in three acts by Gennarantonio Federico.
Direction and stage design by Henning Brockhaus.
Costume design by Giancarlo Colis.
Lighting design by Henning Brockhaus and Fabrizio Gobbi.
9th Festival Pergolesi Spontini, Jesi - 2009.
Il Prigionier Superbo
La serva Padrona

LA SERVA PADRONA. Music by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi. Intermezzi by Gennarantonio Federico.


Direction by Henning Brockhaus. Stage Design by Benito Leonori. Costume design by Giancarlo Colis.
Lighting design by Alessandro Carletti. 11th Festival Pergolesi Spontini, Jesi - 2011.
.
LA SERVA PADRONA. Music by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi. Intermezzi by Gennarantonio Federico.
Direction by Henning Brockhaus. Stage Design by Benito Leonori. Costume design by Giancarlo Colis.
Lighting design by Alessandro Carletti. 11th Festival Pergolesi Spontini, Jesi - 2011.
.

La serva Padrona
Paris, late 18th century. In salons
raged a heated cultural debate, which
would go down in history as
Querelle des Bouffons (La
disputa dei Buffoni). Briefly, the
question hinges on which of the two is
the better: the French drama or the
Neopolitan comic opera.
Neither The Encyclopedists nor Jean-
Jacques Rousseau (1752), harboured
any doubt, and the needle swings in
favour of the Neopolitan opera,
judged to be an authentic expression of
drama and sentiment.
This “querelle”, or dispute, topped
the bill of the 4th edition of the
Festival Pergolesi Spontini in 2004,
with the title
“Filosofi e Buffoni. Il genio
musicale che incendiò Parigi”
(Philosophers and Bufoons. The

LE DEVIN DU VILLAGE
Musical Genius that Inflamed Paris)

thanks to the stagings by Henning


Brockhaus of La Serva padrona
by Pergolesi and Rousseau’s Le devin
du village at Villa Salvati, as shown
in the photos on this page.
Le devin du village by Jean-
Jacques Rousseau sprang from the
desire to introduce into the French
comic opera elements of the Italian
opera, which Rousseau greatly
admired and well knew from first-
hand experience in Venice in 1744
and from Italian comedians on the
playbills in Paris.
Henning Brockhaus created a huge
circus (in the grounds of Villa
Salvati) within a rural context with a
flock of sheep, a donkey, a cow and
an open itinerary through the rooms
of the villa where pages from
Rousseau were read among dancers
and acrobats, and marital diatribes
were recited. After which, off to the
circus! And everyone delighted in the
staging of La Serva padrona.
LA SERVA PADRONA and LE DIVIN DU VILLAGE combined in a circus production by Henning Brockhaus
Sets and costumes by Julio Paz. Festival Pergolesi Spontini, 2004. (Photo Binci)
The mime actor Jean Mening
EL CIMARRON by Hans Werner Henze. Direction by Henning Brockhaus. Stage design by Benito Leonori.
Lighting design by Franco Ferrari. Teatro delle Pietre, for "Macerata Opera". 2003 Photos by Antonio Tabocchini

The drama takes place in an


industrial warehouse temporarily
converted into a stage area.
REFLECTIONS OF A SYMBOLIC
AND MUSICAL DRAMA
obsessive nightmare in which he is surrounded by satraps and surreal
erotic figures in total contrast with Desdemona’s chasteness.
In Act Four, Desdemona, as she prays, recomposes the statue of the

