Mary Duncan Director
Mary Duncan recently directed the premiere of Time and Chance, the final play by Tony Award winning playwright Mark Medoff. She has directed over 40 operas at venues across the U.S. including The Kennedy Center, BAM: The Brooklyn Academy of Music, and The Aspen Music Festival. Her productions include the American premieres of Bizet’s La jolie fille de Perth and Nielsen’s Maskarade (in Danish) with Sarasota Opera and Der Schauspieldirektor, Bastien und Bastienne, and La clemenza di Tito with the National Symphony Orchestra’s Mozart Festival, Christopher Hogwood conducting at the Kennedy Center.
As Associate Artistic Director of the Berkshire Opera for nine seasons, she directed 15 productions. Highlights include the world premiere of Stephen Paulus' Summer, The Rake’s Progress, Turn of the Screw, Susannah, The Consul (released on CD by Newport Classic) La Cenerentola, La Traviata, and Carmen semi-staged at Ozawa Hall, Tanglewood with Denyce Graves.
Notable collaborations include the Rape of Lucretia with iconic designer Massimo Vignelli at BAM, (the Harvey/Majestic Theater) and The Magic Flute with designs by children’s book illustrator, Eric Carle, (PBS New England broadcast). Over a long association with The Aspen Music Festival, her productions include the Russian Avant Garde, Victory Over the Sun, Comedy on the Bridge, Renard, The Marriage of Figaro, Seven Deadly Sins, Trouble in Tahiti, Proving Up, by Mazzoli/Vavrek, and the American premiere of Bedford’s Seven Angels.
Her faculty positions include The Juilliard School, where she also choreographed Vanessa and The Mighty Casey, The Shepherd School of Rice University, where she was a guest faculty, and The University of Arizona where she was guest director. She is a graduate of Juilliard and did post graduate study at the American Repertory Theatre Institute at Harvard University where she interned with Robert Brustein. Ms. Duncan is the recipient of a Sandoz Corporation grant for her adaptation of Wedekind's Spring Awakening, a project mentored by The Eugene O'Neill Music Theater Conference.