REVIVAL! The Phantom of the Opera (2004) dir. Joel Schumacher | Showgays

0:00 [Music] [Applause] [Music] no no no no no no no no no no [Music] paper faces operate masquerade hide your face so the world will never find you let's go back popping [ __ ] on Parade welcome welcome back to Showcase uh this

0:48 week we are for the first time this is our first for the first time in showcase her story we are we're bringing back an eliminated Queen we're Reviving a musical yes we did it we have done it we have successfully revived a musical due to overwhelming support from me and Molly the just the two of us during during the show um we decided that we were going to remount a showcase production of phantom Phantom doesn't get many choices to be remounted because usually it's still in its first run so having a Revival is true yeah it's true um so we will be discussing RJ you listen to a little bit of uh

1:35 uh earlier yes our original our OB -c original recording cast of The Phantom of the Opera back in March 31st 2018. wow yeah engaged yet like it was where is wait a minute yeah I listened to like the first I'm gonna say 30 minutes in like a little bit of the end on like fast speed and the funniest part when you were trying to remember a movie that Gerard Butler was in and you were like maybe it was contagion that's the one about like the disease or whatever and then I was like oh remember when contagion was just like some movie just some movie a movie the movie and not a few people compulsively watch for the first six months of the pandemic right at the start of the pandemic my mom watched

2:21 contagion and was like you should watch it and I was like I think that would be a really bad idea if I was I remember we were yeah we were quarantining quaranteering quarantining I heard it downstairs like she was watching it I was like I'm not going downstairs I live in Contagion why don't [ __ ] what I want to watch wild but I'd already seen it before so I was like I know that I know yeah is that Gwyneth there's a Gwyneth was patience zero that's not the one by that's not the one by m night right that's a separate one it started it's like six times I know Molly do you wanna do you want to start participating in this plot or I don't know speak up come on there's a folding idea this video essay about possibly watching contagion that I recommend if you're gonna have space to it I'll

3:07 revisit early early pandemic times yeah is it is it vintage now that it's like three years later almost three years yeah my hopes yeah although we but I do think people like it because Gwyneth Paltrow is patient zero and yeah it feels like comeuppance and someone you know what I mean yes for singing turkey lurky time on Glee yeah no that was no that was Sarah Jessica Parker I'm so sorry she sang forget you if she did this week RJ you have the task to summarize the plot of 2004's uh The Phantom of the Opera a movie that we know you've watched at least twice in your life um your time does start now in 1870 Paris the Opera popular operates Under

3:53 New Management under monsieurs Furman and Andre and a new young patron the Viscount Raul De Shani who is recognized by dancer Christine Daye as her childhood Crush Carlotta the soprano refuses to perform after almost getting crushed by a set piece Madame giri the company ballet our instructor so just Christine as her replacement as she has been receiving vocal training from an unknown teacher the show is a massive hit Christine and Raul rekindle their love but the Opera ghost appears to Christine as her vocal teacher he is the masked Phantom of the Opera who takes her to his lair and professes his love to her Christine pulls off his mask and the Phantom reacts violently but apologizes and brings Christine back to the Opera the Phantom has demanded Christine to be the star of their next performance but the managers refuse leading the Phantom to kill a stagehand in the middle of the performance at a New Year's masquerade the Phantom reappears to demand his Opera Don Juan triumphant to be performed which causes Raul and the management to hatch a plane

4:39 to catch him in the performance the Phantom kills the lead tenor to play the lead with Christine but she unmasks him in front of the audience so he captures Christine and sets the Opera on Fire by crashing the giant chandelier over the audience as well saves Christine the Phantom catches him and forces Christine to choose between a new life with him or she can refuse and he will kill Raul Christine pities the Phantom and kisses him which moves the Phantom into freeing them both as they escape the Phantom escapes to love Christine from afar for the rest of her life shun by The Rose he left her years later at her grave and that was a minute and 15 seconds it was it was really hard to do this I I this was very hard it is a hard one I mean I think I think what's often difficult about summaries is that there's so much you have to include up front that's like not actually in the movie yeah everything and then you end up skipping so much in the movie yeah like we maybe could have skipped some stuff in the middle but

