Ian Gledhill

Director

Ian Gledhill originally trained and worked as a civil engineer, designing extensions to the London Underground, but he has worked professionally in the theatre since 1983, beginning as an assistant stage manager at Glyndebourne. He was Technical Director for English Festival Opera for seven years, and resident director for Crawley-based Belcanto Opera for eight years. He has directed over 50 operas, operettas and musicals. Ian also works in set design, and has designed over thirty productions, from Les Miserables to The Spiderman Show at Thorpe Park.

While the dialogue in this production of La Périchole is by Ian, he does also write complete opera translations, his work in this field having been performed in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the USA.

As an actor, Ian has appeared both on television and on the stage. Last summer, he was Colonel Pickering in My Fair Lady at the Theatre Royal, Brighton, and this Christmas he was in pantomime with Julian Clary in Cinderella at the Hawth Theatre in Crawley. He describes the change from opera to pantomime as “going from the sublime to the ridiculous — quite literally” but enjoys both. Offenbach is one of his favourite composers and he regards La Périchole as one of Offenbach’s best works, so he is delighted to be working with Opera South on this production.