PHANTOM review 1/19/08

so i saw phantom on broadway for the 2nd time..my review..

CAST:
Phantom: Howard McGillin
Christine: Jennifer Hope Wills
Raoul: Paul Scaefer (understudy)
Carlotta: Wren Marie Harrington (understudy)
and the rest of the cast were the usuals (don't have time to type them up) sorry!

ok...they me start off by saying that the first time i saw phantom i had no clue what it was about.. nothing..and i loved it the first time..i saw it w/ mcGillin and julie hansen (christine)..julie was amazing..and so was howard

i liked it a lot today..but not as much as used to..i thought the cast was a little off..jennifer hope wills and mcgillin were on top of it but overall the ensemble, etc..seemed off

the raoul understudy paul scaefer was great. i was looking foward to seeing tim martin gleason b/c he has been in the show so long and i've never seen him..his understudy was great (better than michael shawn lewis who i saw last year)

Carlotta...when i saw it last year i saw Anne Runolfsen (sp?)..amazing. I believe patricia philips is the new carlotta but her understudy was very good..great voice..ok acting

overall i liked it....

btw..Howard McGillin should be in this role forever..he is amazing!

enjoy!

Glad to hear you enjoyed PHANTOM. But I have to say.....posts like yours can really chap my hide......what do you mean when you say the rest of the cast "seemed off"? What does that mean? Can you point out anything specifically that the ensemble did to "seem off"
Unlike RENT, Phantom has been lovingly cared for for 20 years. It is rare to find an ensemble member who phones in a performance.
If you want to go again and point out exactly which ensemble member is off at precisely which part of the show, I will enthusiastically purchase a ticket for both of us and we can go.

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oh wow two people who like Phantom on BWW! You guys are really making my weekend.

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I have seen this show a couple of times. I do find it amazing that this show has been in great shape for almost twenty years.


I am not a fan of Gleason. I find that he tends to be screaming his lines and not singing them.

Jennifer is an amazing singer and VERY VERY nice at the stage door. Not a bad bone in her body.

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yay the first Phantom hater! Where have you been all night?

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Wow do you need to write a post that contributes nothing to this thread other than to pointlessly personally attack me? Back off!

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I was there at the matinee too!

I was really excited to see Jennifer, and was not let down at all. This was my first time seeing Howard. He impressed me most in the final scene. You'd think after doing as many performances he has done, at this point he would be phoning in (as I have seen happen in the past with other shows), but he still has the excitement, anger, hurt... it all still feels fresh.

I thought the understudies were wonderful, especially Wren Marie Harrington.

I will agree to a point with the comment about the ensemble. I saw it mainly in the girls. A lot of their reactions just felt lifeless, like "ok, shreak and twirl... now."

Everytime I see this show, I'm up in the mezz. This time I was 10 rows back, dead center. AMAZING view. Watching how the show is run, I find they could definitely update a little. Christine's dressing room was kind of rickety as it was being rolled out. Bring out a little more pyro when the overture begins. Pump up the volume of the pit.

It was great to see the show from this point of view though. The staircase for Masquerade really does look gigantic when you are level with the people on the stage.

If there was any show I could watch from backstage, it would be this one. I'd love to watch them move everything, see where everyone enters, watch the drapes move around.

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george,

I have to ask. What's your deal?

You the show "Unlike RENT, Phantom has been lovingly cared for for 20 years."

Then you say, "I agree that Christine's dressing room (as well as the masquerade staircase) sound old and rickety when they are moved on and off."

Is the show lovingly maintained, or old and creaky?

And why are you jumping all over people who have a different opinion of the show than you? Considering you just joined the board, don't you think you are being rude to people who don't share your opinion of the show?

It IS a message board.

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Ugh. Be happy you didn't see Gleason.
He needs to leave the show.

I just ask, george, because you seem to say one thing in one post, and then another is a different post. "The only time I confronted anybody was when they criticized ME personally instead of what I said in a posts"

Here's some:

“You cant let these BWW people get to you. Just like anywhere else, 10% of people on here are just jerks. So, when they insult you, you can just smile and think that you are better than that, and move on.”


“Hmmm foster the only negative bitter angry comment on here now is YOURS oh yeah I went there.”

“Wow do you need to write a post that contributes nothing to this thread other than to pointlessly personally attack me? Back off!”

“yay the first Phantom hater! Where have you been all night?”

“So now we can never again talk about our most beloved musicals? We have to do a search before we make any new posts about anything? If you dont want to deal with a post, then dont read it.”



“Hey liverpool lay off Coolkid. He likes RENT and if you want to get into a discussion about what constitues GOOD theater well that's one thing but there is nothing productive or worthwhile about just shooting down someone's opinion for no apparent reason.”

“Ok sorry neddyfrank didnt know you were the Mayor of Renttown....but hmmm that explains an awful lot about how skanky RENT has looked lately hmmmmmmmm”

“Liverpool dont get me wrong, every time I see Rent I need to be held back from jumping up on stage and kicking some butt to some of those undeserving actors up there. But to say its a shell of its former self? Not by a longshot. It is maybe two mediocre actors in the show at any given time. So I think you are exaggerating.”

“I'm telling you the RENT producers need to just pour some money into some cutting-edge advertising, do some sort of crazy casting call, and keep this show going because it is just too important to too many people to end on Broadway.”


So, is Rent 'skanky', or will 'pouring money into some cutting edge advertising' fix the skankiness?


I'm just saying that you seem to be very hostile and defensive, and you've only just joined.

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All I have to do is click on your profile and I see all of your posts.

I never said I had a problem with you, I just asked why you seem so hostile?

You jump all over people who disagree with you, you run to every Phantom thread and put down anyone who has anything negative to say about it.

This is a public message board, and opinions will differ. That's the point of having an opinon.

So, WHY are you so hostile to people who disagree with your opinion?

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“yay the first Phantom hater! Where have you been all night?”


You may not call them stupid, but when you say things like that, you begin to sound like a Claymate or a Fantasiac, meaning you are always right and no one elses opinions matter.

That's how it's coming across.

I just wanted to point that you to you.

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I think you need to relax. You are only lookin at my comments and not the other person, which is totally unfair. You look kinda uninformed right now. That guy that I called a hater made a totally ignorant useless comment.
If he would have said worthwhile things about why he hated Phantom....please bring it on I'd love to hear it and respond and keep talking. But how can the message board keep going if people just post "this show sucks" and stuff like that? What are we supposed to say to posts like that?

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