 As a polyglot, fluent in German, French and English, Ostermeier was appointed Officier des Arts et des Lettres in 2009 by the French ministry of culture.In 2010 he became the president of the German-French Council of Culture.His 2008 production of Hamlet has won numerous international awards including Best International Production of 2011, and in 2011 Ostermeier received a Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale for his work.