5:25 also then I fear that our listeners would be left you know without submission information yes and I think that that was ultimately my challenge because it felt like I I had to add so much at the top to like set up how how the story kind of like moves into motion but then yeah I fully had to like to like really skip like why Madame Siri or like you know why the Phantoms what the Phantoms like hold is over the Opera and it's mostly I'm cheery like I basically had to like skip that didn't even mention Meg sorry girl forget them all uh unnecessary yeah just remember that Molly called Meg forgettable just

6:11 remember that for later Molly what is your since you're the one who we don't know you know what your background is we'd love to know your relationship to this musical yeah I watched his musical I think when I was a freshman in high school with one of my friends who really liked it um and hit me right at the right time that I was like fantastic I love it it's great I have never seen the stage show but I've watched this movie several times at this point and I have been to this opera house but yeah uh aside I haven't engaged it otherwise yes I when I was in high school went to uh France with that same friend that's it was like a school trip but she was also on it and we all wanted to go to the opera

6:57 house because of this movie haven't come out and everything yeah so we as a group we got tickets actually to see a ballet there because we wanted to experience something and that's what happened to be playing and let me tell you the Acoustics are so good so we got like an obscured view box like one of those like way up in the rafters ones and you could hear the dancer's breath wow oh my gosh hundreds of feet away you could hear the soft shoes on the stage like amazing acoustic so that was really really cool to be able to go to the opera house but not much of a relationship I would say with the stage musical in a way because I don't I don't know I've seen like Clips obviously of live performances and that sort of thing but this movie is kind of my real knowledge of phantom which I feel like is probably going to make some people mad maybe not YouTube but I think maybe some

7:43 of our listeners might get frustrated RJ so I I I initially listened to the episode the first time we did it because I was like well we probably already did a relationship we did not do a relationship back then oh so we can also still talk about relationship but I had seen the um like on Netflix the Sierra bodges version of the production this Western production of the 25th Anniversary Concert so that was my first time seeing phantom phantom and then for a showcase we saw this movie so that's it that's it but growing up like my mom was definitely much more of the Jesus Christ Superstar Avita uh Joseph camps of Android era uh so Phantom I only knew like through osmosis

8:29 and pop culture like knowing like The Mask certain songs It seems impossible to have no sense that this exists yes even if you weren't a musical person because it's also like I would say like more than I would say more than cats that this is like what people think about as like when you either like parody musicals or like you like joke about musicals this is like the go-to like uh image it's like the Phantom of the Opera somehow it's also become combined with like it's it's a it's you it's the joke you can easily make about um like tourists that see musicals on Broadway is like oh they're just here to see Phantom they want the sh they want to be like what is what is Broadway if I

9:16 Wikipedia a Broadway musical what is like the first thing that I see right it's also not helped by the fact that this was the first show to do like a Vegas residency that shortened its time so that people could like get in but also get back out to gamble too they like did like a 90 minute version of this musical that's what I'm sure and I think it's for sure I would love to see um let's all go to Vegas uh I think it's also sort of like the ultimate mega musical right is it a camera Macintosh produced oh it is um so like that the spectacle where it's like the chandelier is like the you know biggest character in some ways yeah that sort of a Vibe um I think it is Iconic for all of those

10:02 reasons so I I uh saw this musical when I was in like eighth grade or whatever um and it was like the air of like rent Phantom Wicked it was like all happening at the same time for the same age group um even though I guess it was maybe because rent was getting its like movie made like I think a year later than this or something like that but everything was just happening around the same time yeah um so I was very much into it that point I had the deluxe soundtrack for the movie so I knew which includes like a lot of the dialogue in her Spurs so like I can like Molly Adam was reciting dialogue when we were watching this what a treat to to be in a room with someone who's mouthing the lines to a

10:47 movie it was voicing accents included accents oh and honey pitches different pitches for different characters like and the accents are a plenty in this film oh yeah yeah excellent abound um so I have it like basically memorized from that standpoint but um after a senior year of high school we went to New York um and we saw four shows we saw in the Heights we saw promises promises we saw La casual fall and we saw a phantom and um we sat in like the [ __ ] nosebleeds at Phantom it was good what was your what did you rank Phantom as in your in

