A full length review. (Just ‘cuz I felt like typing it.)
After my recent adventures overseas, I decided to take advantage of my surroundings and booked a ticket to see
Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. My previous experiences included listening to the CD recording of Sara Brighton and Michael Crawford and a touring
Phantom that came to Indianapolis years ago. Other than that, nada. So I was very intrigued to see
Phantom as I believe it should be seen: in a larger-than-live atmosphere.
On a chilly early Saturday night, I threw on a black-and-white number, high heels, added some makeup, and headed off into New York City. Whizzing on the Q train towards the sparkling lights of buildings, I looked out the window and pondered at the irony of life. Just one week ago I was thousands of miles away in Edinburgh seeing Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “baby”. Seven days later I’m in America seeing his “father” of achievements.
Joseph started his career while
Phantom clinched Webber’s recognition world-wide. The contrast between
Joseph and
Phantom couldn’t be any greater. One is kid-friendly, fast, full of puns, and laughter. The other is dark, suspenseful, and seductive. That’s probably why I love both of them and anticipated what was going to happen that night.
A Broadway show can be expensive. I hadn’t gone in ages so I splurged and wound up playing a whopping $120 dollars (about sixty pounds) for my seat. But if it’s Broadway then the standards are top-notch. There should be no wardrobe, electric, or mechanical malfunctions of any kind and the people on stage MUST know what they’re doing at all times. Those are the expectations of the Great White Way. People go into a theatre knowing they’ve paid their admission and they expect to be entertained by a professional cast of performers and stage hands. So whatever happens for the next two-and-a-half hours is going to be amazing one way or another because nobody wants a refund or heads will roll.
Word of advice:
find good seats. If you're going to spend that much then you might as well get your money's worth. I was three rows from the stage but should have booked better because I was so far on the left that stage props blocked my view of the performers or they were turned to the middle of the audience so I couldn’t see their faces. Conclusion? Next time I’ll try to get a seat several rows back and towards the middle of the theatre instead of one on the far left or right. Fortunately, lots of the time the performers came running onto my side of the stage and at one time I was close enough to see the ring glittering on the Phantom’s hand.
What about the cast? I was startled to discover that Jennifer Hope Wills, who plays Christine, graduated from Indiana University! She had an impressive line of credits in the playbill and her voice for
Phantom projects an admirable heroine: strong, noble, and torn between the love of two men. Like all the other girls she wore the long brown wig of curls but it didn’t detract from her open innocent face and she wore the extravagant costumes with grace and elegance. I put my confidence in Wills 100% for the night.
Everyone knows the GO was formerly the understudy for Raoul so I was keen on looking out for Paul Schaefer, the Raoul understudy for my evening show. This was his Broadway debut and he previously did tours and off-Broadway shows before
Phantom. (And he’s engaged, says the brochure. Mazel Tov.) Schaefer was a good-looking young man with pale skin and short dark hair that went well with a black waistcoat and white cravat. He moved across the stage briskly and with the energy of a passionate, love-sick, and somewhat headstrong young man who doesn’t know what he’s getting into by fighting an opera ghost. While his voice was also good, his rendition of “All I Ask of You” couldn’t hold a candle to Lee and Connie’s performance. He spat out the words and talked them rather than singing them reassuringly to Christine. I think Schaefer was trying too hard or maybe being overly eager about his Broadway debut. But he’s got a fine voice and worked well with the cast so as long as someone tells him to relax and ease up a little, I’m sure he’ll go far on Broadway.
That leaves us to the Phantom. I was startled to discover that the protagonist was Tim Martin Gleason, who usually plays Raoul! There was a photo outside the theatre of Christine and Gleason as Raoul that looked nice enough. But I was skeptical. Can a man go from the role of the knight in shining armor to the dark angel of music? If there was any doubt in my mind, Gleason took it away.