T
Madonna destroyed by Iago, thus emphasising her devoutness and
the strength of her faith in contrast with man’s wickedness. Othello
by Valentina Escobar by now crushed turns cruel and malicious like Iago who has now
completely dominated Othello, stripped him of his true nature; he
fter the first decade of a career spent working in major too will now destroy fragments of Bosch’s paintings and dash to the
repertory theatres and opera houses, I had the good fortune ground part of an old piano, thereby symbolising the disintegration
and the honour to meet Henning Brockhaus, the great director, of harmony, of art and culture by the hand of men like Iago now
musician and man of theatre with whom I had long dreamed of absolutely incapable of loving or simply hungry for power.
working. We immediately developed a great understanding and mutual In the context of symbolic language and of a Shakespearian play
respect; we discovered that we had both worked at the Piccolo Teatro within a play much admired and studied by Verdi, we decided to
in Milan, in different years, for the staging of two shows by Giorgio include several mime actors who also take on the role of doubles,
Strehler (Giorni Felici and La storia della bambola abbandonata). acting as "reflections" of Othello, Desdemona and Cassius, thus
representing their thoughts, fears and anxieties, their desires and
From that day on our intensive professional partnership has been ongoing.
dreams animated by Verdi’s music.
Over time, we have shared much endeavour, success and satisfaction when La Traviata and Macbeth are also immersed in a world of dreams, of
working together on shows that are staged in prestigious theatres and opera symbolism and mirror images. The directing of La Traviata is also
houses in Italy and the rest of the world. based on a voyeuristic dimension, in which the performers and the
It’s always difficult to sum up in just a few lines the work of many a spectators can see themselves reflected thanks to the mirror, the set’s
year, but in this brief account of mine I would like to look back on a principal element with its painted carpets, creating an epic, three-
trio of Verdi operas that have become "classics" for the value they dimensional visual, that bears witness to the flux and the
have acquired in the history of Musical Drama: La Traviata and Macbeth transformation of sentiments and actions (the minor roles build the
for which I was also choreographer, and Otello that I myself re-staged scene in view of the audience who will later join the performers as
at Teatro San Carlo in Naples. onlookers in the scene of Violetta’s demise, to participate in the
heartrending event with rationality mixed with commotion).
The symbolic language of Otello is intended to help the audience and My choreography is totally in line with Brockhaus’ direction, the sets by
the performers to comprehend and create a narrative linked to Verdi’s Josef Svoboda and the costumes created by Giancarlo Colis, immersed in
music and poetry and it is based on a deep analysis of Verdi’s musical "dreams" and in poetry. It all springs from the search for a harmonious
score and the universal themes inherent both in the libretto and balance between the music and Verdi’s passion for all things Spanish and,
Shakespeare’s original tragedy. Themes that convey their eternal nature, for the staging at the Sferisterio di Macerata, the tantalising, erotic flamenco
represented by Shakespeare’s drama and Verdi’s opera, tightly bound without neglecting references to the Sevillana that precedes the first dance
to the world of dreams, the oneiric realm, so dear to Brockhaus but of the gypsy girls and the tango-flamenco following the arrival of Alfredo
also to Shakespeare and to Verdi, in which our true feelings, our during the card game. The mime movements of the vocalists, the chorus,
anguish, our desires, unconscious thoughts, ambitions, as well as the the dancers and the minor players point at being sensual, graceful,
strength, the fragility, the psychology, the nature and the true identity fascinated, poetic in every scene just as Verdi’s music while avoiding the
pitfalls of triviality and vulgarity as an end in itself.
of each character all emerge. This then becomes a vehicle for As for Macbeth, Svoboda’s mirror and panels become essential elements
embracing fundamental aspects of the opera that may not otherwise for the directing, the choreography and the lighting of the ghostly
be revealed. I’m thinking, for example, of the opera’s first symbol: a apparitions that first attracted Shakespeare and Verdi and then Brockhaus,
heavenly image of a painting by Hieronymus Bosch that Iago lets fall, the people who work with him, the audience and critics. So the witches
and in doing so lays bare his cynisism, his sadistic tendencies and his (choristers and mimes) in effect also become protagonists from both a
desire to destabilise, to shatter the peace of mind and compromise directorial and choreographic perspective. Brockhaus therefore aims to
the coexistance of all the other characters. create a theatrical experience that is innovative, epic, symbolic, oneiric and
Moreover, the passionate rapport that Othello and Desdemona share in harmony with the music, to become memorable.
is inevitably associated with death. Verdi himself wrote that
Desdemona fell in love with her proud warrior Othello and his
misfortunes.
In the second act Desdemona and Emilia bring broth to the war- lEGGi l’ARTiCOlO
wounded in the hospital where we also find angelic voices with
iN iTAliANO
bunches of white lilies, as stipulated by Verdi, which serve to represent
Desdemona’s goodness and devout Christian piety. So the imagery of
the hospital associated with the choir ends with Othello’s erotic,

19
Jakob Lenz Photos by Rocco Casaluci
Photos by Antonio Tabocchini

JAKOB LENZ by Wolfgang Rihm. Libretto by Michael Fröhling from the novella “Lenz” by Karl Georg Büchner. Direction,
stage and lighting design by Henning Brockhaus. Costume design by Giancarlo Colis. Production “Palcoscenico Marche”, Festival
“Teatro di teatri”, Teatro Lauro Rossi, Macerata. 2007. Re-staged in 2012 with new scenery (as per the photo on this page) at the
Teatro Comunale di Bologna, in coproduction with Teatro Rossini di Lugo.

