Mark Lamos is a director of plays, musicals and opera. The New York Times has called him a poet of the theater, and his work receives a chapter in Samuel L. Leiter's The Great Stage Directors: 100 Distinguished Careers of the Theater, along with legendary directors of the 20th century. Born and raised in Chicago, educated at Northwestern University, Mr. Lamos began his career in the theater as an actor, first in Chicago and then on Broadway and in regional theater, most notably the Guthrie Theater, where he spent over three seasons, and the Old Globe Theatre, where he played the title role in Hamlet, directed by Jack O'Brien. He made his film acting debut in Longtime Companion.

Mr. Lamos spent 17 seasons as artistic director of Connecticut's Hartford Stage, for which he accepted the Tony Award in 1989. During his tenure at Hartford Stage he staged acclaimed productions of many classics, including 14 Shakespeare plays, as well as a cycle of Ibsen dramas, including the full-length Peer Gynt, starring Richard Thomas. Many new plays and musicals moved from Hartford to New York and beyond, and the theater premiered new work by Tony Kushner, Simon Gray, Tom Stoppard, Richard Foreman, Anne Bogart and many others. Mr. Lamos received the 1989 Connecticut Medal for the Arts and three honorary doctorates for his work at Hartford.

He made his Broadway directing debut with a transfer from Hartford Stage of Our Country's Good, for which he received a Tony Award nomination as Best Director. His other Broadway credits include Cymbeline, Seascape (Tony Award nomination for Best Revival) and The Rivals (Lincoln Center Theater); and The Gershwin's Fascinating Rhythm and The Deep Blue Sea (Roundabout Theatre). Off-Broadway credits include A. R. Gurney's Buffalo Gal and the world premiere of Gurney's Indian Blood (Primary Stages); Big Bill (Lincoln Center Theater); Tiny Alice (Lortel Award, Drama Desk Award nomination); Lee Blessing's Thief River (Signature Theatre); Love's Fire (seven one-acts by Guare, Wasserstein, Bogosian, etc. for The Acting Company at New York Shakespeare Festival); Jon Robin Baitz's The End of the Day (Playwrights Horizons); and Measure for Measure (Lincoln Center Theater, Lortel Award).

Mr. Lamos was the first American director to stage a play with a Russian company in the early days of perestroika, O'Neill's Desire under the Elms at Moscow's Pushkin Theater. He was guest director at Canada's Stratford Festival, La Jolla Playhouse, San Francisco's American Conservatory Theater, the Guthrie Lab, McCarter Theatre, The Old Globe, Ford's Theatre and the Kennedy Center where he directed Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. His most recent productions include Edgardo Mine (Guthrie Theater), The Circle (A.C.T. San Francisco), Lulu at Yale Repertory Theatre and Of Mice and Men at Westport Country Playhouse.

In the realm of opera, he recently directed Adriana Lecouvreur with Plácido Domingo for the Metropolitan Opera. His extensive work in opera includes new productions for the Metropolitan Opera, including the world premiere of John Harbison's The Great Gatsby (also seen at Lyric Opera of Chicago), numerous productions for New York City Opera, and new productions for San Francisco Opera, Glimmerglass Opera and the opera companies of Santa Fe, St. Louis, Seattle, Washington, Toronto, Portland, Dallas, Gothenburg and Munich. Opera world premieres he has guided include Haroun and the Sea Of Stories (New York City Opera), Central Park (Emmy Award nomination for Best Direction, televised for PBS' Great Performances), Dominick Argento's The Aspern Papers (PBS' Great Performances), John Harbison's Winter's Tale (San Francisco Opera), and Tania Leon and Wole Soyinka's Scourge of Hyacinths (Munich Biennale). New York City Opera won an Emmy Award for the Lamos'-directed Madama Butterfly, televised on PBS' Great Performances.

Mr. Lamos was named a Beinecke Fellow at Yale School of Drama in 2007 and has been awarded the Stanford Chair at University of Miami in Coral Cables this year. He has lectured at Yale and was a visiting adjunct professor in the Department of Theater at the University of Michigan.