Daniele Menghini

A director and actor, he graduated from the Paolo Grassi Civic Theater School in Milan.

He entered the world of opera by winning the directing competition organized by the Macerata Opera Festival in 2020 with a project based on G. Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville”, which he staged at the Sferisterio in 2022.

He began his theatrical training as an actor in 2010 at the Mumos Theater School, directed by Gastone Moschin.

After furthering his studies with Ludwig Flaszen and Massimiliano Civica, he collaborated with leading figures in the theater world, from Robert Wilson to Davide Carnevali, from Massimo Popolizio to Umberto Orsini, Filippo Timi, and Fabio Cherstich. In 2013, he founded the Malabranca collective, which won the critics’ award at the Direction Under 30 Festival for the production “L’amantide”, adapted from G. Parise’s “La moglie a cavallo”. He made his debut at the Teatro Franco Parenti in Milan with P. Utili’s pulp drama “All night long” and at the Teatro Out Off with Marius von Mayenburg’s “Alla luce”.

He was introduced to opera at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, where he completed an internship as an assistant for the productions of G.F. Handel’s “Tamerlano” and G. Donizetti’s “Don Pasquale”, both directed by Davide Livermore.

In 2019, he was selected to participate in the Salzburg Festival as one of Europe’s 100 most talented students as part of Roche Continents, a European gathering aimed at fostering connections between science, art, and innovation.

Immediately after graduating, he worked alongside Graham Vick as an assistant director for W.A. Mozart’s “Zaide” at the Teatro dell’Opera in Rome and G. Puccini’s “La Bohème” at the Teatro Comunale in Bologna. In 2021, he assisted Jacopo Spirei at the Verdi Festival for “Un ballo in maschera”, a production by the Teatro Regio di Parma based on Graham Vick’s concept, and for Verdi Off, he conceived and directed the urban performance “Guerrilla Verdi”, a participatory opera project.

For the Teatro Sociale in Como, he staged “La Cenerentola, Grand Hotel dei sogni” as part of the “Opera Domani” project, in co-production with the Opéra de Rouen and the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris; the production was also performed at the Opéra National de Bordeaux and the Granada Festival.

In 2023, he opens the 59th edition of the Macerata Opera Festival with G. Bizet’s “Carmen”.

For the 2024 opera season at the Teatro Regio in Parma, he creates a new production of G. Donizetti’s “L’elisir d’amore”, in co-production with the Teatro Regio in Turin. That same year, he staged R. Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde” at the Teatro Massimo in Palermo and “Un ballo in maschera” for the Verdi Festival in Parma, in co-production with the Rete Lirica delle Marche and the Teatro Comunale in Bologna.

In 2025, he made his debut at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino Festival with the Italian premiere in the original language of H.W. Henze’s opera “Der junge Lord”, and then returned to the Teatro Sociale in Como with V. Bellini’s “I puritani”, a co-production of the Teatri di Opera Lombardia.