11:33 my four probably the lowest um not that it was I thought all of them were really good I liked all four Productions I loved La Cage I think that was my favorite when we saw those four um but I also really that's a nice sorry I was gonna say it's a nice variety of shows yes yeah yeah um anyway yeah it's the none of them it didn't feel like we were repeating the same style show I think the closest is probably LA Cajun promises promises but even then like promises promise is such like a comedy that it was I don't know it was good um but yeah it's a good show uh I have no idea who we saw as like like the amount of christines which which 24th iteration of the past that was I have no idea they did a great job I loved Carlotta a theme that is recurring

12:20 throughout my time with this piece um but yeah uh it's I like Phantom I do I don't I'm trying to think if I would say either this or probably Joseph is my favorite Andrew Lloyd Webber but it's probably this because it's so accessible I I will go on record and say this is the only good Andrew LED Weber Musical that I mean you can a lot of people would agree a lot of people would agree yeah I think like at the I think like before what yeah because I was gonna say before watching this I I held like Jesus Christ in Aveda higher just because that's what I was like well and then you know we I think I had a

13:06 dream Once where we talked about Evita but I don't remember anymore um but I but I will say like this is the most of Andrew Lloyd Webber's like Vision real fully realized like it's like this is this is it feels like his Julie taymores Lion King of like this is me and my core and so I can just like fully like Express yeah this kind of melodrama is where his access yes best suited yes a Gothic romance for sure um yeah I will say before we leave relationships I did listen to that first episode that episode that we did when it was just March 31st 2018. um and just some notes we we definitely noted about like the movie quality like

13:52 the video movie quality like we kept saying like it looked like this was made on Windows Movie Maker like that was like a big theme when we were watching it it's definitely shot on like early digital um we talked about like the ages across the characters from the like Phantom Raul and Madame jiri that was a big point that we made sure to understand really nailed down a lot right we did a lot of drag race references we said a lot of thwarps can only imagine lots of tens acrosses the board um and it was funny because then we were like this is for the few people who like know drag race and and like we really said that a little show and I was like a small little show and now it's like literally like with Cameron in 2018. I think it was 10. so we just made each one what I was thinking about is that I

14:38 think season 10 was the last time I was excited about a new season of drag race boys end up happy to be watching it once I get going and I did watch the two uh opening episodes since last time we spoke but since season 10 every time a new season comes out I have to be like okay you're gonna like this like you have to go turn it on and then you get to know them and then you'll be excited but like I don't get excited before it happens anymore I used to I'm the same way I used to like do the like meet the queens and watch all this like the promo material get really excited and I just like can't be bothered anymore um yeah I would much rather just like oh watch the show and then see what edit they give the queens and that's all we'll find my favorite because it's

15:24 yeah we don't either we just like pick up um pick up people I'm actually more excited about the international uh Seasons like I really liked Canada versus the world I liked the UK seasons and I obviously love drag race Philippines so much so um but yeah I gotta get on some of this but yeah yeah I just it's the drag race fatigue it is um so yeah the one thing we kept also bringing up was like Adam kept making the joke that time was not up by then because uh times times up was was big at the time and we focused primarily on Phantom and this is there's so much media in our history that can get me canceled so easily so it's nice that you know it's just archived for anyone we

16:11 literally just kept bringing like listen time was not up back then and so he was able to do all of these things to her um and then also just noticed that like I think this was when okay so 2018 we did two episodes and then we took a year break and then back in 2020 ER yeah like late 2019 early 2020 was when we're like we're going back in Mary Poppins um and so this was the last episode before that break and I literally was not listening to Adam like he was just explaining the plot of the movie and I kept being like oh because yeah because they did this right because she did this and she Adam was like no it's because this is this I was like we were like not in the same whatever and I could hear Friedrich biting his bone in the background I was filling up water at a specific point of the episode where I got and I heard water being poured from

16:56 my Brita to a glass next to this hot mic and I was like we should not have been given the freedom of speech at this time like we should have been silent we should have we could have met I was like I I could I also had to listen to it and fast speed because time was up for this podcast don't listen to how dumb I like we both sounded oh my God but anyway we're intelligent now I just want to say um you know I know the beauty can I just interrupt you because you're spiraling the beauty of adding Molly to this podcast is oh yeah you can still elect to just not really participate because Molly and I will just keep going me at a topic me listening to this episode and giving you these bullet points is the most research I've ever done in a new

