Born on 23. October 1973 near Munich. From 1995 to 2001 he studied Theatre and Film Sciences, German Literature and Art History in Erlangen and Munich, graduating with a first class MA (Magister Artium 1,05).
Since 2000 Johannes Schmid has worked as an independent director for stage and screen. In his future plans, besides different feature film project for the big screen, family opera - The Snow Queen by Marius Felix Lange, will be staged at Oper Dortmund in March 2018, La Juive, Grand Opera by Frommental Halevy (in Chamber-Version), will see limelight in June 2018 in Konstanz (Germany) and the romantic opera Der Vampyr by Heinrich Marschner will be staged in July 2018 at Läckö Castle Opera in Sweden.
Johannes Schmid has directed about 40 productions for (amongst others): Teatro alla Scala Milano, Deutsche Oper am Rhein Düsseldorf/Duisburg, Oper Dortmund, Salzburger Festspiele, Bayerisches Staatsschauspiel München, Nationaltheater Mannheim, Theater Sankt Gallen, Theater Münster, Theater Konstanz, Pfalztheater Kaiserslautern and Schauburg – Theater der Jugend München. In 2007 his An Odyssey based on Homer was awarded the “Annual Bouquet” prize by the newspaper TZ-Tageszeitung for the best production of the year in Munich. His production of The Changeling, based on the work of Selma Lagerlöf, was invited to the German Festival of Theatre for Young Audiences in 2007.
Frequently he wrote stage plays based on novels. His stage versions of The Trial by Kafka and Don Quixote by Cervantes are published by Theaterstückverlag Korn-Wimmer in Munich. His libretto for The Obduction from the Seraglio for Children based on Mozart, was published by Universal-Verlag Vienna.
Following many short films, his first full-length work for the cinema: Blöde Mütze! (internationally known as Silly’s Sweet Summer), based on his own screenplay was premiered at the International Berlin Film Festival in 2007. It received national and international acclaim and numerous prizes including the Children’s Media Prize “White Elephant 2007” and the screenplay prize “Children’s Tiger 2008”. His second feature film followed in 2011: the German-Polish co-production Winter’s Daughter. This film was equally lauded with, among others, the German Film Prize LOLA AWARD in the category “Best Children’s Film 2012”. In 2015 he finished his third feature film, Agnes, based on the novel by the swiss author Peter Stamm, for which he also wrote the screenplay. Agnes had it‘s world premiere at the Palm Springs International Film Festival and was released in german, austrian and swiss cinemas in 2016. All his feature films were awarded by the German Film Rating Board as "highly recommended".
Johannes has worked in such theatres and festivals as Teatro alla Scala Milano, Salzburg Festival, Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, Deutsche Oper am Rhein Düsseldorf/Duisburg, Oper Dortmund, Oper Bonn, Theater Sankt Gallen, Nationaltheater Mannheim. He has worked with numerous conductors, including Michele Gamba, Ben Gernon, Robert Howarth, Lukas Beikircher, Jacques van Steen, Otto Tausk.
