International productions

Scorp wrote:I didn't even read that bit of the Hamburg brochure...

Nobody does.

No Phantom in Paris this fall, they're doing CATS. Well, at least it's Webber.

http://www.stage-entertainment.fr/cats-le-musical

Was told in NYC that its coming back to Sweden with Peter J soon, not sure how accurate that was but there you go.

Of course with Peter J... Makes me question if I want to see it, if it comes...

Jöback or no Jöback (I managed to avoid him in London as I suspected I wasn't going to like him in the role), I'd be very keen to see the show if the replica production makes its way back to Sweden. Never got to see the original run but it seemed a great production and if it's anything like the Danish one, then it would be excellent. The Danish is probably my favourite out of all the non-UK/US productions.

I saw Joback in London. I felt that his voice was just about adequate for the role - not thrilling, but much improved from his brief guest spot on Phantom 25 at the RAH. But he really scored with his acting. Physically right for the part, and with very expressive body language. I wasn't disappointed.

Mary

I certainly want to see the original production in Stockholm (one can always ask for the dates when Jöback isn't on). But I don't know how sure we can be on that. The current owner of Oscarsteatern hasn't been very keen on doing Phantom until now, at least not spending money on it. As well as she seems to only be doing comedies at the moment (Spamalot, La Cage aux Folles, some comedy play). But who knows?

Also the Helsinki production is running this fall, maybe they would wait until that one's finished? Maybe they even want those costumes and sets?

Now it seems like we really can look forward to see Phantom back in Sweden. According to this:
http://www.svt.se/kultur/joback-blir-fantomen-pa-operan
it will be back in Sweden in September next year. With Jöback in the lead role of course. But so far no signs of bringing it back to Oscarsteatern.

EarlFan wrote:Now it seems like we really can look forward to see Phantom back in Sweden. According to this:
http://www.svt.se/kultur/joback-blir-fantomen-pa-operan
it will be back in Sweden in September next year. With Jöback in the lead role of course. But so far no signs of bringing it back to Oscarsteatern.

No, they're bringing it to Cirkus, a much bigger theatre with no balconies. So I'm excited to see if they're still gonna use the sets from Oscars, cause the difference in size of the two theatres is BIG!

Also, on their casting-page they are looking for a Christine to be in her 20s.... Didn't she use to be 16?

Yes, l hope they find some good understudies for the lead role. My wish would be to bring Richard Carlsohn back, who used to be the understudy for Mikael Samuelsson. I saw him recently in a local production of Sound of Music and I really like him. Both his singing and acting.

ThePhantomOfNorway wrote:

EarlFan wrote:Now it seems like we really can look forward to see Phantom back in Sweden. According to this:
http://www.svt.se/kultur/joback-blir-fantomen-pa-operan
it will be back in Sweden in September next year. With Jöback in the lead role of course. But so far no signs of bringing it back to Oscarsteatern.

No, they're bringing it to Cirkus, a much bigger theatre with no balconies. So I'm excited to see if they're still gonna use the sets from Oscars, cause the difference in size of the two theatres is BIG!

If I were to guess, I'd say they're not using the original Swedish sets. Mostly because they've since been used in Copenhagen, adjusted to Det Ny Teater's stage. I'm pretty certain there'll be a Phantom revival there down the line, so they wouldn't be interested in having the sets scaled up, and then having to re-adjust them. Seems more likely that the new Swedish production inherit/rent the Stage Entertainment lot currently in use in Moscow?

Nothing has been confirmed in any way, though.

It will be so interesting to finally get The Phantom back here in Stockholm and in the homecountry of Christine Daaé. We have waited and waited and waited for it to happen The Phantom of the Opera at Oscarsteatern was Swedens most successful Musical production ever and i have no doubt that this will be a huge sucess too though i don't think it will ve played 6 years this time. I guess 2 years at most.

Interesting that they have opted for Cirkus this time instead of Oscars. Cirkus Where succesful productions like Kristina Från Duvemåla, Chess, Mamma Mia and We Will Rock You have been played in recent years is a bigger theatre with a much bigger stage and 700 more seats than Oscars.

At first i was very negative to Peter Jöback as The Phantom but i got to see him on Broadway and man....He was firing on all cylinders and it was great. I am sure JOJ and Ramin has teached him a thing or two about the role

It will be exciting to see who will join him on stage. I don't think we should expect to see anyone from the former swedish production but we have many swedes who have played in the danish and german productions that i would love to see.

