Posted: 3/15/16 at 12:37pm
I am in love with this new ad for The Phantom of the Opera on Broadway (the first in 4 years apparently).
Great styling.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqXaNYJ3JGg
Updated On: 3/15/16 at 12:37 PM
Posted: 3/15/16 at 12:54pm
I saw it last month (for the first time on Bway), the production was really really bad. They honestly need to redo some of the stage mechanics and sets. It looked like a bad bootlegged youtube video. I honestly was expecting so much more. They clearly missed the light cues more than once, and I could see actors waiting in the wings - extremely distracting and shabby.
To put this in perspective - I saw it almost back to back with Hamilton and The Color Purple which had such excellent everything that Phantom paled gravely in comparison.
Posted: 3/15/16 at 1:40pm
who played Christine for you and how was she?
Posted: 3/16/16 at 3:18pm
People- it's a show that is 28 years old. Same set, same technical specifications. 28 years. Can you think of something in your life, a piece of technology or even a piece of furniture, that has been in your life and used constantly for 28 years? You gotta cut this show a break when comparing it to something brand new. It's an unfair comparison. And for a show of this age, in general it's very impressive and audiences are thrilled.
The new trailer is excellent and beats any currently running commercial for a Broadway show. It's a very exciting clip. Makes that green screen mess that American in Paris recently put out look like total garbage.
Posted: 3/16/16 at 3:49pm
I wish there could be a film with this kind of quality.
Posted: 3/16/16 at 4:23pm
Valentina3 said: "I saw it last month (for the first time on Bway), the production was really really bad. They honestly need to redo some of the stage mechanics and sets. It looked like a bad bootlegged youtube video. I honestly was expecting so much more. They clearly missed the light cues more than once, and I could see actors waiting in the wings - extremely distracting and shabby.
To put this in perspective - I saw it almost back to back with Hamilton and The Color Purple which had such excellent everything that Phantom paled gravely in comparison.
"
The light cues and many sound cues for Phantom run along with a click-track and lary-track all with a SMPTE time code. It is next to impossible for the light cues to be missed. Phantom is rather famous for its use of a click-track and lary-track, as it is used for Christine's high note at the end of the title song, as well as for most of the Phantoms lines during the Notes sequences. When a show is run in that matter, all the light board operator has to do is hit GO on the board at the top of the show and troubleshoot if something is going wrong.
From time to time an intelligent lighting fixture may not be doing what it is supposed to do, a color ram may break, or a lamp may die, and that does have to be compensated for on the fly. It is possible that you were there on a night when something was not working correctly, or the SMPTE computer was down and the show had to be called and run manually, but that would be a freak occurrence.
Posted: 3/16/16 at 4:33pm
Where are you getting your information that the lighting is time coded? There is no way a show who's lighting design was created in 1986 was time coded. Most show's don't even do that now. The Broadway company also apparently is the only currently running show that doesn't use any intelligent lighting, only conventional fixtures.
Posted: 3/16/16 at 11:17pm
jimmycurry01 said: "The light cues and many sound cues for Phantom run along with a click-track and lary-track all with a SMPTE time code. It is next to impossible for the light cues to be missed. Phantom is rather famous for its use of a click-track and lary-track, as it is used for Christine's high note at the end of the title song, as well as for most of the Phantoms lines during the Notes sequences. When a show is run in that matter, all the light board operator has to do is hit GO on the board at the top of the show and troubleshoot if something is going wrong.
From time to time an intelligent lighting fixture may not be doing what it is supposed to do, a color ram may break, or a lamp may die, and that does have to be compensated for on the fly. It is possible that you were there on a night when something was not working correctly, or the SMPTE computer was down and the show had to be called and run manually, but that would be a freak occurrence."
While your knowledge of how those different technologies work is mostly correct, your idea of their implementation in Phantom is not. Every cue is called by the stage manager live each night. It is virtually impossible to do a show on this scale via absolute timecode, as if actors are even a second off the exact timing required, it would mess with the effects for the remainder of the show. Christine's high note in the title song is also not done via timecode, as the entire title song is pre-recorded, and the song starts playing when the conductor hits a button, which is cued by the calling stage manager. The Phantom's note voiceovers are run manually by the sound desk. The only shows that typically would be fully run off timecode are theme park attractions, and even then, most of those have stage managers that run the show.
Source: I do this for a living.
Other source: Girlfriend was in Phantom and I ran this by her first (Not a regional or high school production. Actual Phantom.)
