Partner Lance Mulcahy

Desmond Heeley (1 June 1931 - 10 June 2016) was a British set and costume designer who had an active international career in theater, ballet and opera from the late 1940s through the 2010s. His partner was the Australian-born composer Lance Mulcahy. The work of Broadway's gay and lesbian artistic community went on display in 2007 when the Leslie/Lohman Gay Art Foundation Gallery presents "StageStruck: The Magic of Theatre Design." The exhibit was conceived to highlight the achievements of gay and lesbian designers who work in conjunction with fellow gay and lesbian playwrights, directors, choreographers and composers. Original sketches, props, set pieces and models — some from private collections — represent the work of over 60 designers, including Desmond Heeley.

Heeley was born in Staffordshire, England and began his career as an apprentice designer at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in 1948, and soon established himself as an important designer at that theater and at Sadler's Wells Theatre in London. In 1957, he designed his first set for the Stratford Festival in Ontario, Canada, with whom he established a very long professional relationship, designing sets for more than 40 productions through 2009. He also designed sets and costumes for several Broadway productions and at the Metropolitan Opera.[1]

Heeley has won three Tony Awards. He was notably the first designer to win Tony Awards for both sets and costumes for the same production with his work on the Royal National Theatre production of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead in 1968. His third Tony Award win was for the costumes for The Importance of Being Earnest in 2011.

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