HOLLYWOODS' FILMS & BOOKS
The first and greatest 'Phantom' - a 1925 lobby card for the Lon Chaney film.
Lon Chaney, whose ability to undergo fearsome physical deformation in the assumption of his roles earned him a legendary reputation. He was a master of make-up, 'The Man of a Thousand Faces', and although his appearances were frequently grotesque he was able to display a degree of pathos sufficient to win the sympathy of his audiences. He originally started his career with Universal Studios and was lured away by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. After negotiations between Universal and MGM, he was loaned out to Universal to star in this role of The Phantom.
Lon Chaney had resolved to make his performance a Tour de Force that would strike terror throughout the audience, and he succeeded. There is a classic moment in the film when Mary Philbin snatches his mask off from behind. The revelation as Chaney faces the camera with his horrific countenance exposed, and then turns to confront Philbin, who is overcome with terror, sent such shudders through the audience that theatre managers were urged by the distributors' publicists to lay in stocks of smelling salts for nervous ladies who were likely to faint at the awful sight. Contrary to popular belief, Chaney's make-up was not based on a mask, but on his real face. He inserted a wire device into his nose to push his nostrils apart and give it an upturned look. He placed cellulouid discs inside his cheeks to change the facial shape. Drops in his eyes produced the bulging pop-eyed look. Chaney had set himself a task that would have daunted most actors and succeeded, for in spite of a macabre and repulsive appearance he was able to project so much compassion and sorrow that it was perfectly possible to feel sympathy for this misshapen creature. Chaney's parents had been deaf mutes, and from his earliest childhood he had been obliged to signify his feelings through expression and gesture, which was a contributing factor to his success as a Silent Star. He only made one talking picture before his death from bronchial cancer in 1930.
Chaney's Phantom look was also a hard one to imitate. James Cagney came nowhere near it when he played Chaney in the 1957 film biography 'Man of a Thousand Faces'. Here Cagney imitated Chaney's stance in the 1957 film.
In 1943 a new phantom film was made. It was conceived on a much more lavish scale than was the norm during the economy-conscious climate prevailing in the middle of the 2nd World War. It was made in Technicolor with a budget of $1.75 million, quite the sum for that time. The money, however, was mainly spent on a large cast of singers, lavish costumes and a great many musical sequences. It was the opera, rather than The Phantom, that won in the end. It had been intended that it should be a musical extravaganza. Leroux's storyline was completely revised, and the names of many of the characters were changed.
Claude Rains wearing the mask of The Phantom Claude Rains, a soft-spoken and distinguished British actor, was cast as Erique Claudin, a shy, middle-aged violinist in the orchestra, who had been using his hard earned money to pay secretly for singing lessons for the diva's understudy, Christine Dubois, for whom he has an unrequited passion. She is not aware of how her tuition is financed and has two suitors vying for her affections as well. Claudin is fired from his orchestral job because his playing skills are fading, he attempts to sell his Concerto to an unsympathetic publisher. Hearing one of his own compositions played in the next room, and believing that he has been robbed, he attacks the publisher, but a female assistant throws a tray full of etching acid in his face. He escapes from the police by hiding in the sewers.
Later, Christine (Susanna Foster) is addressed by a hidden voice, and the diva to whom she is understudy is murdered in her dressng-room. A note is received by the management urging that Christine sing the leading role in a new production, but in order to draw The Phantom out, the Inspector requests that someone else be given the role. The angry Phantom cuts the chain that suspends the chandelier over the auditorium. In the pandemonium that follows, he abducts Christine from the backstage area, taking her to his underground lair, where he plays his piano concerto to her. She is urged to sing and does so unwillingly. The two suitors are in pursuit through the cellars and hear her voice. Meanwhile she snatches The Phantom's mask and reveals the disfigured face of Claudin. At that moment her rescuers burst in, a shot is fired and Claudin is killed by a rock fall; the others run away and escape in the nick of time. Later on the two rivals each invite Christine to supper after her triumph on the stage, but she tells them that she is more interested in her career than in either one of them, and so the two bachelors go off together on the town.