17:42 showcase I ran out of time till this I was going to listen to your old app and then I ran out of time so this is very appreciated and Rita did tell me that she feels like RJ you have an important role for sometimes when Adam and I start to talk past each other so you come in and you're like here's the thing you're both trying to get at because I've been listening to YouTube please articulate this so we need we need that third person sometimes to come in you know yeah it's an important part of the dynamic thank you [Music] well let's talk about the history of phantom so

18:28 um I thought I was just going to be discussing the book and then the musical and in the movie but we are going to also be talking about two other things so hold on to your butts because this is going to take a while I will say this was the most vocal I've seen Adam research like there were so many times he like gasped aloudly research yeah I was like oh this must be uh this must be uh there are things I was like I almost went into this being like I don't really need to do any research because we had done this once before and blah blah blah no I'm so glad I did because the catacombs Mama also I started reading Phantom because it's obviously free because it's so old so I'm on chapter like three and it's good okay what did you start two years ago oh

19:15 I started today oh that's what I was doing earlier um so the Phantom of the Opera published in 1911 in English uh was written by gastlyn LaRue um it was in that like very like 19th century early 20th century like printed in a newspaper bit by bit and then finally when it was done it'll be published serialized thank you that's the word um so it's very that so that technically the Publications began in in the Parisian newspaper in 1908. um so he was inspired by Edgar Allan Poe and Sir Arthur coding Doyle um and the story is told from like a document documentarian journalist point of view so it's like I found all this information about this alleged

20:01 disappearance of Christine Daye and now I'm going to tell you about it so that I thought was really interesting because I didn't realize that that was like the way the novel is set up um I'm just gonna tell you some big broad strokes this is pretty much the book I will I will be completely honest I was very impressed yeah well there are some differences I think we both did some research on Phantom did you read about the the event that inspired him to write the novel though and I back us up for just a second the chandelier crash yeah no I mean I saw that it was like a historical event but I didn't look it further into it I just know that one person so this I got from a Lindsay Ellis video which was my entire research who said I just watched a bunch of Lindsay Ellis videos about this because I love her and she's done she is obsessed with Phantom has done so many videos about various

20:46 aspects of phantom there was a concierge which I'm not sure what that means in this context back in the day yeah but I don't know if that's like an usher it was my guess or like somebody working like the businessy side of it who got killed by a counterweight to the chandelier on her first day of work I know but so that was just like an accident that it wasn't properly secured but basically I guess that this guy is sort of inspiration was that he thought like well what if that were not just an accident what if someone did it deliberately and that was like his spark point to write basically a mystery novel of like who caused the chandelier to fall who can and then he added the like who kidnapped Christine die a like all of that other stuff so I thought that was a cool or a cool piece of information that it was like ripped from

21:33 the headlines and then like totally spun into this Fantastical tale just as a result of this one real event do you remember what year the crash was I don't but I think it was like 30 years before he started I thought that's right okay I think it was like in the 18 something I mean maybe the 1870s since that's when this is that yeah um yeah I did see a little bit of that so anyway so I'm just going to talk about some of the differences so the chandelier Falls um in this in the scene in which Carlotta croaks like a toad um Eric is the Phantom by the way his name is Eric with a K Eric just Eric uh he keeps Christine underground for two weeks the first time he steals her

22:19 which I mean I think it was I don't think it was that long in the movie but it was like a certain time because they were like she's been missing I always thought it was like a day because it seems to be the next day they're all like oh whatever um but yeah definitely two weeks and then she like asks to go back and they're like okay fine uh there's a character called the Persian who's completely removed um and he kind of is just like an odd eccentric uh from like not Paris so there's your fun exotic element I can tell you more about The Purge there's a whole Lindsay Ellis video just about the Persian the most whitewashed character in literary history I believe I'm linking all of these in the show notes because I really would recommend unlike a lot of my sources that are like academic articles I assume no one's

