Saturday Matinee

A shot of the infamous “Phantom of the Opera” chandelier

After a bit of a blogging slump in addition to feeling like I’m drowning at work, I had a chance to return back to my roots of sorts. I went to see the touring production of Phantom of the Opera, the very first musical I ever saw. Although it’s not one of my favorites now, it was one of those shows that planted the seeds that grew into my love for theater.

The most striking thing for me was to watch the show as it mirrored the real life story behind its creation. I’m a bit fuzzy on the details, but this is how I remember it (and how I like to remember it). Andrew Lloyd Webber married singer Sarah Brightman in 1984, and this was his sweeping Gothic love story that he wrote for her. She starred as Christine in the original cast in 1986. In Phantom of the Opera, it’s painfully clear how Lloyd Webber viewed himself as the disfigured Phantom who entrances Christine, his love interest, with his music and showcases her vocal talents so that another man, Raoul the Vicomte de Chagny, falls in love with her. In a random case of art imitating life, [spoiler alert] Lloyd Webber wrote the ending with Christine running off with Raoul instead of the Phantom, foreshadowing Lloyd Webber’s divorce with Brightman in 1990.

Since the moment
I first heard you sing,
I have needed you with me,
To serve me, to sing,
for my music

PHANTOM:
Angel of Music!
You denied me,
turning from true beauty
Do not shun me
Come to your strange Angel

The national tour surged above the faded polish of a show that passed its peak. The dated feel came from the sweeping Gothic melodrama and extravagant orchestration that’s so over the top and so eighties. The limitations of a national tour forced to use portable sets and a thin fog machine struggled to match the overextravagance the show requires. Despite this, the talented cast transcended its limited conditions to resurrect the show to life. Sara Jean Ford as the young Christine Daae brought a nuanced phrasing and subtle momentum that gave new life to the music that I’ve heard a million times.Stephen Tewksbury sang the Phantom with a deep gravitas and soaring power, yet Christine’s attraction to his scary persona didn’t make sense, as he controlled her through brute force rather than hypnotic allure. In the original cast, Phantom’s hold over Christine is supported by Michael Crawford’s eery timbre in his singing voice that entrances the listener, despite his villain moments. Tewksbury lacks the same hypnotic quality which makes it makes it difficult to empathize with his pain as well as making Christine’s draw to him unclear. Despite vague direction, Tewksbury’s powerful voice still drew me into the story in the end of the second act, in the fight when he entraps Christine and Raoul (the appropriately debonair Greg Mills) in his underground lair. In the fight of conflicting passions, I finally found myself getting swept up in the push-pull of passionate strength and vulnerable pain. John Whitney as Piangi was another standout for me, with his crystalline bell-like voice ringing clear.

Although it’s not my favorite, the Phantom of the Opera proved to me that its music of the night still has its charms. I’ll be seeing it again soon just to see Kelly Jeanne Grant sing Christine. She was in one of my favorite recent Broadway shows, the revival of Company, and it’s too hard to keep away from the chance to see Company’s Kathy sing the role of Christine Daae.

The Phantom of the Opera official website