The 1962 film done by Hammer Films, starring Herbert Lom as The Phantom. It was more a remake of the 1943 version rather than the 1925 film, but there was a significant difference in that The Phantom was now a wholly sympathetic character, blamed for the foul deeds of a new menace, the Dwarf, and he dies attempting to save the heroine from the falling chandelier.
In 1974 a television movie, Phantom of Hollywood, was made, directed by Gene Levitt, which took as its setting not an opera house, but a movie studio. The Phantom was an old, disfigured actor, played by Jack Cassidy, who had hidden out on the lot for thirty years, but when the bulldozers come to destroy his home he goes on a wild rampage. A neat idea brought down by an inadequate script. Several old Hollywood names also appear in this movie, Broderick Crawford, Peter Lawford, Corinne Calvet, Jackie Coogan and John Ireland.
Also in 1974 a more interesting film version was done by Brian De Palma. A rock version called 'The Phantom of the Paradise'. Paul Williams composed most of the music, and he also appeared as Swan, a machiavellian record impresario, with William Finley as Winslow Leach, an unknown composer whose music Swan steals for his new rock palace, The Paradise. Winslow is framed and sent to prision. He escapes, breaks into Swan's record factory to do some sabotage, but gets his head stuck in a disc-pressing machine. He adopts a birdlike mask to hide his face together with a long cape and haunts The Paradise more or less openly. Swan persuades him to complete his rock opera on the Faust legend, and Winslow agrees providing that Phoenix, a girl singer (Jessica Harper) with whom he is infatuated, has the lead. Swan secretly gives the part to Beef, a gay muscelbound male, but the Phantom kills him.
When Winslow discovers that Swan has signed a pact with the Devil and is planning to have Phoenix assassinated on coast-to-coast television he has a confrontation with Swan and the TV rock fans of America see both their spectacular deaths instead. The movie was not a success when it was first released, but it did however, establish a cult following.
In 1983 a television movie was broadcast. the setting this time was in Hungary, using a convenient warren of tunnels under a brewery. The opera house scenes were filmed in the theatre at Kecskemet. The Phantom was played by Maximilian Schell, with Jane Seymour as his victim and Michael York as her lover. The setting is Budapest before the 1st W.W. the wife of the conductor makes her debut, but a powerful impresario and spurned lover organizes a bad review. She kills herself and her husband, in a struggle with the critic responsible, knocks over a heater setting his clothes alight. He douses himself with what he thinks is water but is really acid. Permanently scarred he crawls off to the sewers to don the Phantom Mask. Later a young singer who seems to resemble his dead wife, appears. The Phantom then sets out on his terrifying plan to destroy his enemies and make sure that the girl has the sucess denied his wife.
In 1990 Robert Englund (Freddie Krueger in the enormously successful 'Nightmare on Elm Street') returned to the screen with a blood-thirsty vengeance in this chilling and gory remake of the horror film classic 'The Phantom of the Opera'
The Phantom, cursed by the Devil, stalks the earth - the living dead. Jill Schoelen is the young opera singer sucked from the present back to 19th century London. In the past, her worst nightmare is about to become a terrifying reality. The Phantom falls desperately in love, and schemes to make her the star of the opera. But this Phantom has an unusual way of showing that he cares, instead of sending flowers, he sends bodies. As the slaughter escalates, the young singer is catapulted to stardom and perhaps to an early grave.
Of worthy mention is the NBC miniseries "Phantom of the Opera' starring Charles Dance as The Phantom and Burt Lancanster as his father. It is one of the finest versions I had yet seen. Unfortunatly I don't believe that it was ever released on video. but I was lucky enough to have the forsight to tape it on my VCR, so I have enjoyed it many times over the years. I belive it was produced in early 1990 or late 1989. Note: I've just recently found out that it was released on video and DVD in 1999. Ten years after it was shown on TV. If you can buy this, I highly recommend that you do so, you won't be dissappointed!
