The Phantom of the Opera - His Majesty's Theatre

Oh, that's disappointing to hear the cracked thing doesn't rectify itself so at least the proscenium doesn't look so awful.

Re the rising piece of the proscenium, it sounds like this is developed from the Connor tour.

Which basically seems to suggest that the Connor tour was VERY much CM in director mode telling Connor and the designer what to do, and then where he has been able to, he's then recycled a lot of this for this production. So we end up with a weird hybrid of the 2012 'restaged' version and the original.

Not really tempting me to buy a ticket. Will save for another Broadway trip instead.

I first saw Phantom in about 1988, so missed the original cast by about two years. It was glorious in London in the 80s and very much the hot ticket. I remember the daily returns queue. In the decade that followed it became quite the global phenomenon and I saw it many times. We also had the sensational Manchester production and the first UK tours.

I then began to lose interest, probably mid 90s as other, more exciting things took it's place. I gave it another go maybe mid 00s and mid 10s and have to say was a shadow of it's former self. Some questionable casting, actors who although they sang well had minimal emotional connection to the piece. And an original direction more or less lost through the decades of dilution from resident directors/cast change directors and the like. The once spectacular set creaky and needing repair. The audience behaviour also became too much for me with the talking, chewing, coming and going and the dreaded mobile phones - truly the worse invention for theatre audiences in my lifetime. It really was a long way from that magical 80s experience.

Still, as a London theatre goer of the 80s, this was always a special show to me and some of my nearest and dearest so we grabbed tickets for last night a few months ago. Have read with interest all the comings and goings of the last 18 months, but am pleased to report what I found had the show restored to the kind of form it had back in the day. Very enthusiastic but impeccably well behaved audience went bananas the moment the overture started and the chandelier began to rise. A beautiful moment.

The vision is very faithful to the original creatives, with direction, choreography and design almost identical. It is restored to acting through song with the relationships between the characters sincere and believable. I personally found it closer to Prince's original direction than the diluted muddied version of the last 20 years. A word we use too much perhaps but it was 'fresh.' Prince's black box vision fully intact with the action centre stage framed non intrusively by the set pieces.

The set was different at the end of Act 1, with a huge horse hydraulically moved centre stage. So high in fact that the Phantom was almost at the same height as when the gargoyle thing came down. Not at all like the horse in the Laurence Connor version that some people seemed to think would be used. The chandelier then falls spectacularly. Otherwise was nice to see a cleaner set. Ironically, the biggest change in design came from the creative who is still alive - I think the lighting was more or less completely re-designed. It looked gorgeous.

The only set disappointment came when there were no candelabras in the title song. These were there at the end however, so assume was an IT malfunction or someone forgot to press the button (I have no idea how these things work!).

Orchestra sounded for the main part great. There were some points where I missed the swell of the huge strings section, but I understand why it was necessary. Wonderful times though they were, sadly we will never see a pit band of 30+ in a West End long runner ever again.

Killian is every bit the West End leading man. Lucy St Louis is beautiful, sensitive and charming as Christine. Very emotional to see her in floods of tears at the curtain call. Rhys Whitfield the dashing romantic male lead and also gas a great voice. Saori Oda is a camp glorious Carlotta. I honesty didn't notice this Piangi being gay thing from the back of the Stalls. Though if he is, you can see why he'd be happy with a Carlotta at new heights of gay iconery.

My mother LOVED it. Partner enjoyed it. I had a great time and look forward to going back to see it settled in. After the awful 18 months we have been through it did feel like détente. Finally a time to look forward with optimism. Elements of the original I missed but I would urge any doubters to go and see for themselves. A slick new version, 95%+ faithful to the original, but more appropriate for 2021. A wonderful musical born again. I look forward to it's future!

God Bless America

It don’t!

There's more use of surround, plus the staged theatre sections on stage fuse into the actual theatre much better. There is some lighting around the perimeter of the proscenium and multicolour LEDs at the top (most visible from upper sections) - akin to mood lighting like you might get in a car. The chandelier lift contains far more strobe effects and lighting around the auditorium similar to the RAH concert. This production pulls you in more so you feel wrapped by it (at least I did in stalls row C), so you feel less of an observer and more enveloped in the action. I don't quite know how they did it, but this production feels warmer and more embracing than the previous. If they cam sort the orchestra/keys levels out to mimic the big sound of the larger orchestra, I'll stick my neck out and say this version will probably end up being the better of the two.

I guess the word we're all going to have subjective opinions on here is "almost". For me, the design changes to the proscenium, the opening, the rooftop, and the front curtain at the end of the show and during the entr'acte are rather drastic when that was the key to the show, but I can understand that others wouldn't have an issue with it.

I'm not so sure though we can call Prince's black box vision "fully intact", though, when the real theatre boxes that were previously taken out of action and painted black have not only been restored but done in very bright colours, and all the black paint that surrounded the ceiling above the proscenium removed.

Re the production looking "warmer", as a poster above put it, it does seem both warmer and brighter...and I'm not sure that's a good thing. The previous colour palette suggested darkness, mystery, and sexuality.



There wasn't a big horse in the rooftop in the Connor scene; it was set on Apollo's Lyre (although a rather flimsy representation of it; the Hungarian production was far more successful at using that setting). The horse was always from the 2020 tour, which is the same one being used here.

Just to add while the show was great, I think the audience helped hugely. To have a full house, fully engaged, not on their iPhones (I am very much not the iPhone generation and it's a loss to me why people are on them so often during performances) was fantastic. 

Having read all the negativity during lockdown I must admit I was a bit worried an equivalent of the "Love Must Die" brigade who took up residence outside the Adelphi in 2010 might be there. But it was 100% supportive and people who were loving being there. Great stuff. 

Great to read everyone’s feedback, and to see lurkers and new members choosing this thread to start posting. Welcome!

The poll is open, please keep to the spirit of this and only rate the show after you have seen it, rather than based on what you have heard about it. If we see the poll being abused it will be removed.

Got a bigger laugh out of this than all the jokes written/timed into the updated Phantom script combined, thank you

Another downgrade at Phantom!

People think they cut what they did for safety reasons? I could see that with the Angel...but not anything else. That proscenium wasn't harming anyone.

While I do not agree she should be fired for the misjudged tweet, her post is embarrassing in its unprofessionalism and undermines the efforts of her colleagues to cast the show in a good light. Looks like she trawled through comments by searching since she doesn't seem to be addressing anyone in particular. She'll have worse comments to face in the future for sure for later productions she works on, so maybe she should learn that audience reaction is part and parcel of the job...?

A look through her earlier tweets also suggests an unpleasant spat with a theatre academic due to the latter calling out ALW for the orchestra firing. Not a good look.