Dmitri Tcherniakov

Source: werktreue.com

Dmitri Tcherniakov was born in Moscow. He finished his studies at the Russian Academy of Performing Arts in 1993. Beyond directing, Tcherniakov is designing the sets of all his productions, sometimes the costumes as well. He was awarded with several international prizes, including Italy’s Franco Abbiati Prize and four times with the Golden Mask, Russia’s most prestigious honor.  His career took off in Novosibirsk with widely discussed productions, until Glinka’s Ruslan and Lyudmila established his reputation at the reopening of Moscow’s Bolshoi Theatre nationally in 2011. Tschaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, guest performed worldwide in Paris, London, New York and Tokyo, marked another highlight at the Bolshoi Theatre, followed by Berg’s Wozzeck.

Mussorgski’s Boris Godunov at Berlin’s Staatsoper initiated a longtime partnership with Daniel Barenboim as conductor in 2005, followed by several collaborations, Prokofiev’s The Gambler, Rimsky-Korsakov’s The Zsar’s Bride, Wagner’s Parsifal and Tristan und Isolde. Prokofiev’s rarely performed Betrothal in the Monastery expanded their common worklist.

Glinka’s A Life for the Zsar at St. Petersburg’s Mariinski Theatre, Mussorgsky’s Chowanshtshina in Munich and Shostakovitch’s Lady Macbeth from Mzensk, shown at Deutsche Oper am Rhein, London’s ENO and Lyon’s Opera, consolidated both his standing as an “ambassador” of Russian opera and as one of today’s leading directors and designers. He was invited to stage Verdi’s Macbeth and Berlioz’ Les Troyens at the Opéra de Paris, Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra at London’s ENO, Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Bizet’s Carmen at the Festival in Aix-en-Provence.

Premiered  in Munich, Poulenc’ Dialogues des Carmélites, Berg/Cerha’s Lulu, Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra, and Weber´s Der Freischütz strengthened his success in Germany, Verdi’s La traviata brought him to La Scala and Borodin’s Prince Igor to New York’s Metropolitan Opera, widening his intercontinental fame.

Amongst the highlights of his career were Rimski-Korsakov’s The Legend from the Unvisible City of Kitesh and from the Virgin Fevronia in Amsterdam, Verdi’s Il trovatore and Rimsky-Korsakov’s The Tale of Tsar Saltan in Brussels, and three productions at the Zurich Opera. He opened two seasons with Janáčeks  Jenufa in 2012 and The Makropulos Case in 2019, Debussy’s Pelléas et Melisande being set in between. Korngold’s Die tote Stadt is to follow in 2025.

The Paris Opéra presented Tcherniakov with the unique opportunity to recreate a historical double bill from 1892, never repeated anywhere else, combining Tchaikovsky’s one-act-opera Iolanta with his ballet The Nutcracker. Loyal to Tchaikovsky’s idea, Tcherniakov staged opera and ballet as an entity of characters. It was Paris again, where Tcherniakov expanded the re-discoveries of Rimsky-Korsakov with Snegurotchka (The Snow Maiden), and Moscow’s Bolshoi Theater with Sadko in 2020.

Several spectacular productions set highlights during the pandemic seasons. Eugene Onegin was successfully recreated at the Vienna Staatsoper in 2020, followed by his debut at the Bayreuth Festival with Der fliegende Holländer in 2021. An overall Der Ring des Nibelungen took place at Berlin’s Staatsoper in 2022.

War and Peace, staged at the Munich Opera, opened Tcherniakov’s theatrical examinations in a politically changed world in 2022. In Aix-en-Provence he transposed “War and Peace” into a historical context, combining Gluck’s Iphigénie en Aulide and Iphigénie en Tauride as a “double bill” and looking at societies before and after the Troian war. Focussing on Richard Strauss at Hamburg’s Opera, he staged Elektra and Salome. Ariadne auf Naxos follows in 2025.

Tcherniakov highlighted the festival summer in 2023. In Aix-en-Provence the unpredictability of love in Mozart’s Cosi fan tutte was transposed upon a cast of “senior” characters. At Bochum’s Ruhrtriennale the setting in a former industrial hall marked a common “Gulag” for actors and spectators in Janácek’s From the House of the  Dead.