SYNOPSIS Tony Richardson's version of Leroux's oft-filmed novel about a disfigured hermit and his tortured love for a gifted young singer stars Charles Dance as the maimed Erik Destler, aka the Phantom, in a musical adaptation of Arthur Kopit's 1982 play, which renders its protagonist a more sympathetic figure than had previous versions. Gerard Carriere (Burt Lancaster) has managed the Paris Opera House for many years but has been dismissed by the new owners, M. Cholet (Ian Richardson) and his talentless wife, Carlotta (Andrea Ferreol). This displeases the Phantom, who inhabits the depths of the opera house, since Carriere is a friend who has protected him, even inventing the Phantom legend to keep strangers from approaching his domain. Christine (Teri Polo) has arrived to study singing with Carriere but, in his absence, is hired as costumer and given lodging at the opera. When he hears Christine's singing, the Phantom, enchanted by her voice, seeks her out to offer singing lessons while insisting on retaining his anonymity. She agrees, and they begin working together. Simultaneously, a number of accidents befall Carlotta while she is performing, all a part of the Phantom's efforts to drive the mediocre singer from the stage and replace her with his beloved protégée. Surprsingly, given the tenor of Richardson's career, this highly romantic version of the story, which formed the basis of the popular stage musical, is played abolutely straight, with fine performances from Dance, Richardson, and Lancaster.
Phantom of the 0pera (1998), Director Dario Argento, Italy Julian Sands plays a very good Phantom, doing a good job presenting the character's dual nature. Asia Argento plays the part of Christine, and though she overacts and seems to play the wrong emotion during certain scenes, she still plays a relatively good role here. Andrea Di Stefano plays Raoul, and though his character doesn't have a whole lot of depth, he carries it well. The bottom line with Phantom is that it's not going to please everybody. Diehard fans of classic Phantom of the Opera probably won't appreciate Argento's decidedly odd take on the story, and many (though not all) Argento fans will have trouble handling his shift in directorial style from his work 20 years ago. But, if you go into Phantom ready for visually beautiful film and an unconventional narrative, you should come away from the movie entertained.
It must be noted that in most of the films after Lon Chaney, the scriptwriters have shied away from the idea that The Phantom, or Erik, was born deformed but was of high intelligence, rather like the Elephant Man, and that his psychological condition stemmed from his need to hide away from the real world and create an environment in which he could be the unchallenged master. They have found it easier to deal with a normal man suffering a wrong and an accidental disfigurement, making The Phantom's obsession simplified and coarse, and his existence implausible (how does he in a short space of time find and furnish his lair even to the extent of installing a piano?). At least Leroux gave his Phantom not only many years to establish himself but also architectural training and oriental experience in building secret hideaways, as well as a contract from Garnier himself to work on the extended construction of the opera house. Leroux's Phantom did go out into the streets and ride in cabs, wearing a less frightening disguise than the mask used for his opera house terror, and was in spite of his bizarre apperance , able to comport himself like other men. Nevertheless the yarn, written in the spirit of a sensational thriller, has survived these and many other variations, plainly possessing the imaginative qualities that the public loved. It is after all, a familiar love story, a version of The Beauty and The Beast.
Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom of the Opera (2005)
His voice calls to her, nurturing her extraordinary talents from the shadows of the opera house where innocent chorus girl Christine Daae (EMMY ROSSUM) makes her home. Only ballet mistress Madame Giry (MIRANDA RICHARDSON) knows that Christine's mysterious "Angel of Music" is actually the Phantom (GERARD BUTLER), a disfigured musical genius who haunts the catacombs of the theatre, terrifying the ensemble of artists who live and work there. When temperamental diva La Carlotta (MINNIE DRIVER) walks out in the middle of a dress rehearsal for the company's latest production, the theatre's eager new managers (SIMON CALLOW and CIARAN HINDS) have no choice but to thrust Christine into the spotlight. Her mesmerizing opening night performance captivates both the audience and the Phantom, who devotes himself to casting his protégé as the opera's next star. But he is not the only powerful man to be awed by the young soprano, as Christine soon finds herself courted by the theatre's wealthy patron, the Vicompte Raoul de Chagny (PATRICK WILSON). Though she is enthralled by her charismatic mentor, Christine is undeniably drawn to the dashing Raoul, enraging the Phantom and setting the stage for a dramatic crescendo in which soaring passions, fierce jealousies and obsessive love threaten to drive the fated lovers past the point of no return. Warner Bros. Pictures presents, in association with Odyssey Entertainment, a Really Useful Films / Scion Films production of a film by Joel Schumacher, The Phantom of the Opera, starring GERARD BUTLER, EMMY ROSSUM, PATRICK WILSON, MIRANDA RICHARDSON and MINNIE DRIVER. Directed by JOEL SCHUMACHER from a screenplay by ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER & JOEL SCHUMACHER, the film is produced by ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER. The executive producers are AUSTIN SHAW, PAUL HITCHCOCK, LOUISE GOODSILL, RALPH KAMP, JEFF ABBERLEY, JULIA BLACKMAN and KEITH COUSINS. The co-producer is ELI RICHBOURG. TERRY The director of photography is JOHN MATHIESON; the production designer is ANTHONY PRATT; the film is edited by RAWLINGS, A.C.E.; the costume designer is ALEXANDRA BYRNE; the visual effects supervisor is NATHAN MCGUINNESS; and the choreographer is PETER DARLING. The music is by ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER, lyrics by CHARLES HART, and additional lyrics by RICHARD STILGOE. The music co-producer is NIGEL WRIGHT. The music supervisor and conductor is SIMON LEE. Originally produced for the stage by CAMERON MACKINTOSH & THE REALLY USEFUL GROUP. Based upon the novel "Le Fantôme de l'Opéra" by GASTON LEROUX. Stage play directed by HAROLD PRINCE.
Cast and Characters For director Joel Schumacher and producer-composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, casting their film version of Phantom proved to be an exceptional challenge. Schumacher envisioned the film as a sexy young love story, and set out to cast fresh new actors in the principal roles. This was especially vital in casting Christine, a naïve, orphaned teenager who believes the Phantom's voice calling to her from the shadows of the opera house is the "Angel of Music" her dying father promised to send her. "Part of the beauty of the character is her innocence, her attachment to her father and her belief that the Phantom might actually be a representation of him from beyond the grave," Schumacher notes. "We needed to find a young woman who could exude a genuine youthful innocence and longing, and at the same time, we had to find two wildly charismatic actors to play the two men she is torn between." "One of Joel's trademarks is that he finds talented young actors who are just about to break through," says Lloyd Webber, who entrusted the acting aspect of the casting process to Schumacher while he strived to achieve the perfect "vocal balance" between the candidates who demonstrated they possessed the vocal chops to perform his libretto of sophisticated songs. "It was absolutely crucial that we have people who could really sing," he emphasizes, "because song drives the entire piece." Set in Paris in 1870, The Phantom of the Opera tells the story of a disfigured musical genius who terrifies the denizens of the Opera Populaire, the city's premiere opera house. When he falls fatally in love with Christine, the Phantom devotes himself to creating a new star for the Opera, exerting a strange sense of control over the young soprano as he nurtures her extraordinary talents. The role of the eponymous Phantom demanded an actor who radiates a charismatic intensity. "We needed somebody who has a bit of rock and roll sensibility in him," Lloyd Webber says. "He's got to be a bit rough, a bit dangerous; not a conventional singer. Christine is attracted to the