In the 22 years since Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera opened to raves at Her Majesty’s Theatre in London it has thrilled over 80 million people worldwide. Phantom overtook Cats on January 6, 2006, to become the longest running musical in Broadway history with its 7,486 performance at the Majestic Theatre. It continues to play to enthusiastic audiences in its 20th year on Broadway. The touring company will celebrate its 16th anniversary when the show is on stage at the Orpheum Theatre in December of this year. What is it about Phantom that continues to appeal to theatergoers around the world?

You could say it’s the sheer spectacle of the production, the stunning sets and costumes, the lush, memorable score, or all of the above. Yet, if you ask an ardent Phantom Phan and the first-timer, the will agree: it’s the romance.

Acording to Andrew Lloyd Webber, “there isn’t another musical that has been written in the last two decades or so that has a plot that is so escapist, that allows high romance to happen.”

Producer Cameron Mackintosh agrees. “The musical is a kind of beauty and the beast story. It appeals to everyone because it is about an impossible love, which I think many of us have had. The whole framework or design of the show is that you are sucked into this mythical world below the Paris Opera House and yet shown something where we can feel the same emotions as one can feel in normal life.”

The romance of the story is what appealed to director Hal Prince when Andrew Lloyd Webber initially approached him.

“I was in a restaurant having coffee and joined Andrew at his table and he brought up the idea of doing a musical version of The Phantom of the Opera,” Prince explained. “I uncharacteristically said, ‘For God’s sake, let’s do that.’ I was desperate to see a romantic musical. You know, musical and romance should be rather usual currency. But, they’re not. The last totally romantic musical I had seen was South Pacific in 1949. It is an intense love story, beginning to end, and Phantom turns out to be one as well.”

We know the show is a favorite among female theatergoers but don’t discount the guys. Typically, when the action stops and people break into song women are swept away but men slip into an altered state of disbelief. Yet, they dig Phantom. Is it the abused outcast seeking revenge, the two guys fighting over the girl, the mayhem and murder? Or maybe they identify with the man in the mask.

Whatever the case, we do know that the Phantom creative team assumed that audiences would want to lose themselves in a romantic musical and in an atmosphere that does not reflect their personal lives and environs. The focus of the story is not on the fear that pervades the Paris Opera House or the Phantom’s deteriorating mental state. It’s the love triangle — the love stories between the Phantom and Christine and Christine and Raoul.

The dramatic opening organ riff sets the tone for the production and for the Phantom himself — power, rage, passion, and madness. Your heart aches over his desperate longing for acceptance and unrequited love for the young soprano Christine. Everything the Phantom does is for Christine, to further her career, to protect her, to show his devotion. When he doesn’t see that his very actions have driven her away, he is shocked that she betrays him. It just rips your heart out.

After all these years, how does Phantom sustain its poignancy? Hal Prince keeps an eye on all of the productions.  “I see the New York production four times a year and London, twice a year,” he explained “On the road, once a year maybe more if I happen to be where they are. When I watch, I focus on the truth in each character’s emotional response. If you lose that truth, you lose the effectiveness of the show.”

To Prince and other members of the creative team, the road productions can ultimately be more important than Broadway. The touring companies are intrinsically what make a show extremely successful. Audiences on the road are discerning and insist on quality.

“They want the show to be the show that’s up in New York,” Prince admitted. “Though the show tours and we have to get it in and out of theatres quickly, we go to great lengths to make sure it’s exactly the show that’s in New York. It just gets delivered differently. You can’t quite make the holes in the floor that are permanent in New York but you find ways to circumvent that, and it works.”

The Phantom of the Opera continues to bring audiences back multiple times, and the show now appeals to a whole new generation. “I’m bringing my grandchildren,” Prince said. “And it seems to have a real pull. How long will it run? Your guess is a good as mine.”

For the fascinating facts All About Phantom,
click here.

Photo credit: Joan Marcus

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