Jakob Lenz
Photos by Rocco Casaluci
Jakob Lenz
JAKOB LENZ by di Wolfgang Rihm.
Direction, stage design and lighting design
by Henning Brockhaus.
Teatro Comunale di Bologna, 2012.

Photos by Rocco Casaluci


Jakob Lenz
JAKOB LENZ by
di Wolfgang Rihm.
Direction, stage
design and lighting
design
by Henning
Brockhaus.
Teatro Comunale di
Bologna, 2012.
Macbeth
Pothos by Binci Fotografia Jesi.

MACBETH. Music by Giuseppe Verdi.Opera in four acts from the libretto by Francesco Maria Piave and Andrea Maffei
based on William Shakespeare’s tragedy. Direction and lighting design by Henning Brockhaus. Stage design by Josef
Svoboda. Costume design by Nanà Cecchi. Teatro Carlo Felice, Genoa 2013. In coproduction with the Fondazione Teatro
Lirico G. Verdi, Trieste and Fondazione Pergolesi Spontini, Jesi.
Macbeth
Rigoletto

RIGOLETTO. Music by
Giuseppe Verdi. Direction by
Henning Brockhaus. Stage
design Alessandro Camera.
Costume design Patricia
Toffolutti. Lighting design
Roberto Venturi. Teatro
Massimo, Palermo. 2013

26
RIGOLETTO. Music by Giuseppe Verdi. Direction by Henning Brockhaus. Stage design Alessandro Camera.
Costume design Patricia Toffolutti. Lighting design Roberto Venturi. Teatro Massimo, Palermo. 2013

Photos by Corrado Lannino

27
LUCIA DI LAMMERMOOR
Photos by Antonio Tabocchini
(edizione Sferisterio di Macerata 1992 )
Photos by Binci Fotografia Jesi
(edizione Teatro Pergolesi 2013)
LUCIA DI LAMMERMOOR

Photos by Antonio Tabocchini


LUCIA DI LAMMERMOOR. Music by Gaetano Donizetti. Tragic opera in three acts.
Libretto by Salvadore Cammarano from the novel “The Bride of Lammermoor”
by Sir Walter Scott.

In the 1992 edition staged at Macerata Opera Festival. Stage


direction, Henning Brockhaus. Stage and costume design by Josef
Svoboda. In the 2013 edition at Teatro Pergolesi, 2012 opera
season, Jesi, directed by Henning Brockhaus, costume design by
Patricia Toffolutti and scenery reconstruction by Benito Leonori.
Don Quijote
DON QUIXOTE by Cervantes at Teatro La cavallerizza in Reggio Emilia, 2002. Re-staged the same year at
the Astra in Turin, a former cinema being refurbished - for an unconventional performance and a reading of
Cervantes’ poem that shuns tradition and the commonplace. A drama production, adaptation by Henning
Brockhaus in 5 separate evenings.
The Emperor Jones
The Emperor Jones
THE EMPEROR JONES by Louis Gruenberg. Direction, stage and lighting design by Henning Brockhaus.
Costume design and Videoprojection by Accademia di Belle Arti di Macerata). Teatro delle Muse, Ancona, 2009.
DI TENDA

BEATRICE DI TENDA by Vincenzo Bellini, an opera taken


from the literary text of the same name written in 1825 by Carlo
Tedaldi Fores. Direction and stage design by Henning
Brockhaus. Assistant to sets and costumes, Giancarlo Colis.
Assistant to the director and the choreographer, Emma Scialfa.
Video shoot by Mariangela Malvaso. A new production staged
at the Teatro Massimo Bellini in Catania, 2010.

Photos by Giacomo Orlando


Let’s Make An Opera, the masterpiece for children written by Benjamin Britten in1949 Let’s Make An Opera by Eric
Crozier. Music by Benjamin
from the libretto by Eric Crozier. Britten and Crozier conceived it for the second edition of the Britten. Direction Henning
Aldeburgh Festival and dedicated it to the festival’s president, Lord Cranbrook, naming the Brockhaus. Macerata Opera
opera’s juvenile characters after his children. festival. Teatro Lauro Rossi, 2013.
In the first part of the opera we are introduced to four adults and seven children who decide to
produce an opera by writing the libretto, composing the music, creating the sets and rehearsing
the scenes. The audience is also involved in the creative process, by being asked to rehearse then
sing the so-called “Audience Songs” that open the three scenes of the opera.