Phantom because he's the right side of danger, so we had to find an actor who could deliver that vocal quality." The filmmakers found the myriad qualities they were looking for in Gerard Butler, best known to American audiences for his starring role opposite Angelina Jolie in the 2003 blockbuster Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life. "Gerry Butler has got a great rock tenor voice," Lloyd Webber praises. "I saw Gerry Butler in Dracula 2000 and he had such incredible screen presence, I wanted to meet him," Schumacher recounts. "He's a wonderful actor and I knew he would make a stunning Phantom." Butler was not familiar with the stage production when Schumacher initially approached him about the role, so he listened to the original cast recording while reading the screenplay for the first time. "It just blew me away. By the end of the script, I had tears streaming down my face," says the actor, who has since seen the musical in London and on Broadway. "I really identified with the character of the Phantom, with his passion, his longing and artistry, as well as the pain and isolation he's felt all his life. "I think that's why Phantom is such a powerful piece, because people identify with his pain," Butler muses. "The older you get, the more you develop baggage in your life – things you don't want to let go of, things you fear that if you open them up to the world, the world will find you repulsive and ugly." To prepare for his audition for Lloyd Webber, Butler took singing lessons on the sly, and rehearsed with Phantom musical director Simon Lee. Butler recalls his moment of truth: "Suddenly I'm standing in front of Andrew Lloyd Webber, in his house. Simon was playing the piano, reminding me to breathe, and I thought, I'm about to sing 'Music of the Night,' one of the most famous songs of all time, for the composer. My legs started shaking." Butler continued his voice training throughout production, in concert with movement classes. "I needed to find a voice and a way of movement for the Phantom to 'bring down the character,'" he explains. "Because we were making a movie and not a stage show, many aspects of the character had to be more grounded in reality and less melodramatic, less theatrical, and more real and human." The Phantom's mask, an iconic image from the stage production and a crucial component of his character and the story, hides a grotesque medical condition that left him abandoned by his family as a child, shunned by society and relegated to the role of sideshow freak. Butler conducted research into physical deformities to better understand the character, but his experience wearing the Phantom's prosthetic makeup – a process that took four and a half hours to apply – gave him plenty of practical experience upon which to draw. "I was amazed and upset by the looks I got just walking around the studio. I wanted to say What's your problem? What are you looking at? It illuminates the ugliness and the beauty that exists within each of us, and that's what this story represents to me." Casting the part of the gifted young chorus girl Christine Daae proved to be another challenge for the filmmakers, as the character calls for an actress who can exude a genuine innocence yet command a sophisticated vocal prowess. As Schumacher prepared to screen test a handful of potential Christines, he met with Emmy Rossum, a then-sixteen year-old actress who delivered a memorable performance as Sean Penn's murdered daughter in the Oscar winning drama Mystic River, and played the young Audrey Hepburn in ABC's 2000 telefilm The Audrey Hepburn Story. "Lightning struck when we found Emmy," Schumacher enthuses. "Not only is she an exquisite actress, but Emmy has trained at the Metropolitan Opera since she was seven. She came in at the last second and almost didn't screen test because she had to go to a family reunion in Las Vegas. I had to talk her out of it!" "We met on a Thursday, and Joel said 'Can you be in New York on Saturday for a screen test?'" recalls Rossum, who had just wrapped her starring role in the disaster epic The Day After Tomorrow. "Then about a week later I went to sing for Andrew at his house, which was very nerve-wracking! I was warming up with the accompanist when Andrew walked into the room, sat down without introducing himself and said 'Shall we?'" As she proved at her audition, "Emmy has got a fantastic voice," Lloyd Webber attests. To prepare for her role, Rossum took dance lessons, toured the famed Garnier Opera House in Paris, on which the Opera Populaire is loosely based, and visited the Musée D'Orsay to study Degas' paintings and sculptures of ballerinas, many of which were based on the dancers from the Garnier Opera company. "The biggest challenge for me was finding a balance between my voice and my acting," Rossum says. "It