The Phantom of the Opera - His Majesty's Theatre

No-one is lying, it's still the same show. And anyone with half an ounce of common sense can work out it is for profit, you don't need to be spoon fed that.

The thing to be angry about is how the musicians were told (or rather not told). Reducing the orchestra size was pretty much inevitable, but there are nicer ways to go about it and they haven't done that.

Clearly an emotive subject.

Of course it it sad when the sizes of orchestras are massively reduced. The Phantom of The Opera was truly one of the mega musicals and with that came a no expense spared approach to all elements of the production in 1986. And nobody could deny that it is wonderful to have 30+ musicians in a West End pit.

But times have completely changed. There really are no musicals made in the model of the 80s and 90s anymore and there is no producer shelling out that kind of money. Theatre is a business and it is simply not a realistic part of the business model for a long running musical in 2021. 14-16 musicians is pretty much the maximum any show needs so Phantom remains at the top end. And although the finer tuned ear can tell the difference, 99% of the theatre going public will have no idea. Phantom is not unique. Aspects of Love, Sunset Boulevard, Woman in White, Love Never Dies all have lush scores with extensive use of strings and have all sounded sensational with the standard 14-16 piece orchestra.

Further, technology has massively, insanely moved on since 1986 and synthesised sound blended in with the other instruments can sound great. The thing is, you need to either decide to use synthesised strings or not - there isn't really a half way house, and that is why the orchestra has been almost cut in half and not reduced. You either have a full strings section, or you have fully synthesised 'backing' strings with a real violin/viola/cello playing solo lines across the top - as Les Mis now has. In fact Les Mis is a good example of this. As they gradually chipped away at the orchestra, I agree the quality did indeed go down. But when they fully re-orchestrated it 10 years ago and went fully with the synthesised strings plus solo lines over this, I think it sounded sensational. The current tour and London (pre covid) productions have never sounded better.

Yes of course a massive orchestra would be wonderful. But it is a luxury that cannot be afforded. And doesn't make sense. The drop in quality, to the average member of the public is minuscule compared to the cost saving.

And I really think people are underestimating how tough it's gonna be for shows like Phantom coming out of lockdown. A quick lock at the seating plans shows weeks and weeks of barely sold houses. It relies massively on tourism which isn't gonna be back at a meaningful level for ages. It absolutely HAS to re open as a lean efficient machine, otherwise it really will not survive. And that would be a far bigger tragedy than anything else we are discussing.

The argument that it has made huge profits in the past so they should be plunged into a bigger orchestra now is I am afraid a complete nonsense and shows no understanding of how businesses work. The profits go back to the shareholders, they don't sit in a safe somewhere and have long been dissipated around the world. Every business in the world has to be profitable TODAY. It doesn't matter what has gone before, to be a going concern it needs to work now. Otherwise you are pouring money away and ultimately the business will go. M&S were hugely profitable in the 90s and have massively struggled in later years. They don't use the profits from the 90s to give away free food and clothes now, that would clearly be ridiculous.

As for the old orchestra, yes of course this is very sad. People losing their jobs is tragic and everything that has gone with Coronavirus has been truly heartbreaking. But they are not alone. Covid has carved through jobs, lives, communities, industries. It's dreadful. But there really isn't a huge amount that can be done at individual production level. The recent outbursts on Twitter I understand, but are without substance really. The entire team was made redundant with no promise whatsoever that they would be re-employed. So they are cross about something that they were never told would happen anyway. Again, it's tragic how this effects individuals as they clearly hoped they would be re-employed but producers sadly don't owe them anything. Further, none of us will truly ever have any idea how CM/RUG have managed this. Nobody ever takes to Twitter to say "thrilled with my redundancy, bosses have managed it so well." Just doesn't happen. Social media in this regard is where the hurt and the the upset speak out. So one must understand their emotions and the hard time they are going through, but not necessarily draw conclusions about their former employer.

