The Phantom of the Opera - His Majesty's Theatre

I find myself in some agreement with CM. There are musicians who have been playing the same show for 30yrs and you can tell as they're usually the ones who rock up at drunk at beginners, are the first ones in the pub at the interval and the first ones in the pub at the end.

It's controversial but I prefer the new orchestrations in Les Mis to the original so I'm very intrigued to hear what Phantom is going to sound like.

Honestly, not anytime soon, if at all. Hopefully that doesn't produce a response of 'well what are you moaning about'.
Call me a purest, but the changes to the UK touring production were destructive enough to make me regret buying tickets. Once you've seen and heard the full original, its hard for any direct reduction of that to compare, in my mind. The diluted orchestrations genuinely made me writhe at points, but some have argued here most people aren't shrewd enough to notice, so it'll probably be hailed a veritable success and set a precedent for the further cuts in the future. 

Not legally or contractually. Morally though? He absolutely does. Some of the musicians (and cast) had been with the show since it opened in 1986. They dedicated almost the entirety of their professional careers, 34 years, to this production, to their employer. They've been thrown into the gutter like a pair of soiled underpants. Without a second thought. Some not even dignified with legitimate communication. It's disgusting.

I guess it was entirely predictable though. Lets not forget this from the same Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber who flew back from New York to vote in favour of decreasing working tax credits for the lower class. He has no real regard for the people below him.

Griffiths hadn't played the same role since 1986. He joined the show in 1990 and it was still a few years after that that he played the auctioneer/Reyer.

There were only 2-3 members of the orchestra who'd been with the show since the beginning.

If we keep saying that this a "business", then we have to recognise that part of business is that people who aren't billionaires like to have job security.

Just wait til Cameron & Andrew find out the latest digital sound desk have 'automix' functions and follow spots can be automated based on tracking markers inside costumes. 3 from Sound sacked and 3 from LX. Soon enough it'll be the DSM pressing go for LX & Sound and a guy running the orchestra off his keyboard.

Who was it called shows like these 'machines'? This isnt "art".

Automated followspot systems aren't yet anywhere near as good as an operator, Robert Juliat have a very nice system (called SpotMe) which is similar to BlackTrax but still uses an actual operator.

On the International tour I believe they use one of the remote operation followspot systems but I'm not sure which one.

That said, if Phantom utilised BlackTrax or SpotMe you could get some absolutely beautiful effects.

I’ve no idea what the process is when you get to the end of a contract. Do you have to re-audition? Do they ask you if you want to stay on? What happens?

I don’t have to re-apply for my job every year but I’m certainly assessed constantly, and have a review every year. He should be doing the same with his employees, especially if he wants to boot some out.

Cameron's comments are completely tone deaf and hypocritical. Artists have to work, they have mortgages, families and responsibilities. Nobody owes them a living any more than ASDA owes the checkout staff a living, this is true. But his justification is outrageous.

Philip Griffiths has been with the show since 1990. Scott Davies for 20 years on and off. John Owen Jones played the role thousands of times. They obviously have no artistic pride either.

If he'd have just stuck to the official line about the post-Covid world he could've prevented another PR disaster.

The sad thing is they will. The Musicians Union holds absolutely no weight, their pr response is testimony to this 'sad and disappointed' nothing more. No requests for meetings to resolve, no suggestion of a strike or boycott.

Unfortunately as a result of the pandemic hundreds of musicians will be looking to finally return to a job they know and love, bills have got to be paid, mouths fed. For the current and next round of graduates, unaware of the politics of this situation, the accolade of going on to work at a CML production is the golden goose on the CV. They'll do it without batting an eyelid and probably accept a fee deduction in the process.

Reviving Cats? Cool!

My God. I have never heard anything more arrogant, narrow-minded and contemptuous of the arts as this comment of Cameron's. And then to be able to pick out this singularly tone-deaf and insensitive comment and specifically say one agrees with it. 

Check. Your. Privilege.

If the musicians had been getting sick of their jobs, they would have resigned. If their lack of enthusiasm for the show had shown through their playing, Cameron could have sacked them citing poor performance. But no. Instead he acts like he's doing them a god damned favour by sacking them. This is enough to unite those who are specifically unhappy with what's going on at Phantom, and those who simply want the arts sector to be given the value and respect it deserves.

Cancel culture will do its job soon enough.

This was also one of the biggest aspects that jumped out at me in Leicester, thank you for phrasing it so well. In my mind I called it "original-ish production but in shiny HD", but the photographic metaphor- "overexposed"- is very appropriate. An overabundance of detail, all of the time, can get distracting. (The same reason why I rarely see an example of HDR photography that truly elevates the picture.) The Point of No Return scene was one that particularly stuck out, the painted inn backdrop was so brightly lit, it did no favours for the busy foreground props and Christine moving across the stage in her equally patterned dress. Hopefully they will have tweaked it by the time it reopens in London.

Good framing is knowing how to isolate background noise from your focal point. The pureness of concept, translated so well to real life, is what makes Maria Bjornson's black box sets so famed. It's also what makes the Masquerade scene so breathtaking and unforgettable- the sudden reveal of richness and textures in a lavish presentation of cast and costumes, after the darker, single-point-focus Rooftop scenes first with R & C traversing an almost empty stage, and then with the golden angel suspended against the cloudy night. I suppose the older technology facilitated the look & feel of the original production, which had so much patina and depth precisely because it transported us away from the crispness and sharpness we have become used to everywhere else.

Now every scene is bright, bright, bright, the lighting and framing so rigid that it wouldn't have been able to visually blend with the varying negative space had the production/sets continued to tour the UK. I was sitting dead centre for a performance and I could clearly see the crash mat structure that rolled out to catch the Raoul actor after Down Once More, you couldn't brush it off as a cheap seats angle that they hadn't accounted for.

I was not sitting as close to the orchestra as you were but I also noted that the new orchestrations sounded more synthesised, to a point and crispness that is obviously not achievable by non-virtual instruments. Again, I hope everything is mixed better at HMT.

Bloody artists wanting to eat, start families. How bloody dare they pour sweat into a physically demanding job 6 days a week and want to get paid for it. The leeches.

They should of resigned and busked in the street in the recessions of the eighties and the noughties.

Job security isn’t for artists and they should resign every year and go into audition for new shows.

£70 is enough to eat, pay rent and travel to auditions in London.

After all they shouldn’t have children or partners as artists, they chose to be musicians they can’t have everything.

Parasites living off billionaire producers.