was important that my acting be at the same level as it would be in a normal film, so I had to find a place at which my voice and my acting meshed in a way that felt natural." Rossum sees Christine as a lonely soul looking for the love and protection her father provided before his untimely death. "Christine is so desperate to find a sign of her father's love that when she first hears the Phantom's voice, she desperately wants to believe he is the 'Angel of Music' her father promised to send her. She discovers that they are kindred spirits, as he is lonely and damaged as well. Their relationship begins as one of great affection and admiration because they inspire one another artistically. But as Christine begins to mature and become a more confident young woman, the Phantom starts looking at her differently." Indeed, the Phantom falls obsessively in love with Christine – as she is falling for the Vicomte Raoul de Chagny, the Opera Populaire's wealthy new patron and Christine's childhood sweetheart. "All the Phantom wants is a companion, someone who understands him, someone to talk to," Butler says. "He has become accustomed to rejection, but there's one rejection that he can't take and that is from Christine, because she has become the sole focus of his life. As he watches her become drawn to Raoul, the Phantom is increasingly blinded by his rage and desire. He thinks that if he can just write this opera for her, then she'll love him, or if he can bring her to his lair, make her see his world, then she'll finally understand him." "I think Christine's relationship with Raoul is her romantic awakening as a teenager, but her pull towards the Phantom is a very sexual, very deep, very soulful union," Schumacher suggests. "Perhaps if he wasn't disfigured and hadn't become as violent and as insane as he became, then perhaps someday they could have been together. What Emmy does so beautifully in her performance is that she always meets his disfigurement with compassion." In the role of Raoul, the filmmakers cast Patrick Wilson, star of Broadway's Oklahoma! and The Full Monty, and an Emmy nominee for his performance in the HBO miniseries Angels in America. "I had seen Patrick on the stage and I knew he sang beautifully," says Schumacher. "He's a very talented actor and he has the voice of an angel." Lloyd Webber was familiar with Wilson's Broadway pedigree when the young actor traveled to London to audition for him. "Patrick is one of the great natural lyric tenors from the theatre. I mean, he was Curly in Oklahoma!" Wilson's turn as Raoul represents a more dynamic version of the character than audiences have seen in the theatrical production. "In the stage show, Raoul has a very minor role in the love triangle, but in the film, we made him a very aggressive, swashbuckling romantic hero," the director notes. "He's even more appealing to Christine – and a greater threat to the Phantom." "The role has been even more dynamic and challenging than I anticipated," says Wilson, who underwent a five hour prosthetics process to age him to 70 years old for sequences that take place in 1919. "I ride bareback in the movie, which is an experience unlike any other, but that's what I wanted. I didn't want to cheat anything; I wanted to convey the zest for living that people had then. In those days lives were lived very dramatically. You died young, so when you found love, you went after it." Versatile actress Miranda Richardson, an Academy Award nominee for her roles in Tom & Viv and Damage, plays Madame Giry, the ballet mistress who knows more about the mysterious events at the Opera Populaire – and the Phantom – than she cares to reveal. "Miranda has been one of my favorite actresses ever since I saw her in Dance With a Stranger," Schumacher says. "I can't say enough about the brilliance she brought to the role of Madame Giry." By expanding Madame Giry's role in their screenplay, Schumacher and Lloyd Webber provide further insight into the Phantom's turbulent backstory. "Madame Giry is instrumental to why the Phantom is in the opera house in the first place," says Richardson, who first received international acclaim for her memorable performance in the hit 1992 thriller The Crying Game. "The Phantom's life is very theatrical, and there's an element of that that she adores. The Opera Populaire is her world, her family, her life. "In the stage show, Madame Giry is very rigid, very harsh with the ballet girls, and she looks a bit like an exclamation mark," Richardson continues. "But she is also a romantic and quite passionate, and I talked to Joel about showing more of this aspect of her in the film." "I wanted to tell the audience more about Madame Giry's relationship with the Phantom, because it's always been kind of a mystery," the director says. "When I met with Miranda to discuss the