Peter Sellars

this body is so impermanent… (2021)

A film featuring singer Ganavya, calligrapher Wang Dongling, and dancer Michael Schumacher who during COVID lockdown, created an hour-long meditation on the visionary, radiant Vimalakirti Sutra, a Buddhist text from the first century CE. A businessman, ha ...

Mozart: Idomeneo (2019)

Considered to be one of his most brilliant creations, Mozart's Idomeneo is a perfect masterpiece for the two enfants terribles of classical music and opera staging, conductor Teodor Currentzis and stage director Peter Sellars. Joined by the exceptional voi ...

Wagner: Tristan und Isolde (2018)

Motivated by the love that bound him to Mathilda Wesendonck, Richard Wagner's composition of Tristan und Isolde goes far beyond any simple operatic gesture. Peter Sellars' production pours oil onto this troubled sea of emotions in an almost dematerialised ...

Only the Sound Remains (2017)

This DVD and Blu-ray derive from the world premiere performances, at the Dutch National Opera in 2016, of Only the Sound Remains, a Japanese-inspired double bill by Kaija Saariaho. Her first opera, L'Amour de loin, has captivated audiences around the world ...

Mozart: La clemenza di Tito (2017)

How do we live together in an age of conflict? How do you heal a divided and angry people? In their 2017 production of Mozart's La clemenza di Tito, Peter Sellars and Teodor Currentzis examine these questions through the story of a warrior-emperor who brin ...

Bach: St. John Passion (2014)

Johann Sebastian Bach's St John Passion with the Berliner Philharmoniker and Sir Simon Rattle was one of the outstanding events of the past season. As before with the St Matthew Passion, star director Peter Sellars succeeded in creating a staging which ma ...

Iolanta / Perséphone – Teatro Real (2012)

Iolanta is a one act lyric opera, sung in Russian, by Tchaikovsky. Performed in the style of a nineteenth-century Italian melodrama, the scenes have a recitative introduction followed by a single arioso, aria, duet or chorus. Persephone is a three act mel ...

Purcell: The Indian Queen (2012)

A superb adaptation of Purcell's the Indian Queen, staged and directed by Peter Sellars and performed in 2013 at the Teatro Real in Madrid. Peters Sellars combines John Dryden and Robert Howard's libretto with a short-story written by the Nicaraguan writer ...

John Adams: Nixon in China (2011)

John Adams's groundbreaking work vividly brings to life US President Nixon's 1972 visit to the People's Republic of China. Peter Sellars's Metropolitan Opera production, based on his 1987 world-premiere staging, features choreography by Mark Morris and sta ...

Bach: St. Matthew Passion (2010)

Sir Simon Rattle was in no doubt: the performance of the St Matthew Passion which he realised together with the Berliner Philharmoniker and the Rundfunkchor Berlin in 2010 was for him "the single most important thing we ever did here". Critics around the w ...

Adams: Doctor Atomic (2008)

John Adams's mesmerizing score, in the powerful production of Penny Woolcock, tells the story of one of the pivotal moments in human history—the creation of the atomic bomb. Conducted by Alan Gilbert in his Met debut, this gripping opera presents the hum ...

John Adams: Doctor Atomic (2007)

The European premiere of the opera by the contemporary American composer John Adams, with libretto by Peter Sellars, in a co-production of the San Francisco Opera (where the work premiered), the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and De Nederlandse Opera. The plot fo ...

Saariaho: L'Amour de Loin (2004)

This is the 2004 version of Kaija Saariaho's opera performed by the Finnish National Opera and conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen. ...

The Tristan Project (2004)

A four-hour plus video production inspired by Richard Wagner's oeuvre "Tristan und Isolde" and projected during the opera premiere in Paris, in partnership with Peter Sellars as artistic collaborator, and conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen. ...

John Adams: El Niño (2000)

Headlined by Dawn Upshaw, Lorraine Hunt Lieberson and Willard White and orchestrated by the Berlin German Symphony Orchestra, this Nativity oratorio from composer John Adams tells the magical story of the birth of Christ. Conducted by renowned maestro Kent ...

Theodora (1996)

The Peter Sellars production of Handel's "Theodora", recorded live at the Glyndebourne Festival in May 1996. Dawn Upshaw stars as Theodora, with David Daniels as Didymus, Lorraine Hunt Lieberson as Irene, Richard Croft as Septimius, and Frode Olsen as Vale ...

It Is Now Our Time: Peter Sellars’ The Merchant of Venice (1994)

A BBC documentary about a pre-rehearsal workshop held in New York prior to the Goodman Theater's 1994 production of The Merchant of Venice, directed by Peter Sellars in Chicago. ...

The Seven Deadly Sins (1993)

Anna I and Anna II set out on a seven year journey that takes them through a series of varied life experiences while their parents and two brothers remain behind. ...

Letter to Peter, on Saint François d'Assise by Olivier Messiaen (1992)

In 1992, Olivier Messiaen's epic opera "Saint François d'Assise" was brought to the Salzburg Festival in a staging by Peter Sellars. The distinct visual appearance that Sellars lent to the opera, where video monitors with powerful images are used as a sor ...

