Romeo Castellucci was born in Cesena (Italy) and studied painting and set design at the Accademia delle Belle Arti in Bologna. In 1981, together with Claudia Castellucci and Chiara Guidi, he founded the theatre collective Socìetas Raffaello Sanzio. He has created numerous productions for which he has taken on the roles of author, director, and set, costume and lighting designer.
His opera productions have included Parsifal at La Monnaie in Brussels (2011), Orfeo ed Euridice at the Vienna Festival (2014), Moses und Aron at the Paris Opéra (2015, with a 2016 revival at the Teatro Real in Madrid), Honegger’s Jeanne d’Arc au bûcher at the Opéra national de Lyon (2017), Tannhäuser at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich (2017), Henze’s Das Floß der Medusa at the Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam (2018), Die Zauberflöte at La Monnaie (2018, in a co-production with the Opéra de Lille), Alessandro Scarlatti’s Il primo omicidio at the Paris Opéra (2019, in a co-production with the Berlin State Opera), A Paixão (Bach’s St Matthew Passion) at the Centro Cultural de Belém in Lisbon (2019), Mozart’s Requiem at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence (2019), Pavane für Prometheus at the Beethoven Festival in Bonn (2021), Résurrection (Mahler’s Second Symphony) at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence (2022, with revivals at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, 2023, and at La Villette in Paris, 2024), Daphne at the Berlin State Opera (2023), Das Rheingold (2023) and Die Walküre (2024) at La Monnaie, and the music theatre evening Le lacrime di Eros (2024), which explores the origins of opera, at the Dutch National Opera.
In 2025 he created the production Stabat Mater, featuring music by Pergolesi and Scelsi and co-produced by the Grand Théâtre de Genève and the Teatro dell’Opera in Rome, with performances at St Peter’s Cathedral in Geneva and at the Basilica Santa Maria in Aracoeli in Rome. In 2026 he directed Pelléas et Mélisande at La Scala, Milan.
In 2018 he made his debut at the Salzburg Festival with Salome, returning in 2021 and 2024 for Don Giovanni and in 2022 for Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle, performed in a double bill with Orff’s De temporum fine comoedia.
In 2005 Romeo Castellucci headed the theatre section of the Venice Biennale, and in 2008 he was ’Artiste associé’ of the 62nd edition of the Festival d’Avignon. He was ’Grand Invité’ of the Triennale Milano from 2021 to 2024.
Romeo Castellucci has received numerous prizes and awards, including the Premio Europa Nuove Realtà Teatrali (1996), the rank of Chevalier in the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (2002), the Golden Lion of the Venice Biennale for his life’s work (2013), an honorary doctorate from the University of Bologna (2014) and the Decoration of Merit in Gold of the State of Vienna (2022). He is a member of the Académie royale de Belgique. The magazine Opernwelt named him Director of the Year in 2014 (for Orfeo ed Euridice), Set Designer of the Year in 2017 (for Jeanne d’Arc au bûcher) and both Director and Set Designer of the Year in 2019 for Salome.
