Biography
Matthew Wild is one of the most versatile and prolific South African theatre directors of his generation, equally at home staging operas, musicals, new plays and classic texts. A two-time Fleur du Cap Award winner, Mr. Wild’s productions have been seen on stages throughout his homeland, as well as in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Sweden and Ireland. From 2015 to 2021, he was the Artistic Director of Cape Town Opera.Mr. Wild started the 2020-21 season with Porgy & Bess for the Theater an der Wien, his debut in Austria. Planned productions of Verdi's Macbeth for the Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden and Parsifal for Konzert Theater Bern were postponed and cancelled respectively due to the COVID-19 pandemic. He will return to Austria in July 2021 for Humperdinck's Königskinder at the Tiroler Festspiele Erl.
He has directed acclaimed productions for Cape Town Opera, including Gluck’s Orphée et Eurydice, Donizetti’s Maria Stuarda, Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer, Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, Cosi fan tutte, and Don Giovanni, Richard Strauss’ Salome, Rossini’s Il viaggio a Reims, Puccini’s Suor Angelica, and Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress.
Matthew Wild made his German debut with a critically acclaimed production of Katya Kabanova for the Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden in 2016, which was revived in 2017-18. Mozart's Don Giovanni and Puccini's La bòheme followed at Konzert Theater Bern. In 2019, he staged Kander and Ebb's Chicago at the Staatstheater Braunschweig,
In the same year, he directed Cyndi Lauper’s Kinky Boots for The Fugard Theatre in Cape Town, where he made his musical theatre debut with an award-winning production of Richard O’Brien’s The Rocky Horror Show in 2013. This was followed by Kander and Ebb’s Cabaret in 2015, Jule Styne's Funny Girl in 2017, as well as a major production of Bernstein’s West Side Story at the Artscape Opera House in Cape Town in 2015 and in Johannesburg in 2017, returning to Cape Town in 2018.
Mr. Wild made his opera directing debut in Sweden in 2009 with Boesmans’ Julie for NorrlandsOperan and Malmö Opera. He returned in 2013 to direct the premiere of Philip Miller’s Between a Rock and a Hard Place in Stockholm.
His work in spoken theatre stretches back to his professional debut in 2000, with the self-penned drama More, created while he was still completing his studies in Drama and English at the University of Cape Town. Notable productions of contemporary scripts include Brent Palmer’s Witnesses, John van der Ruit’s Crooked, Pieter Jacobs’ Dalliances, Brett Goldin’s Bad Apple, Nhlanhla Mavundla’s A Man and a Dog and Nicholas Spagnoletti’s Special Thanks to Guests from Afar. He made his Shakespearean debut with The Comedy of Errors at the Maynardville Open-Air Theatre in 2012, a production which earned him a Fleur du Cap nomination for Best Director.
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Artist Website
www.matthewwild.co.zaManagement
General ManagementArtist Manager

Ingunn Sighvatsdóttir
Artist Manager
ingunn@orlob.net
Mobil: +49-173-2 067 821
News

Theater an der Wien´s "Porgy and Bess" nominated for Austrian Music- Theatre Prize
Matthew Wild´s production of Porgy and Bess in 2020 at Theater an der Wien was praised by critiques and audience alike.The production was now nominated in the category Best Overall Production: Opera, at the Austrian Music-Theatre Prize and for the best set and costume design.
At a ceremony last night at Grafenegg, Katrin Lea Tag took home the Austrian Music-Theatre Prize for Best Design, for her set and costumes, for Matthew Wild's production of Porgy & Bess at the Theater an der Wien.
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