Ming Cho Lee | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Born | (1930-10-03)October 3, 1930 Shanghai, China | ||||||||||
| Died | October 24, 2020(2020-10-24) (aged 90) | ||||||||||
| Occupations | Set designer, professor | ||||||||||
| Spouse | Elizabeth (Betsy) Lee | ||||||||||
| Children | Richard Lee, Christopher Lee, David Lee | ||||||||||
| Parent(s) | Lee Tsu Fa Tang Ing | ||||||||||
| Relatives | Lee Tsu Fa (grandfather) | ||||||||||
| Chinese name | |||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 李名覺 | ||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 李名觉 | ||||||||||
| |||||||||||
Ming Cho Lee (Chinese:李名覺;pinyin:Lǐ Míngjué; October 3, 1930 – October 23, 2020)[2] was a Chinese-American theatricalset designer and professor at theYale School of Drama.[3]
Lee was born on Oct. 3, 1930, inShanghai, China to Lee Tsu Fa and Tang Ing.[3] Lee, whose father (Lee Tsu Fa) was a Yale University graduate (1918), moved to the United States in 1949 and attendedOccidental College.
Lee married Elizabeth (Rapport) Lee in 1958. They had three sons Richard, Christopher, and David.[3]
Lee first worked onBroadway as a second assistant set designer toJo Mielziner onThe Most Happy Fella in 1956. His first Broadway play as Scenic Designer wasThe Moon Besieged in 1962; he went on to design the sets for over 20 Broadway shows, includingMother Courage and Her Children,King Lear,The Glass Menagerie,The Shadow Box, andFor Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf.
He also designed sets for opera (including eight productions for theMetropolitan Opera and thirteen for theNew York City Opera), ballet (including Firebird, Carmina Burana, Silver Lining and Swan Lake forPacific Northwest Ballet[4]), and regional theatres such asArena Stage, theMark Taper Forum, and theGuthrie Theater.
He designed over 30 productions forJoseph Papp atThe Public Theater, including the originalOff-Broadway production ofHair (musical). Starting in 1969, Lee taught at the Yale School of Drama, where he was co-chair of the Design Department. In February 2017, he announced that he would be retiring at the end of the fall semester.[5] He was on the Board of Directors for The Actors Center inManhattan. Lee is the subject ofMing Cho Lee: A Life in Design by Arnold Aronson, which was published byTCG Books in 2014.[6] In 2013, the Yale school of Architecture and School of Drama staged a retrospective of his work at the architecture gallery.[7]
