Word: phantoms
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Forum and The Jokers. "The moment I saw him with Sarah at dinner for the first time, I knew there was no point in discussing the casting any further," remembers Lloyd Webber. "The way he hypnotized her with his view of what he thought the Phantom could be . . . I just tiptoed off and left them. I phoned Hal and said, 'It's cast...
Crawford, who had trained as a boy soprano under Composer Benjamin Britten, responded immediately to the Phantom's soaring tenor line. "I had only to hear the first eight or so bars to know that Phantom was something quite special," he says. "The score sent chills down my spine the first time I heard it, and still does. Andrew's got me singing from the bottom of my heart to the top hair on my head...
...Brightman might not be allowed to repeat her role in New York. Actors' Equity objected to her being cast in the Broadway production, rather than an American actress, on the ground that Brightman was not an international star. Lloyd Webber was furious. His implied threat of no-Sarah, no-Phantom eventually prevailed, but under an agreement with the union, Brightman will play Christine for only six months. To preserve her voice, she will appear in six of the eight weekly performances; American Patti Cohenour will sing the other two. (Crawford's contract is for nine months and all eight performances...
Like Cats and Starlight Express, though, Phantom is likely to prove "castproof," for much of its attraction lies in its spectacular coups de theatre inspired by Victorian stage machinery. Among the highlights: a boat gliding across a gloomy underground lake, and a chandelier that appears to crash onto the audience at the end of Act I. The multiple trapdoors that create many of the illusions -- there are 102 tiny ones to accommodate the candles that rise from the gloom to illuminate the Phantom's subterranean realm -- are all controlled by computer. Says Will Bowen, assistant production manager in London...
...Mozart and Richard Rodgers, teams with buddy to write school musical, is discovered by slumming music critic, goes on to pen smash biblical epic Jesus Christ Superstar and monster hit Evita, splits with pal, has megatriumphs with Cats and Starlight Express, then comes up with extra-hot spook, The Phantom of the Opera. Along the way swaps bell-bottoms for swank Belgravia flat, 1,350-acre English country estate, choice property on the French Riviera, $6 million apartment in Manhattan, private jet, beautiful second wife and a worldwide musical empire that, conservatively, rings his personal cash register to the tune...