Beni Montresor

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Beni Montresor, photographed by Carl Van Vechten in 1964

Beni Montresor (actually Benito Montresor ; born March 31, 1926 in Bussolengo ; † October 11, 2001 in Verona ) was an Italian set designer , director and illustrator .

Life

Montresor studied at the Verona Art High School and at the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice . Thanks to a scholarship, he was also able to visit the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia in Rome , where he a. a. worked with Fellini .

In 1960 he went to New York and started a world career from there, working as a set designer in outstanding opera houses; so at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where he made his debut in 1964 with The Last Savage by Gian Carlo Menotti , the Royal Opera House in London , the Opéra National de Paris .

The London Times called him “a stage magician”, Le Monde “a vivionary poet”, and the New York Times “one of the few real romantics”. Montresor did not limit himself to the theater: he was also valued as an illustrator of children's books, in which he could let his magical fantasy become Nild. May I Bring a Friend , for which he was awarded the “Caldecott Medal” in 1965,stands out among his thirty works in this regard.

After working intensively as a costume and set designer for the Italian film industry between 1953 and 1959, Montresor turned to this art form more intensively at the end of the 1960s and directed two films based on his own script in the United States and France.

In the second half of his career he returned to Italy and made a name for himself as an opera director at the Scala in Milan , the Teatro Carlo Felice in Genoa , the Teatro Massimo Vittorio Emanuele in Palermo and the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma in the Italian capital. Outstanding during his time in Verona were the productions by Cinderella (by Prokofiev ) in 1978 and by Giselle in 1985. He directed the Teatro Filarmonico and was responsible for the costumes and sets of the Magic Flute in 1991; At the Estate Teatrale he brought Der Bürger on stage as a nobleman and for the Arena di Verona a Madama Butterfly (1997) and The Merry Widow (1999) were created. For his later productions and pictures, Montresor also had to take criticism; it was labeled as artificial or too TV-appropriate.

Filmography (selection)

Director

  • 1970: Pilgrimage
  • 1974: The ritual (La messe dorée)

Stage design

  • 1958: Non sono più guaglione by Domenico Paolella
  • 1959: Destinazione Sanremo by Paolella

bibliography

  • Gaetano Miglioranzi: Dal colore alla luce. Beni Montresor, un protagonista del teatro internazionale Corazzano, Titivillus Edizioni, 2004.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://www.agenziaaise.it/component/content/article/5835.html  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.agenziaaise.it  
  2. ^ Obituary for Montresor
  3. ^ Roberto Poppi: Dizionario del cinema italiano. I registers. Gremese Editore, Rome 2002, p. 297
personal data
SURNAME Montresor, Beni
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Montresor, Benito
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian set designer, director and draftsman
DATE OF BIRTH March 31, 1926
PLACE OF BIRTH Bussolengo
DATE OF DEATH October 11, 2001
Place of death Verona