And re ALW and Cam Mac - again, God knows what the relationship is between them. Am sure ALW the purist and composer would always want the biggest orchestra, but ALW the businessman would understand he can't always have this. I think, Cam Mac holds the more power at Phantom London so perhaps could have overridden what ALW wanted. That said, I think they get on better than the media would have us believe.

"The Brilliant original." Well, clearly not for most people on here. But again I think definitely will be for Joe Public. My mates would-not-have-a-clue how many people are in the pit which you can't see. Plus it's an advertising strap line. It doesn't need to be true. It's designed to go on a poster and sell tickets. Advertisers make claims all the time. Is Bounty the taste of paradise? I mean it's a matter of opinion but not really. Is Gillette the best a man can get? No lol, it just rhymes.

So yes. Sad to see this epic orchestra halved, very sad for people that has lost their jobs. But IMHO essential in what will be a very harsh post corona world for theatre and necessary for the show's survival. Plus I do think if it's as good as Les Mis then the new orchestrations could be very exciting. And I for one, can't wait to see the show and am literally counting the days until can be in Her Majesty's again. I still think it's going to be a truly wonderful moment!

Now - if maybe we could have some casting info and communication about rescheduled dates!

Well at least we've moved on from the nonsense that it is going to be "bigger and better" and "more spectacular than ever" to an admission that the quality will drop. Because it will.

Yes, saying that something is "showbusiness" and that is the way it's always done does not excuse it. There is simply no excuse to treat the musicians like that. Cameron would have known for some time if he planned to cut the musicians. Rather than leaving them in the dark throughout this horrendous past year, he could have done the decent thing rather than cause needless anxiety to those who have been loyal to this particular production since...well, in some cases since it opened.

It's also clearly not the same show. On Broadway they can claim it is. If they brought back the original designs as Jessica Koravos and ALW repeatedly claimed would happened, then maybe. But that's obviously not going to happen.

Maybe it's just me, but doing something just because one can apparently get away with it without being caught out isn't a very good reason to do it. I don't hold "Joe Public" in such contempt. And, frankly, the comments on social media have been very surprising in terms of the sheer numbers objecting to this. Almost every post that is made by the powers-that-be seems to attract comments criticising what is going on.

The very look of the show is being altered. It may be the same show, but not the same production, and certainly not the production that was branded for years as the "brilliant original". 



For a start, Cameron hasn't even committed to rehiring the remaining 14 musicians. All of them have been let go.

Secondly, isn't that the very "showbusiness" you repeatedly invoke? *If* it is the case that a show ceases to become profitable (which in Phantom's case I highly doubt - we don't have the London grosses, but the reports from cast members was that it was still selling out and I don't recall seeing it regularly on TKTS in recent years), then it would be usual to close the show. Not hack away at it. 

Again to our ‘new member’, people aren’t so much defending it as acknowledging & understanding the circumstances in which it has happened. Theres no denying that it isn’t a crappy thing to do but I suspect it would have happened pandemic or not.

It looks as though what's going on is entirely what was stated in the joint statement issued in July 2020 ? 


www.whatsonstage.com/london-theatre/news/phantom-opera-new-design-physical_52098.html?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=30July2020

Nope, the joint statement didn't acknowledge they were putting the tour in, claiming they were building new sets to look exactly like the original production.

In fact, they can't afford to do that and - as several of us said last year (but were dismissed) - they are putting in the tour sets into HM's. The 2020 tour did not look like the original in several ways and did not use Maria's original designs.

Aren't the ones denying the reality the ones who repeatedly insisted in the past few months, on posts in this very thread, that the show would return "bigger, better and more spectacular than ever before" and that we should "have faith" in Cameron? Rather than the ones who pointed out from the beginning that to say Hal Prince's production will "return in its entirety and hopefully bigger and better before" was duplicitous when the investors were told at the same time this would not be the case?

David Benedict is at least on the same page as some of us - this is what he said today in The Stage:

It was back on the wha*sons*age forum 😂