Draft:Bernard Uzan

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Bernard Frank Uzan (born December 5,1944, Tunis) is an internationally acclaimed French-American director of opera, theater and film, actor and writer known for the dramatic intensity and creativity of his work.. Bernard Uzan has dedicated his life to the development of the performing arts industry for the past 50 years. His extensive background in the Performing Arts includes great achievements as a General Director, Artistic Director, Stage Director, Artist Manager, Set Designer, Librettist, Educator, Actor, and published Novelist and Internet Journalist. Bernard Uzan received many prizes and awards among which the lifetime achievement award from the Giulio Gari Foundation. He also made an appearance on the Emmy Award winning Amazon show Mozart in the Jungle for which he was named one of the “9 Mozart in the Jungle Scene-Stealing Cameos” by WQXR

EARLY LIFE

Bernard Uzan was born in Tunis, Tunisia, the second son of the Tunisian Jewish industrialist Henri Uzzan and the Italian-Tunisian Jewish Elise Pansieri. His brother, Fabien Uzzan, born in 1939, died in a car accident in 1965 in France. His father, Henri Uzzan, died a year later. Bernard spent the first 16 years of his life in Tunis, attending Lycée Carnot, then, following the independence of Tunisia, he moved to France together with his family. He went to the University of Nanterre in Paris where he created a theater company, performed and directed many plays by Ionesco, Beckett, de Obaldia, Chekov. Spending his formative years in France, Bernard Uzan graduated from the University of Paris with advanced degrees in Literature, Theatrical Studies, and Philosophy. He began his career in the theater as an actor and director in 1963, earning recognition and receiving awards as the Best Young Actor, Best Young Director, and Best Director by the Concours des Jeunes Compagnies during a ten year run in some of the most prestigious French theaters. He also lent his voice to the French dubs of 60 movies including The Graduate, Serpico, and Dog Day Afternoon.

