Having created the most successful entertainment in history, pulling in an estimated $5.6 billion, composer Andrew Lloyd Webber and his producer Cameron Mackintosh can afford a new redesigned and refreshed take on Phantom of the Opera, taking advantage of the advances in technology since the quasi-operatic musical opened on Broadway 29 years ago.
Whether you are an unconditional fan of the show or you find it to be overblown claptrap — sorry, but I am much closer to the latter — you have to admire the craft, and the financial investment, that has gone into this national tour.
Pulled in from the world of opera is scenic designer Paul Brown, who offers new original visuals, highlighted by a massive, revolving central cylinder which opens to reveal the office of the opera impresarios, the Phantom’s subterranean lair and other locales. Even for Mackintosh, who has long delivered full-scale spectacle in his touring shows, this is a physically imposing production devised exclusively for the road.
The story, of course, is a variation on Beauty and the Beast. The Beauty is Christine Daae, a lowly ensemble member of the Paris Opera’s corps de ballet, who has been mentored by the Beast, a horribly disfigured former architect who skulks about the lower depths of the theater. Having acted as Christine’s vocal coach, he now pushes to elevate her to featured roles, threatening dire consequences — including, yes, sending the hall’s ornate mothership of a chandelier crashing to the stage — if his star-making demands are not met. In addition, he extorts a monthly salary for himself from the two new owners of the opera house.
In the same way that Miss Saigon is “that helicopter show,” Phantom has long been about its chandelier, although on Broadway — due to safety considerations — the giant lighting fixture floats down rather than hurling to the ground. For this tour, the descent seems a bit faster, plummeting straight down from the Dreyfoos Hall ceiling to a height 10 feet above the heads of patrons in the front rows of the orchestra. It is an improvement, but still hardly the terror element the first act finale calls for.
Go instead for the exceptional singing of the dozens of cast members, notably Derrick Davis as the Phantom, who wraps his creamy tenor voice around “The Music of the Night” and the title tune. At Friday’s official opening, Katie Travis was Christine, trilling such gymnastic soprano arias as “Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again,” originally written for Lloyd Webber’s then-wife, Sarah Brightman. Completing the romantic triangle Friday night was understudy Eric Ruiz as the dashing Vicomte de Chagny, a childhood friend of Christine’s, who woos her anew with the rooftop duet, “All I Ask of You,” the musical highlight of the show.
Director Laurence Connor, Mackintosh’s go-to guy for restaging his cash cows (Les Misérables) has taken a darker, grittier approach to Phantom compared to the great Harold Prince’s original rendering. While it is a valid alternative, it often seems at odds with the Victorian fantasy inherent in the material.
Connor favors pyrotechnics, including flashpots and vertical fire flames intended to temporarily blind the audience and allow the Phantom to elude his would-be captors. And whether they clash with designer Brown’s vision for the show, or were simply logistically difficult, I do miss the candelabras that used to rise eerily out of the mist of the underground lagoon.
In all, this new look to the classic musical has its pluses and minuses, and your reaction to it will probably depend on how you felt about the show when you first encountered it.
PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, Kravis Center’s Dreyfoos Hall, 701 Okeechobee Blvd., West Palm Beach, Through Saturday. From $31 and up. Call: 561-832-7469.