Michael Levine Set designer

Season 23/24 Artist – Season 24/25 Artist

Michael Levine was born in Toronto and studied at the Central School of Art and Design in London. He works in theatre, cinema, and opera all over the world. 

He has designed the sets (often combined with the costumes design) for the Bregenz Festival (Madama Butterfly), the New York Metropolitan Opera (Parsifal, Madame Butterfly, Eugene Onegin, Mefistofele), Milan’s La Scala (Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Don Giovanni, A Midsummer Night’s Dream), London’s Royal Opera House (Der Fliegende Holländer), the Vienna Staatsoper (Dialogues des carmélites), the Paris Opera (The magic flute, Elektra, Capriccio, Les Boréades, Rusalka, Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Nabucco, I Capuleti e i Montecchi), the English National Opera (Rigoletto, Rudolf Rojahn’s Heart of a Dog), Chicago’s Lyric Opera and Madrid’s Teatro Real (Rigoletto, Billy Budd), the Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam (Die Zauberflöte), the Lyon Opera (Parsifal, Tabachnik’s Benjamin, dernière nuit), Turin’s Teatro Regio (Rusalka), the Théâtre du Châtelet (Candide), the Rhine Opera (La Bohème), the Canadian Opera Company of Toronto (Wozzeck, Idomeneo, Oedipus Rex, and the sets and costumes for the complete cycle of Wagner’s Ring), the Aix Festival (Die Zauberflöte, A Midsummer Night’s Dream), the Zurich Opera (The Queen of Spades, Sweeney Todd), the Deutsche Oper in Berlin (The Rape of Lucretia), London’s Complicite Theatre (A Disappearing Number, Mnemonic), and the Royal National Theatre, the Old Vic Theatre, the Glasgow Citizen’s Theatre and theatres in London’s West End and on Broadway. 

In 2021-2022, he created the set designs for Peter Grimes and Jenůfa (Royal Opera House, London), The Cunning Little Vixen (Bavarian State Opera Munich), Carmen and Turandot (Dutch National Opera) and La Mouette (Royal Dramaten Theatre Stockholm). 

His work has received numerous awards including a Gemini Award, the Prix de la Critique in Paris, the Edinburgh Festival Music Award, two Dora Awards and the Toronto Arts Award. He was promoted to the rank of Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres in 2002.