Castelli was instrumental in helping the show reach Broadway and would later lead the effort to introduce Hair to a worldwide theatre audience.
Beginning as an innovative lighting designer for ballet and opera, Castelli tried screenwriting, playwriting, choreographing and directing before becoming a producer of Hair in New York and then masterminding its many international productions.
[1][2] Castelli began his professional artistic career in France working for ballet and opera companies in Paris, starting with lighting design.
He then was able to stage a first-class production of his ballet Les Algues, composed by Guy Bernard, and hired the ballerina Janine Charrat to choreograph and dance the lead role.
[1] The ballet earned him considerable success and gave him an "entrée to the society of artists" that, at the time, included Louis-Ferdinand Céline and Jean-Paul Sartre.
He wrote numerous plays, including The Umbrella which was produced both on Broadway and in London, The Men's Room and A Frenchman in New York, the last of which was turned into a film.
[7] He produced and sometimes directed companies in France, Germany, Mexico and several other countries, unearthing local and international talent such as Donna Summer and the French singer Julien Clerc.
[8] During the last 15 years of his life, Castelli lived mostly in the Yucatán, Mexico, where he was artist in residence at the Maroma Resort and Spa in Riviera Maya, not far from Cancún.