Let’s
The second part comprises the opera itself, entitled The Little Sweep, set in about 1810, which
narrates the act of solidarity that a group of wealthy children feel for a young boy forced to work
as a chimney-sweep. M ak e
An
The Little Sweep
Opera

T HE DIRECTOR Photo by Antonio Tabocchini


H ENNING
B ROCKHAUS
SHIFTS THE
ACTION FROM
THE INTERIORS
OF A PLUSH
18 TH - CENTURY
ABODE TO A
PRESENT - DAY
ELEMENTARY
SCHOOL . W HEN
THE OPERA
FINALLY TAKES
FORM , THE
CHILDREN KNOCK
DOWN THE WALLS
THAT ARE
REVEALED TO BE
MADE OF
PAINTED BOXES .
T HUS THE
GLOOMY WALLS
OF THE SCHOOL
ARE REPLACED BY
A FRESH , HIGHLY
COLOURED
ENVIRONMENT
ENTIRELY
CREATED BY THE
CHILDREN .
S TAGE DESIGN BY
THE A CCADEMIA
DELLE B ELLE
A RTI DI
M ACERATA .
TURANDOT
TURANDOT. Music by Giacomo Puccini. From the libretto by Giu-
seppe Adami and Renato Simoni. Direction by Henning Brockhaus.
Stage and costume design by Ezio Toffolutti. Choreography by
Maria Cristina Madau. Rome, Baths of Caracalla, 2007.
TURANDOT
BUTTERFLY

Photos by Antonio Tabocchini


MADAMA
Puccini’s Madama Butterfly
at the Macerata Opera Festival. 2009.
Direction and stage design by Henning Brockhaus.
of productions, namely: The Good by Bertold Brecht and Kurt
Person of Sezuan by Bertolt Brecht Weill, with Ute Lemper as the
(Hamburg and Piccolo Teatro, lead, at the Schauspielhaus in
Milan); El nost Milan by Carlo Düsseldorf; Clavigo by Johann
Bertolazzi; Shakespeare’s The Tempest; Wolfgang von Goethe at
August Strindberg’s Storm; Samuel Schauspielhaus in Zurich;
Beckett’s Happy Days; La storia della Biedermann und die Brandstifter
bambola abbandonata by Giorgio by Max Frisch and La Buona
Strehler, taken from a fable by Madre by Carlo Goldoni in
Alfonso Sastre; La grande magia by Antwerp.
Eduardo De Filippo; Arlecchino With Pina Bausch’s theatre
servitore di due padroni by Carlo company, in Wuppertal he
Goldoni; Luigi Pirandello’s Come tu stages Un Ballo in Maschera by
mi vuoi, and Faust by Johann Giuseppe Verdi, Andorra by
theatre director, scenographer.

Wolfgang von Goethe. Max Frisch, Don Carlos by


His working relationship with Friedrich Schiller, and
Cronology. A short biografy.

Strehler continued at the Teatro alla Giuseppe Verdi’s Otello at


Scala in Milan with Lohengrin, two Saarbrücken, Richard
stagings of Die Entführung aus dem Wagner’s Parsifal in Utrecht,
Serail, Simon Boccanegra, Don Giovanni and Il Matrimonio segreto by
and Le Nozze di Figaro. Domenico Cimarosa at
Born in Plettenberg, Germany, Henning From 1984 to 1989 he was the Staatsoper in Berlin.
Brockhaus graduated in languages in 1965. theatre company’s dramatist and At the Teatro Sperimentale di
In that same year he began to study music director at the Odeon - Théâtre de Spoleto he stages Tosca by
at the Nordwest-Deutsche Musikakademie l'Europe in Paris, staging L'Histoire Giacomo Puccini, at the
in Detmold. He graduated in clarinet and inachevée by Volker Braun; Jeux de Nationale Reisopera –
completed courses in composition. femme by Krzysztof Zanussi and Holland, Wagner’s Tristan und
Following a promising career as a clarinetist Edward Zebrowski and Il signor Isolde and at the Verdi Festival
he continued his studies at Freie Universität Pirandello è desiderato al telefono by in Parma, Verdi’s Rigoletto.
in Berlin, where he studied psychology, Antonio Tabucchi. His productions met with
philosophy and theatre studies, while also In 1989, he returns to the Piccolo great success at the Staatsoper
HENNING BROCKHAUS