FYI- From the last week of January through February, Phantom will play at Madach Szinhaz in Budapest!

Confirmed today that Emmi Christensson will be playing "Christine Daaé" in the swedish production in Stockholm starting in September 2016. Phantastic news

She'll continue as alternate Christine in London until early summer 2016.

http://www.aftonbladet.se/nojesbladet/scen/article21462371.ab

Well, what do you know! We all didn't see that coming

I wonder now who will be playing Raoul... I cross my fingers for Anton Zetterholm (I just hope he's available!). That guy is seriously one of my favorite actors. He's so versatile: he can play the revolutionary made of marble like the sassy Vinkun prince like the absolute dork of a vampire hunter, and all that in a way he's in my favorites in the roles. His Raoul can only be good... *fangirl moment over*

It was indeed expected as she and Peter also are close personal friends. But you never know til it's confirmed

Anton Zetterholm would be interesting. Would be fun to see him do something in Sweden. He proved in Les Mis that he definitely as the vocal capacity for such a demanding role. And as his girlfriend has just finished her round as the principal Christine in London, he can always ask for good Phantom advise in the family

If anyone on here manages to get the new Russian Cast Recording would you be so kind as to rip it and share? It seems like it might be hard to get outside of the theatre in Russia

The Phantom is finally landing in Paris!!

Today RUG announced that the Phantom will be playing in Paris from October 2016 http://www.reallyuseful.com/news/the-phantom-of-the-opera-to-open-in-paris/

Man, why is there a production in Paris precisely at the time where I'm not there!? I can't wait to see who's going to get cast, though. And I also hope they won't use the same lyrics for the French dub of the 2004 movie... I don't see much criticism of it, but since French is my first language, I thought they sounded pretty clunky...

was thinking about this the other day, back in the early 90's, can anyone remember what the most simultaneously running productions of phantom were:

I remember there was a time when we had
London
Broadway
San Francisco
us tour 2
us tour 3
toronto
hamburg
japan

and not sure if these overlapped but around that time we also had
Netherlands
Sweden
Basel
UK tour
Canadian tour
Australia

would be interesting to know what the highest number was (were they were running all at the same time)

Irina de France wrote:Man, why is there a production in Paris precisely at the time where I'm not there!? I can't wait to see who's going to get cast, though. And I also hope they won't use the same lyrics for the French dub of the 2004 movie... I don't see much criticism of it, but since French is my first language, I thought they sounded pretty clunky...

I'm ridiculously excited about this: seeing a Parisian production of Phantom has long been a dream of mine.

My main two concerns are: a) the casting (the French seem to like to go very poppy for their musicals); and b) the translation. There were two done for the 2004 film -- one for North America, and one for France. Both of them sucked. A lot.

I'm looking forward to seeing the show loaded in, It's been a while since Phantom was in a European theatre that was not one of those modern looking buildings (I have not been able to see a good shot from Russia but from the bits I see it does not look like a traditional theatre, think Her Majesty;s or Majestic). so not since Denmark I think.

Also I know they have a very deep stage so they should have the candelabras that come up, unless the rumor is true that they kept Lion Kind's pride rock stuff there in the event that they return.

Scorp: I admit it, I'm worried about the casting as well. I cross my fingers so they won't have the girls who played Sarah Chagal in the Paris production of Tanz der Vampire and they'll go for someone with a more classical sound for Christine. I mean, Rafaëlle Cohen, Alyzée Lalande and Manon Taris are talented, but they don't have the pipes for Christine. And going around on Tumblr and looking at blogs who know a bit more about French performers, I seem to be the only one who REALLY doesn't want Cécilia Cara :/ It's been a very long while, but back in my very early Phandom days, when I was first introduced to POTO thanks to the 2004 movie (don't judge, I'm not the only one ), I actually preferred Emmy Rossssum to Cécilia Cara :/

I'm staying optimistic for the Phantom (though I probably shouldn't), but they'll have a poppish voice for Raoul for sure (though I am crossing my fingers for Danielle Carta Mantiglia. He'd be a great Raoul!)

justin-from-barbados wrote:Also I know they have a very deep stage so they should have the candelabras that come up, unless the rumor is true that they kept Lion Kind's pride rock stuff there in the event that they return.

I guess both of the Stage Entertainment sets uses a show deck, so it might depend on those having the traps for candelabras to rise up. But yes, they should really make them come up, this being a grand anniversary production and all.

