Sellars was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and attended Phillips Academy and, subsequently, Harvard University, graduating in 1981. As an undergraduate, he performed a puppet version of Wagner'sRing cycle, and directed a minimalist production of Anton Chekhov's Three Sisters, with mature birch trees on the stage apron at Loeb Drama Center and Chopin Nocturnes played on a concert grand piano seen through a suspended gauze box set. Sellars' production of Antony and Cleopatra in the swimming pool of Harvard's Adams House brought press attention well beyond campus, as did the subsequent techno-industrial production of King Lear which included a Lincoln Continental on-stage and ambient musical moods by the Steel Cello Ensemble. In his senior year, he staged a production of Gogol's The Inspector-General at the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, MA.
This was followed during the summer of 1980 by staging of Don Giovanni performed under the aegis of the Monadnock Music Festival in Manchester, NH, which Opera News hailed as "an act of artistic vandalism". In the winter of 1980, a production of Handel's Orlando, again at the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, brought him to national attention -- perhaps because of the novel conceit of setting it in outer space. Later, Sellars studied in Japan, China, and India.
He was Artistic Director of the 1990 and 1993 Los Angeles Festivals, presenting works of talented artists like the late Iranian director Reza Abdoh, and playwright Frank Ambriz.
In August, 2006 he directed a staged performance of Mozart's unfinished opera Zaide as part of the Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center in New York; the pre-concert discussions were about contemporary slavery and the prospect of abolishing it, as well as Mozart's egalitarianism and opposition to slavery. In late 2006, Sellars organized the New Crowned Hope Festival in Vienna, Austria as Artistic Director (the festival was part of Vienna Mozart Year 2006), and directed the premiere John Adams' most recent opera, A Flowering Tree, also in Vienna.
In 2007, Sellars delivered the "State of Cinema" address at the 50th San Francisco International Film Festival on April 29. He introduced the screenings of Mahamat Saleh Haroun's Daratt and Garin Nugroho's Opera Jawa, two of the New Crowned Hope films and it also screened Jon Else's documentary, Wonders Are Many, which features an account of Adams and Sellars creation of the first San Francisco production of Doctor Atomic.
Sellars has been no stranger to controversy, often criticized for straying too far from the composer's intention. György Ligeti was deeply upset at Sellars's 1997 production of his Le Grand Macabre at the Salzburg Festival.citation needed On the other hand, Kaija Saariaho has statedcitation needed that Sellars's design for the Salzburg and Santa Fe Opera productions of her 2000 opera L'amour de loin was in harmony with her imagination of the set. Sellars again worked with Saariaho in directing the 2006 Paris, and 2008 Helsinki and Santa Fe presentations of her second opera, Adriana Mater.