working as a voluntary assistant to the Teatro with L'affare by Egidio in Hamburg for La vera storia
director on a number of diverse productions Bertazzoni, is appointed the theatre by Luciano Berio, at Reggio
at the renowned Volksbühne Berlin DDR company’s dramatist for the Faust Emilia for Don Quixote by
with Benno Besson and Heiner Müller, and Project (while also directing a Miguel de Cervantes, then
at the Berliner Ensemble with Manfred number of other productions there) staged in Turin (a prose
Weckwerth and La Staatsoper in Berlin with in addition to working for the Union performance, adaptation by
Ruth Berghaus. des Théâtres de l’Europe. Henning Brockhaus in five
But it was an encounter with Giorgio In 1990, Henning Brockhaus directs different evenings).
Strehler in 1975 that veered him towards The Lady from the Sea by Henrik But among his most critically
directing as a career. Ibsen, also staged at the Teatro acclaimed productions we
He then became assistent to and close collaborator Argentina in Rome. have the unforgettable La
of the founder of the Piccolo Teatro in Milan. Here we reference his most Traviata, Rigoletto, and Attila by
While at the Piccolo Teatro, and with important productions as director in Giuseppe Verdi, Lucia di
Strehler, he worked on the sets for a number successive years: The Seven Deadly Sins Lammermoor by Gaetano

42
Festival; Jaokob Lenz by Wolfgang Rihm, Teatro Comunale di
Bologna and Festival Lugo; Lucia di Lammermoor, Circuito Lirico
Lombardo, Ravenna and Fondazione Pergolesi Jesi; Macbeth,
Fondazione Pergolesi Jesi; Macbeth, Teatro Carlo Felice, Teatro
Verdi di Trieste.
In 2014. Otello at Teatro Massimo, Palermo and at San Carlo,
Naples; Macbeth, Royal Opera House, Oman; La Traviata at
Trieste and Udine, at Macerata Opera Festival, in
Astana/Kazakistan, at Festival Verdi di Busseto.
In 2015. Lohengrin at Teatro Municipal de São Paulo.
Josef Svobota (a sinistra) insieme a Henning Brockhaus durante la conferenza
stampa per la La Traviata a Macerata Opera Festival.
In addition to his long and illustrious career he teaches directing
at university level, at I.U.A.V. in Venice and since 2004, at the
Donizetti and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly at the Macerata Opera Accademia di Belle Arti di Macerata.
Festival; Verdi’s Otello at the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, also
La Traviata and Macbeth, and Elektra by Richard Strauss at the
Teatro dell'Opera di Roma.
His productions have attained wide consensus in Japan:
La Traviata in Nagoya, and Faust, Lucia di Lammermoor
and Macbeth in Tokyo, which was the recipient of the
Japanese critics’ top award.
In 1993, for La Traviata and in 2003, for El Cimarrón by H.W.
Henze, at Macerata he receives the Premio Abbiati (Italian
music critics’ award).
For the Pergolesi-Spontini di Jesi festival in 2004 he
stages La Serva Padrona by Gian Battista Pergolesi and
a prose performance on various texts by J. J. Rousseau:
Le devin du village.
In 2005, Vanne, carta amorosa. Festival Pergolesi-Spontini.
In 2006, Turandot, by Giacomo Puccini. Baths of Caracalla,
Summer Festival, Teatro dell’Opera di Roma.
In 2007, Jakob Lenz by Wolfgang Rihm at Macerata, Terra dei
Teatri.
In 2008, La Traviata at Palm Beach, USA, Turandot at New
National Theatre of Tokyo.
In 2009, The Emperor Jones by Louis Gruenberg at Teatro delle
Muse, Ancona; Il Prigionier superbo by G.B. Pergolesi at Jesi.
In 2010, La Traviata at San Carlo in Naples, Palau de les Arts
di Valencia andNCPA in Beijing (conducted by Lorin Maazel);
Beatrice di Tenda by Vincenzo Bellini at Teatro Bellini di Catania.
In 2011, La Serva Padrona by G.B. Pergolesi and Le Devin
du village by J. J. Rousseau for the Festival Pergolesi-
Spontini at Jesi.
In 2012, Le Notti Bianche by Dostojevsky, Grotte di Frasassi;
La Traviata, Teatro Massimo di Palermo and Macerata Opera

43
Photo by Antonio Tabocchini

Henning Brockhuaas with Josef Svoboda

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