Posted: 3/17/16 at 7:49am
DAMN. Stunning. I kinda wish they filmed the whole show at this quality.
(Yes, I know we have the movie and the 25th, but it always bugged me that Cats have a home media release of the actual show and Phantom doesn't)
Posted: 3/17/16 at 12:40pm
I have seen Phantom on Broadway 59 times, and two of those times were in 2016. While I have seen many mistakes through the years, the two most recent times I saw Phantom in 2016, the show was perfect.
Posted: 3/17/16 at 7:43pm
Wow, Phantom4ever, that's a whole lot of sessions. Congrats!
May I ask when do you first saw it? Did you never saw it too much in a short amount of time and got tired for a while? What is the most funny experience you had while seeing Phantom?
Posted: 3/17/16 at 10:54pm
I actually saw the production last night. I don't think I've seen or thought about the show in 10 years or more, and I thought it was pretty damn good shape!
Posted: 3/17/16 at 10:56pm
There was one time in January 2004 when I was going to take a group of my high school students to see Phantom on a Friday night, but the Wednesday before we had a snow day, so I went and saw the matinee. Seeing it that close together was a bit much even for me. When the sound was replaced in August 2008, I bought tickets to the last show before the sound shutdown, and the first show after the shutdown, so I could really compare the difference. Well, I went to the show before the shutdown, but 4 days later, I just gave the tickets away because I didn't feel like going again so soon.
The first time I saw Phantom on Broadway was Wednesday, December 16, 1998. I had seen the touring version twice before.
Some of the funniest experiences seeing Phantom were:
-having one of my high school students say "the director of this show really knows what he's doing! As soon as everybody in the audience falls asleep, he makes sure to have an actor scream or something crash so everybody wakes up!" Shady, lol.
-During Don Juan, Carlotta used to hold an apple and then she would stick it in the dead pig's mouth as it was carried past her. At least five times I saw her stick the apple in the pig's mouth only to have it pop back out. It was interesting to see when an actor would finally pick it up.
-During Carlott's Think of Me, the crew dropped the curtain one chorus too early. So the actors were all in the way and some got it. And the company had to basically ignore it. Then, when it came time for the actual cue, and the lighting and the music changed, and now everybody is screaming.........it was messy. But funny.
-I always feel bad for the Phantom who cannot hold out the final "night" in Music of the Night. Happens quite often.
-Once when a friend and I sat front row center, we stood up at intermission and had the people behind us take our picture with the chandelier resting on the stage. As we prepared for the picture, the chandelier started its ascent and we have one picture with the chandelier right behind our heads and another picture of us ducking out of the way. I know it couldn't have hit it us but man was it close.
-I looooooove the scene with the actor in the pit and when his gun goes off. Everybody in the audience jumps and laughs nervously. I love seeing people have so much fun. And when the Phantom says "I'm here" through different speakers in the house, everybody keeps darting their head around to look---tons of fun.
-For several years during Il Muto, the actor playing the husband would hold out the word "her" on the line "I will hide over there to observe herrrrrrrrr". Audiences didn't know whether to laugh or clap or what. Luckily they stopped that bit.
-once I sat next to a couple who was making out rather passionately during All I Ask of You. At intermission, they asked me how I liked the show, and I told them that they were distracting me and occasionally elbowing me. They got up and did not come back for Act 2.
-My saddest Phantom memory was the two Saturdays after 9/11 when the news was reporting that all the long running shows would have to close because there would not be any tourism in New York for quite some time. So I went to see Phantom one last time. I bought a rear mezz seat. Before the show started, they moved everyone out of the rear mezz, front mezz, and orch into the first 5 rows of the orchestra. The rest of the theater was completely empty. It broke my heart and I thought that there was no way the show could possibly last even one more week like this.
Posted: 3/18/16 at 5:48pm
1998, that is so much time ago, Phantom4ever!
Very cool to read your stories. I thought you were some kind of a lunatic we can see these days (that show comes to mind), but glad to read you're perfectly sane and capable of getting tired of seeing it too much as well. Your shady student made me laugh and your heads almost getting chopped off by the chandelier too lol.
"All I ask of you is to stop doing this and watch the damn show, thanks!"
My heart broke a little bit reading your experience with Phantom after 9/11. Must have been really hard for all the affected people of NY. I'm always glad to see NY recovered (and Phantom!)
Someday I'll make my way to NYC and see Phantom too. Till then I can only dream :)
Thank you for your reply.
May I ask one last thing? What is your opinion on Love Never Dies?
