The story starts out in 1905. An auction is being held to sell the old memorablilias from the Opera Populaire.  The auctioneer motions towards a large chandelier 'in pieces' on the floor.
    "Some of you may recall the strange affair of the Phantom of the Opera: a mystery never fully explained. We are told ladies and gentlemen, that this is the very chandelier which figures in the famous disaster. Our workshops have restored it and fitted up parts of it with wiring for the new electric light, so that we may get a hint of what it may look like when re-assembled. Perhaps we may frighten away the ghost of so many years ago with a little illumination, gentlemen?" The auctioneer states, as he switches on the chandelier. An enormous flash emits itself from the chandelier, and the overture starts, transporting us back in time to the late 1800's.... and into the time when the Phantom reigned the opera house...

      The story is about a young woman named Christine, once chorus girl, turned diva, and an opera house haunted by a 'Phantom'.
In the beginning, the Phantom falls in love with Christine's voice and deceives her by claiming to be her 'Angel of Music', offering to give her voice lessons through her dressing mirror.  Christine's voice metamorphosis's from a insecure, soft , yet lovely voice, into the 'perfect instrument' under the Phantom's instruction. On Christine's premiere in Hannibal, a childhood friend of Christine's then enters the scene, Raoul de Chagny.  That very night, Raoul goes to Christine's dressing room and proposes they go to dinner to celebrate her triumph. Christine responds that "The Angel is very strict". Ignoring her, he announces he will return shortly.   The Phantom, then, takes the opportunity to make his presence known from behind the mirror and lures Christine down to his lair beneath the opera house....
    The next morning Christine awakens to find herself in the Phantom's lair, and finds the Phantom himself at his organ composing a terrifying melody. Overcome by curiosity at the shockingly white mask covering half of his face, she sneaks up behind him, and unmasks him. She gasps in utter revulsion and horror at the sight of his horrible deformity....

    This story is about the struggle of a man with a face of a monster, and a young woman with the voice of an angel.  Would she ever learn to see the man behind the mask?  A man so brilliant, and yet so ugly, that he had faced the pains and rejections of the world in its fullest..?.  A man, who could have held an empire of the world in the palm of his hand-  had he not been 'blessed' with his gruesome deformity?  And a man, who deep inside wanted nothing more than love..... ?
 
  But love, ladies and gentlemen,  is a terrible thing..... If you can never attain it.......
 

                   "My mind has touched the farthest horizons of mortal imagination and reaches ever outward to embrace infinity. There is no knowledge beyond my comprehension, no art or skill upon this entire planet that lies beyond the mastery of my hand. And yet, like Faust, I look in vain, I learn in vain. . . . .For as long as I live, no woman will ever look on me in love. "
                                                                                    -Quote; Erik (phantom)