The Cabinet of Dr. Ramirez (1991)

Featuring music instead of any dialogue and set in a near Kafkaesque future, this loose remake of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari follows a bureaucrat whom mysterious Dr. Ramirez and his hideous sidekick want as their latest victim. ...

Don Giovanni (1991)

This production was originally staged for the Pepsico Summerfare Festival, The International Performing Arts Festival of the State University of New York at Purchase. Leaving the lyrics in their original Italian, acclaimed American director Peter Sellars t ...

The Marriage of Figaro (1990)

In this modern-day presentation of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's beloved opera "Le Nozze di Figaro," acclaimed American director Peter Sellars moves the action from a castle in Seville to a Trump Tower penthouse on New York City's Fifth Avenue. Sellars's conte ...

Handel: Giulio Cesare (1990)

Director Peter Sellars helms this provocative adaptation of George Frideric Handel's opera "Giulio Cesare," sung in the original Italian by soprano Susan Larson (who plays Cleopatra) and countertenor Jeffrey Gall (in the role of Julius Caesar) but set in a ...

Così fan tutte (1990)

Though performed in the original Italian, Peter Sellars' production of Cosi fan tutte relocates Mozart's comedy of love to the neon-and-chrome glare of a seaside diner, mirroring the turbulent world of late-twentieth-century America. ...

King Lear (1988)

A descendant of Shakespeare tries to restore his plays in a world rebuilding itself after the Chernobyl catastrophe obliterates most of human civilization. ...

Jedermann auf der Weltbühne – 100 Jahre Salzburger Festspiele (2020)

DAU. Cinema (2020)

An ongoing experiment, evolving from a biopic about Soviet physicist Lev Landau into a large scale project – part cinematic cycle, part behavioral experiment – involving hundreds of participants from around the world. Combining elements of film, theatr ...

Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am (2019)

This artful and intimate meditation on the legendary storyteller examines her life, her works, and the powerful themes she has confronted throughout her literary career. Toni Morrison leads an assembly of her peers, critics, and colleagues on an exploratio ...

Franco Zeffirelli: Directing from Life (2018)

Franco Zeffirelli passed away on 15th June 2019. Chris Hunt's biography explores how Zeffirelli's sense of drama was born out of his own experience and how his life inspired his productions. Chris Hunt interviewed him and other famous actors, friends and a ...

Reza Abdoh: Theater Visionary (2015)

The impact of wunderkind theatre director Reza Abdoh's explosive work is finally brought to light twenty years after his death of AIDS, with live performance footage and interviews with those closest to him. ...

Erbarme dich - Matthäus Passion Stories (2015)

Erbarme dich - Matthäus Passion Stories is a labyrinthine narrative in which notables such as Peter Sellars, Emio Greco, Simon Halsey and painter Rinke Nijburg explain their special relationship with Bach's St Matthew Passion to Ramón Gieling (Johan Crui ...

Britten: Nocturne (2013)

Tony Palmer directs this documentary exploring the life and work of the celebrated English composer, conductor and pianist. Britten is particularly well known for his operas, which include 'Peter Grimes' and 'Death in Venice'. Palmer discusses the life exp ...

Hail Bop! A Portrait of John Adams (2006)

Shot over the course of a year, this intimate portrait of provocative composer John Adams presents scenes of the artist at work and at play against the backdrop of dramatic American landscapes that reflect the themes of his music. Though he has a number of ...

Alice Waters and Her Delicious Revolution (2003)

Every great cook secretly believes in the power of food. Alice Waters just believes this more than anybody else. She is certain that we are what we eat, and she has made it her mission in life to make sure that people eat beautifully. Waters is creating a ...

Foreigners Out! Schlingensief's Container (2002)

FOREIGNERS OUT! SCHLINGENSIEFS CONTAINER is a thrilling, insightful, funny chronicle and reflection of one of he biggest public pranks and acts of art terrorism ever committed. Austria 2000: Right after the FPÖ under Jörg Haider had become part of the go ...

John Adams: A Portrait and A Concert of Modern American Music (2000)

Peer into the world of contemporary composer John Adams with this documentary that blends performance footage with insightful interviews and commentary from his collaborators and the master himself. Highlights include performances of Adams's Grammy Award-w ...

Destination Mozart: A Night at the Opera with Peter Sellars (1990)

This special program gives viewers a revealing look at Sellar's controversial productions of Mozart's Don Giovanni, Marriage of Figaro and Cosi Fan Tutte. ...

King Lear (1988)

A descendant of Shakespeare tries to restore his plays in a world rebuilding itself after the Chernobyl catastrophe obliterates most of human civilization. ...

Happy New Year (1987)

Small time crooksters Nick and Charlie have an elaborate plan to rob an exclusive jewelers store. Using a variety of disguises and posing as rich old men and women they begin the set-up, but then Nick falls for the owner of a neighboring antique store and ...