Oliver Mears

English director Oliver Mears is The Royal Opera’s Director of Opera. He joined The Royal Opera in March 2017.

Oliver studied English and history at Oxford University and began his career assisting playwright Howard Barker. In 2004 he co-founded London-based opera company Second Movement and directed numerous site-specific productions for the company, including several UK stage premieres. He was founding Artistic Director of Northern Ireland Opera from 2010 until 2017. His productions for Northern Ireland Opera included Tosca (winner of the 2012 Irish Times Theatre Award for Best Opera), Der fliegende Holländer, Macbeth (with Welsh National Opera), Salome, Agrippina, Hansel and Gretel, The Turn of the Screw (also at Kolobov Novaya Opera Theatre, Moscow) and Noye’s Fludde (London Cultural Olympiad/Beijing/Shanghai Festivals). In 2021 he made his Royal Opera debut with a new production of Rigoletto. His has directed for other companies including the Young Vic, Norwegian National Opera (L’Elisir D’Amore), Aldeburgh Music (Albert Herring) Magdeburg Opera (Aida), Opera North, Scottish Opera (Eugene Onegin), Pimlico Opera, Nederlandse Reisopera, Bergen National Opera (Don Giovanni) and the National Opera Studio.