Director:Julia Mintzer
An alumn of the Royal Opera House’s Mentorship Programme, Julia Mintzer has been nominated for two Off West End Awards for Best Opera Production for Bluebeard’s Castle and Der Vampyr with Gothi Opera. A 2017 National Opera Association Directing Fellow, her interactive theater piece Pizza Parlance was listed in Nombre Art Magazine’s “5 Must-Sees of Venice Biennale” and revived for NWR-Forum Düsseldorf and the Toronto Museum of Contemporary Art. Julia’s participation in Dutch National Opera’s Towards a New Dramaturgy workshop was sponsored by Britten Pears Arts. She recently directed a festival of American opera at the Royal Conservatoire Antw rp. She revived East West Street for Nova Touring at the Alliance Francaise in Washington,, DC, starring Katja Riemann and Laurent Naouri.
Her production of Savitri for Hampstead Garden Opera was the first fully staged opera in London since the start of the pandemic, hailed as “dignified and rewarding” by Opera Magazine and for its ‘“sensitive direction that traded in closeness and distance” by The T mes. Julia led an all-female cast of La Bohème for MassOpera, hailed by The Theater Times as “a fascinating, high-energy production.” With the support of the Bogliasco Foundation, she co-created On Behalf of a Madman, premiered by Grand Harmonie and revived for The Maltings Theatre on US Election Day, praised by The Stage as “an inventive mashup.” She directed the first full staging of Fidelio with historical instruments in America, with period orchestra Grand Harmonie at Princeton Univer ity. Julia was sponsored by the European Network of Opera Academies to direct excerpts from Il barbiere di Siviglia at the Opera Academy of Verona, and invited back by ENOA to direct and develop new work at the Helsinki Festival.
As a singer, Julia has performed leading roles at Theater an der Wien, Die Semperoper Dresden, Washington National Opera, and Welsh National Opera. She is a graduate of The Juilliard School with additional studies at Columbia University, and holds a Tier 1 Exceptional Talent Visa in the United Kingdom.
Julia is collaborating with the Animation team in Iran to direct the illustrated film for Zal and the Phoenix and will stage the live performance.