He
was the Phantom in voice, acting, and spirit. All his brown hair was slicked back and with a half-mask concealing his face, his voice rang out like thunder or melted into soft pleading tones. I can see why Lee would like to play Phantom someday. It's a helluva role. You could feel the anguish from every motion he made, every shake of his hand and frown on his face. After Christine peeled off his mask and collapsed to the ground in fear, the horrified Phantom did the same. Then he slowly crawled his way towards her like the distorted animal he felt like. At one point he wore an Oriental robe over his tuxedo and a funny-looking hat on top of his masked face: a poor attempt to dress and appear more human than he is. Gleason snarled at Raoul, he acted sarcastic, he wept at Chrstine’s betrayal….he poured out the anguish of the character until one could only pity instead of loath his tortured soul. He deserved every second of that standing ovation. Gleason’s credits were interesting: fours year in business before going into show biz and among his credits were Tony in West Side Story and Joseph in
Joseph! If only he could have sung "Close Every Door" for us…
The rest of the cast were amazing. Madame Giry (Maryline Caskey) was part slave-driver to the ballet girls and part-obedient servant to the Phantom but shows Raoul the correct way to rescue his fair maiden. I loved Patricia Phillips as Carlotta because she was the first on stage in a ridiculously enormous sequined red, green, and yellow number for “Hannibal” and sang in a high twittering voice for her pompous role. She had a lot of comic wit so even within a dark drama, the audience enjoyed several good laughs.
Now onto the theatre itsef. I walked passed two shows on the way:
Les Miserables and
Spamelot (which boasted it could get *gasp*
men into musical theatre!) before wandering into the Majestic Theatre. And ho boy, was it majestic! I mentally kick myself for not bringing my camera but there was no room for it in my teensy evening handbag and I didn’t know you could take pictures during intermission like lots of people around me. (Photography during the show is still strictly prohibited.) The theatre is enormous with a huge ceiling, scalloped details, and elegant lights that give it a fine grand setting for the show. The stage itself was twice as high as the Adelphi but this is
Phantom, not
Joseph. It
has to be big. The sheer grand-scale of the props and special effects is mesmerizing and so extravagant that most musicals couldn’t pull it off. But Andrew Lloyd Webber gave the story such life and passion that it all fits into place. I noticed gauzy black curtains loosely draped around the frame of the stage and after the auction scene, these were quickly thrown off revealing the sculpted gold angels that adorned the old opera house. The chanticleer made me gulp because it doesn’t simply rise up, but out into the audience as well! We could see the Phantom on the catwalk high above everyone’s heads as he laughed like a maniac and shook the ropes to jangle the chanticleer. The special affects were also scary and stunning. I could feel the heat of the flames that spurt from the stage after the Phantom thunders,
“It shall be war upon you both!!”
Another thing is diction and accents. If I may say one teensy thing that rasped my ears at Joseph, its hearing the brothers attempt a twang cowboy western accent and saying, “But Joseph the things that you stood fer.” It’s “for” as in “four”. Not “
fer”!! I’m sorry, that’s just something that drives me crazy unless they talk that way all the time in a musical like
Oklahoma. Anyhow, I was relieved that the Phantom cast stuck to their diction. They didn’t pretend to be British performers singing in a French Opera house so Wills didn’t talk like Sara Brighton, which was more than all right with me. I have nothing against performers with accents but I like people to stick with what they can say as long as we hear them all right.
There was tons of energy on the stage. Nobody simply stood in one place and sang; they briskly go about the stage in joy, fear, or anger. Christine and the Phantom had a lot of electricity in "The Point of No Return" when they move back and forth in constant limbo between saying “yes” and “no” to one another. At one point he plucks an apple from her hand and makes her drink deeply from a goblet of wine so there’s some hidden temptation suggested. And then comes the moment when he lifts up her hand so the audience can see him slowly and pleadingly put the ring on her finger, well, there’s no way to describe his undying love for her.
All in all, a powerhouse of a workout of a show and I only wish I could have stayed longer to stick around and watch the cast come out. But it was a chilly night and I was not prepared for it in a short raincoat so I returned home with the rendition of Music of the Night in my ears and silently thanking Gleason and Company for an incredible evening.
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Seriously. I know how you feel, though. I've already given my heart to see Lee in 
, but not far off!