CAREER

In 1965 Uzan became a professional actor and worked with Tania Balachova and Jean Louis Barrault. He continued his career in France as an actor, performing in many theaters among which Théâtre Mouffetard, Théâtre des Amandiers, Theatre de L’est Parisien, Théâtre de L’épée de Bois, Théâtre de L’ouest Parisien, Théâtre Montparnasse, Théâtre de l’Odéon. He also toured all over France in cities like Rennes, Marseille, Lyon etc. and traveled to Madagascar and Ile de la Réunion to perform L’école des femmes by Moliére and Les Caprices de Marianne by Alfred de Musset. At the same time, he participated in many television shows and became a leading role as a French voice in foreign movies. In 1971, Uzan was invited to teach at the Middlebury Summer School in Vermont (USA) and direct French plays with the students. This moment marked the beginning of what Bernard Uzan calls my American adventure. The plays he directed with students were so successful, that the French consul from Boston invited him to start a French theater company in Boston. In 1972, Uzan established the French Theater in America, a company that toured for a decade giving 100 performances per year of classic French plays. On television, he starred in a special series dramatizing the lives and careers of famous musicians and as a special guest on the soap opera, Search for Tomorrow. He also directed the Interactive Language Learning CD-ROM Who is Oscar Lake? in four languages, while still teaching at Wellesley College, Mount Holyoke, Sarah Lawrence. Concomitantly, he also restarted The Alliance Française of Boston with school and artistic activities. In 1981 the invitation by Sarah Caldwell to direct the French dialogues of Gounod's opera Faust at Boston Lyric Opera, not only brought Bernard Uzan to his first direct contact with the opera world, but also changed the course of his career. The next year he directed his first operas with Lake George Opera (Pagliacci), Opera Company of Philadelphia (La Rondine), and Michigan Opera Theatre (La Traviata and Faust). In 1984, he directed Carmen for the Tulsa Opera, returning the following year for Faust with Neil Shicoff, Samuel Ramey, and Diana Soviero. In 1987, Uzan became the General and Artistic Director of Tulsa Opera and the following year he was appointed General and Artistic Director of Montreal Opera, a position he held until 2002. In Montreal, he brought the company a great and unprecedented financial success and international artistic recognition. Uzan supplemented the standard operatic canon by programming lesser known and contemporary pieces, as well as world premières such as Thérèse Raquin by Tobias Picker and Nelligan by Andre Gagnon. Since 1981 Bernard Uzan has directed no less than 415 productions from French, Italian, Spanish and German repertoire, which appeared on the stages of more than 100 opera companies all over the world: USA, Canada, Mexico, Chile, Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Monte Carlo, Spain, South Africa etc in such cities as Buenos Aires, Caracas, Catania, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Mexico City, Miami, Monte Carlo, Palermo, Philadelphia, Montreal, San Francisco, Santiago, Seattle, Zurich, Toronto, Vancouver, Ottawa and Erfurt, where his production of Carmen was voted the Best Production of the Year. Uzan also co-designed many sets for productions, some are still on the market today. Over the 50 years of career Uzan directed renowned singers such as John Alexander Giacomo Aragall, Fabio Armiliato, Lando Bartolini, Franco Bonisolli, Zach Borichevsky, Jose Carreras, Fiorenza Cossotto, Gilda Cruz Romo, Alberto Cupido, Tonio di Paolo, Mignon Dunn, Mirella Freni, Donald Graham, Susan Graham, Greer Grimsley, Jerry Hadley, Ben Heppner, Alfredo Kraus, Gregory Kunde, Richard Leech, Kathryn Lewek, Veriano Luchetti, Cornell MacNeil, Eva Marton, Ermanno Mauro, Sherrill Milnes, James Morris, Jessye Norman, Leah Partridge, Marian Pop, Louis Quilico, Anita Rachvelishvili, Samuel Ramey, Renata Scotto, Nadine Sierra, Mietta Sighele, Diana Soviero, Jon Vickers and collaborated with the prominent composers and conductors Christian Badea, Angelo Campori, Francis Ford Coppola, David DiChiera, Mark Flint, Anton Guadano, Eduardo Mueller, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Tobias Picker, Joseph Rescigno, Bruno Rigacci, Alfredo Silipigni, Michelangelo Veltri etc. Committed to nurturing the artists of tomorrow, Uzan taught courses, classes, and workshops, served on the faculties of Wellesley College, Middlebury College, Sarah Lawrence University, and Mount Holyoke College, in addition to directing Young Artist Programs at companies such as Florida Grand Opera. In this context, in 2002, he created a management company for singers, conductors and directors of Opera. The company named Uzan International Artists (UIA) is presently one of the most successful in the USA. In 2018 Bernard Uzan retired from opera and consecrated his time to acting and writing. As a writer, Uzan published Spoken French for Students and Travelers in 1978 with D.C Heath and Company, the successful novels: Le Ciel Eclate/The Shattered Sky first edition published by Enigma Books in 2008 and the second edition published by Eurostampa in 2019, adaptations of novels for the theater such as The Stranger by Albert Camus, Les Mains Sales by Jean Paul Sartre, the libretto Cyrano written for the opera Cyrano by David DiChiera (world premiere in October 2007 at Detroit Opera) published by Eurostampa 2019 and the blog The Wooden Sword. The past few years he was cast as an actor in many television series like Cake After Midnight, City on a Hill, A Hand of Bridge, Love Life for Monday, Mr. Pritchett, The Douglass House and commercials.

OTHER HONORS AND AWARDS

Wilde award 2017, Best Opera, Cyrano OPUS 96/97 Award for opera Jenůfa at Montreal Opera Félix Award for the most popular show of the season for the Quebec-composed romantic opera, Nelligan, by André Gagnon, Montreal Opera, 1989 Honored by the Giulio Gari Foundation, 2015 Honored by the Gerda Lissner Foundation, 2018