role, it was the only meeting I've ever had with an actress where I felt she was auditioning me. She had a list of about a hundred questions that she asked me, and I loved it." "I was attracted to the idea of working with Joel, especially on a project as lavish and lush as Phantom," the actress reports. "I like to have that sense of working on a set and occasionally being struck dumb at the scale of what's around me." Having no classical dance training herself, Richardson participated in ballet classes with other members of the ensemble. "I felt it was important to know what the rigour of that world is," she says. "Even though Madame Giry doesn't dance solo any more, she's running a company, and she has a great deal of knowledge and respect for the discipline." The only member of the Opera ensemble whose larger-than-life persona threatens to eclipse the Phantom's menacing presence is the company's temperamental diva-in-residence, La Carlotta. Minnie Driver, the talented actress known for her performances in the Oscar-winning drama Good Will Hunting and NBC's Emmy-lauded comedy Will & Grace, portrays the volatile Italian soprano. "In 1870, the diva of the opera house had the presence and effect of David Beckham, Madonna and Kylie Minogue all rolled into one," says Driver. "Carlotta is a huge presence, and in her mind everybody else exists as a satellite around her." Though a talented singer in her own right, Driver did not perform her own singing for the film – her part was voiced by professional opera singer Margaret Preece, who has performed the role onstage. Driver did, however, create additional dialogue in Italian to improvise Carlotta's vituperative rants. "I channeled my inner diva!" she says with a laugh. "When we discussed the character, Joel said 'Nobody ever paid to see under the top.' He pretty much just wound me up and let me go!" "I could tell that Minnie would be great, but she even surprised me and I think herself with how fantastic she really is," Schumacher says. "Some of her best moments are ad-libbed because she has a wonderful sense of humor. Minnie was perfect for this role – she is funny, statuesque and out-diva'd the divas." The Opera Populaire's enterprising new managers, Gilles Andre and Richard Firmin, arrive at the theatre during the dress rehearsal for the company's production of the epic opera Hannibal to find Carlotta threatening to walk out before the curtain is raised for the opening night performance. And that's not all that awaits them: an ominous letter from the Phantom threatens grave consequences should the new management fail to meet his various demands. Accomplished character actors Simon Callow (Shakespeare in Love) and Ciaran Hinds (Road to Perdition) play theatre buff Andre and the business-minded Firmin, respectively. "Andre is interested in the artistic and cultural side of the theatre, whereas Firmin is more involved in getting bums on seats," says Hinds, who co-starred with Cate Blanchett in Schumacher's 2003 thriller Veronica Guerin. "Joel told me to think of Firmin as a used car salesman, slightly flashy and over-dressed." "Andre and Firmin are bound like Siamese twins," Callow adds. "They made their money in scrap metal and are rather excited to be buying themselves into the world of the theatre, but like many people before them, they come to regret it." Rounding out the Phantom cast are James Fleet (Sense and Sensibility) as the retiring theatre manager Lefevre; Victor McGuire (Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels) as the grand baritone singer Piangi; and Jennifer Ellison (Brookside) in the role of Christine's young friend Meg Giry.
Books
This book published in 1991, written by Susan Kay is a beautiful and haunting expansion of Leroux's original novel. In it she covers in greater detail the Phantom's childhood and life leading up to the Opera House. A child is born...his mother's only gift is a mask. Precocious and gifted, he will live friendless and alone. Taunted and abused, he will flee, only to find himself caged again - as a freak in a Gypsy Carnival. A brilliant outcast...the world is his home. Filled with bitter rage, he will kill to escape, becoming a stonemason's apprentice in Rome...a dark magician at the treacherous Persian Court...and finally, the genius behind the construction of the Paris Opera House and the labyrinthine world below. Lacking one thing only: a woman's love. Cloaked in secrets his power complete, he will see the exquisite Christine and for the first time know what is means to love. Obsessed, he will bring her into his eerie subterranean world, driven to possess her heart and soul. "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...but as long as I live, no woman will ever look on me in love." -FROM PHANTOM
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