Luc Bondy (17 July 1948 – 28 November 2015) was a Swiss theatre and film director.
Life and career
Trained in Paris with the theatre teacher Jacques Lecoq, he received a job in 1969 as an assistant at the Hamburg Thalia Theatre. In a surprise, he took over in 1985 after the resignation of Peter Stein at the Schaubühne in Berlin. He also worked as a producer of both plays and operas at the Salzburg Festival, and in 1985 as a director at the Vienna Festival.
He was the director of the most recent version of Tosca, by Puccini, at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Both the opera, as well as the director, were greeted by loud boos on opening night, 21 September 2009. The reception was generally negative. James Levine, the music director at the Metropolitan Opera likened the production to a 'Hitchcock movie' and the cultural critic for the New York Times, Charles McGrath, felt that the new production was a part of Gelb's mission to transform the Met by emphasizing theatricality.
In an interview after the premiere of Marc-André Dalbavie's opera Charlotte Salomon, Bondy was asked whether his being Jewish had anything to do with his having directed the production. "So I said to her this is a production about a Jewish artist...the subject is the story of Charlotte Salomon" said Bondy, who then walked out on the interviewer.
He died on 28 November 2015 in Zurich.
Direction
Source:
Stage productions
1971 : Der Narr und die Nonne (The Fool and the Nun) by Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz at Göttingen 1973 : Die See (The Sea) by Edward Bond at the Munich Residenztheater 1974 : Glaube, Liebe, Hoffnung (Faith, Love, Hope) by Ödön von Horvath at Hamburg 1977 : Man spielt nicht mit der Liebe by Alfred de Musset at the Schaubühne, Berlin 1980 : Happy Days by Samuel Beckett at Cologne 1980 : Yvonne, die Burgunderprinzessin (Yvonne, the Princess of Burgundy) by Witold Gombrowicz at Cologne 1982 : Macbeth by William Shakespeare at Cologne 1983 : Sommer (Summer) by Edward Bond at Munich 1984 : Das weite Land (The Far Country) by Arthur Schnitzler at the Théâtre des Amandiers in Nanterre 1985 : Triumph der Liebe (The Triumph of Love) by Marivaux 1989 : Le conte d'hiver by Shakespeare, at Nanterre-Amandier 1989 : Die Zeit und das Zimmer (The Time and the Room) by Botho Strauß, at Berlin (premiere) 1990 : The Winter's Tale by Shakespeare, at the Lehniner Palace 1992 : Schlußchor by Botho Strauß at Berlin (premiere) 1993 : John Gabriel Borkman by Henrik Ibsen at the Théâtre de l'Odéon, Paris 1993 : Das Gleichgewicht (The Equilibrium) by Botho Strauß, at the Salzburg Festival (premiere) 1994 : Die Stunde da wir nichts voneinander wußten by Peter Handke 1999 : Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett, at the Vienna Festival 2000 : Drei Mal Leben by Yasmina Reza, at the Burgtheater in Vienna (premiere) 2002 : Anatol by Arthur Schnitzler, at the Burgtheater in Vienna 2004 : Cruel & Tender by Martin Crimp, at Young Vic, London (premiere) 2005 : Die eine und die andere by Botho Strauß, at Berlin 2005 : Viol by Botho Strauß, after Titus Andronicus, at Odéon, Atelier Berthier, Paris 2010 : Sweet Nothings by David Harrower from Arthur Schnitzler's Liebelei at Young Vic, London (premiere)