Frank Corsaro


Frank Corsaro was one of America's foremost stage directors of opera and theatre. His Broadway productions include The Night of the Iguana.

Career

A graduate of De Witt Clinton High School, he made his operatic directing debut at the New York City Opera in 1958 with a staging of Carlisle Floyd's Susannah. It was this production that the company took to the Brussels World's Fair that year, starring Phyllis Curtin, Norman Treigle and Richard Cassilly.
He became one of the City Opera's leading directors, creating such important productions as Prokofiev's The Fiery Angel, Verdi's La traviata, Puccini's Madama Butterfly, Robert Ward's The Crucible, Gounod's Faust, Borodin's Prince Igor, Janáček's The Makropulos Affair, Lee Hoiby's Summer and Smoke, Cherubini's Médée, Korngold's Die tote Stadt, Janáček's The Cunning Little Vixen and Bizet's Carmen.
Corsaro directed the world premieres of two of Floyd's later operas, Of Mice and Men and Flower and Hawk. He made his Metropolitan Opera debut in 1984, with Handel's Rinaldo, starring Marilyn Horne and Samuel Ramey.
Corsaro wrote several librettos for operas, including Heloise and Abelard by Stephen Paulus and Frau Margot by Thomas Pasatieri whose opera, The Seagull, he directed at its premiere.
As an actor, Corsaro appeared as Hector Jonas opposite Joanne Woodward in the 1968 film Rachel, Rachel, directed by her husband, Paul Newman. In 1988, he became the head of the Actors Studio.