Also, I think most of the french Lion King is down in Madrid rocking atm.

I need some info on this new Russian CD, just downloaded it but obviously I can't read the booklet. Can somebody who knows please tell me who the phantom and christine are and of the 4, who are singing on what tracks, I thought the ones that started out singing would do the full recording and the bonus tracks would be of the other 2 (like the new Korean one) but PONR sounds like it is the phantom and christine from the bonus tracks. Please help

thanks

justin-from-barbados wrote:I need some info on this new Russian CD, just downloaded it but obviously I can't read the booklet. Can somebody who knows please tell me who the phantom and christine are and of the 4, who are singing on what tracks, I thought the ones that started out singing would do the full recording and the bonus tracks would be of the other 2 (like the new Korean one) but PONR sounds like it is the phantom and christine from the bonus tracks. Please help

thanks

It's mixed up a lot between the double casts. The Phantoms are Dmitry Ermak and Ivan Ozhogina, and the Christines are Ellen Bakhtiyarova and Tamara Kotova. The digital booklet tells you who's singing which track.

Scorp: I admit it, I'm worried about the casting as well. I cross my fingers so they won't have the girls who played Sarah Chagal in the Paris production of Tanz der Vampire and they'll go for someone with a more classical sound for Christine. I mean, Rafaëlle Cohen, Alyzée Lalande and Manon Taris are talented, but they don't have the pipes for Christine. And going around on Tumblr and looking at blogs who know a bit more about French performers, I seem to be the only one who REALLY doesn't want Cécilia Cara :/ It's been a very long while, but back in my very early Phandom days, when I was first introduced to POTO thanks to the 2004 movie (don't judge, I'm not the only one Laughing ), I actually preferred Emmy Rossssum to Cécilia Cara :/

I'm staying optimistic for the Phantom (though I probably shouldn't), but they'll have a poppish voice for Raoul for sure (though I am crossing my fingers for Danielle Carta Mantiglia. He'd be a great Raoul!)

There's no question Cécilia Cara has a good voice, and it is a lot more consistent and confident than Ms Rossum's, which was just all over the place, but it is a pop voice, and not really what you'd expect from Phantom. Is Cara even in the running?

Laurent Bàn was even worse though in the movie dubs.

The problem is Paris has no real culture of musical theatre, and what few musicals there are are the Europoppy ones, which are for an entirely different kind of voice. And I worry that they feel they might alienate their audiences if they cast more in the tradition of voice that we're used to seeing in the UK, US, Germany, Scandinavia etc... Hoping to be proved wrong on this, though.

I really hope they make the candelabra go up. I was extremely disappointed they didn't do that in the Neue Flora for the Hamburg revival, which cut all sorts of corners, including ignoring the staircase that Raoul and Christine use to go up to the roof and that the Phantom takes Christine down just before the travelator appears during the title song. At least Stage Entertainment uses the original production, but it is with a LOT of short cuts... They cut half the orchestra in Hamburg and made the absolutely false claim that this was done in accordance with ALW's intentions for a new orchestration!

Speaking about cutting orchestra, listening to the Russian CD, on one hand I am quite happy as its the first studio CD with new music in a long long while (Both Korean and the Mexican one use the Canadian tracks) and I try not to listen to the Hungarian or Polish ones). Also happy to have the new overture and title song arrangements on CD (not counting the 25th since that was live) even though I don;t aggree with alot of the changes to the title song, It is still nice to have.
But.
Is it just me or does the whole thing sound rather tinny? I was wondering if thats just because it might have not been recorded/mixed well, or if they are using the reduced orchestra orchestrations with alot of the instruments done with synths.

I also noticed on my last visit to London that I could see the 2 keyboardists in the lower box and they were playing ALOT of notes that were not typical keyboard/synth notes, particularly alot of the wind notes. Did London go through that process that Les Mis did where alot of the instruments were replaced by keyboards?

All the musicians in NYC are in the put so you can't really see them all from the house but I'm pretty sure they dont use that much synths on Broadway.

justin-from-barbados wrote:
I also noticed on my last visit to London that I could see the 2 keyboardists in the lower box and they were playing ALOT of notes that were not typical keyboard/synth notes, particularly alot of the wind notes. Did London go through that process that Les Mis did where alot of the instruments were replaced by keyboards?

No, not as far as I know. Phantom still has the largest orchestra in the West End by some way -- it's a 29-piece orchestra, I believe.

But I know what you mean about the Russian album sounding tinny.