23:05 reading this time go watch all these videos he he is actually so in the first half or so of the like serialization slash novel there's a lot of red herring character there's a lot of like suspicious characters around the Opera to make you wonder who is who is the Phantom and then it's revealed like oh it's just like a guy who's full-time gig is being a fan it wasn't any of these people it was somebody who's like in the basement just like being a phantom and the Persian it turns out is like he's been exiled from Persia he's like a cousin of the Shahs and the reason he's called the Persian is that in the style of like oh this is like me as a real journalist reporting that these stories it's that he's trying to like yeah so so he's like oh I'm not going to reveal to you what this guy's name is

23:50 because I don't want to like you know like that in part of this framing device and Eric spent time with the in Persia with the Persian so it's basically like uh we were young men together we had we went through stuff together kind of thing and he does the role that jiri plays a lot in this version of sort of being his like apologist wingman character yeah and but he's so selfish of the novel that actually the second half is told mostly from his perspective it's mostly like his recounting of what happened so he like brings Raul down to the Phantom all this stuff and at the end of the novel The Phantom like comes to him after Christine has laughed and is like here's what happened here's how I feel about it like all so like he gets the like final

24:36 character resolution for the Phantom essentially because he is like the best friend character so he's actually like a very um central part of the whole novel but then is like almost immediately left out of almost all adaptations because like nobody knows what to do with him so either like totally whitewash him like there are some movies where he's like he's the Persian but then he like turns out to be like secretly a white French inspector or he's like given that role as given to other characters or like there's one apparently like romance novel from the 90s it was like very popular that has a whole like everyone being like your culture sucks dude you really like don't treat women very well in Persia um so yeah the whole video is about the fact that like this is actually a very essential character and he was really

25:23 Progressive for the time in the sense of being like a central character who's a real person and not just a stereotype but like no one seems to know how to treat him in subsequent uh adaptations so yeah so that's the Persian and then the the Opera they do is Faust it's not Don Juan triumphant or whatever um he kidnaps Christine to be his bride specifically which I think is like kind of implied in the because he she wears the like bridal gowns it's very explicit that he's like you're marrying me um he the whole kiss thing when she like kisses him and that's what changes his heart that is like true um and then he apparently like reveals that he's never been in his life even by like his own

26:08 mother when he was a child so it's a point of trauma for him uh Christine promises to return the ring he gave her on his death day and then the Persian runs a line in the newspaper which is quote Eric is dead so that's like how the end of his life I guess happens this is all just what I found out from Wikipedia because I haven't finished reading the book yet um okay so that was all and then I just wanted to note that the original New York Times review of the book uh complained that it was a letdown to find out that the Phantom was just simply a guy so I think that's really funny I think that's a very funny review yeah I can't tell I can't tell if they're like complaining because that wasn't one of the characters it wasn't it wasn't it

26:54 was a mystery or if they're complaining like I wanted it to be a ghost I couldn't tell if that was the complaint but I didn't also go back to like find The Originals because there are there's like I think it's Dazzle Hammond or something but there's like the rules of mystery novels that got published there was an author who published some proposed roles in like I want to say the 30s or something and one of them is like it needs to be someone who's been introduced by the plot it can't just be like an outside character so like hoe's original novel that sparked the whole mystery genre like it the reveals that it was an ape that did it which is like not very satisfying it couldn't really have guessed that one do you know what I mean confined so we have certain expectations now of mysteries that like people abide by these rules that maybe it didn't really abide by at the time my God Ben Shapiro would have a real

27:39 field day with that one oh I'm sure he would have been thrilled to live in 1911. let's let's move them back there actually so yeah in in my research I found uh this which is the Phantom of the Opera from 1976 music and lyrics by Ken Hill and you may be saying Adam what are you talking about that's not Phantom of the Opera and to that I say oh but wait so he came up with this idea uh it was mostly an original score I don't remember the guy the original guy who did the music for the the first version um and then there were excerpts from the actual Faust uh Opera and that was in 1976 and then in 1984 okay 1984 he retools it and he was like what I really

28:26 want to do with it is I want to use music that would have truly been sung in 1870 at the Opera but I'm going to change all the lyrics from these operas and make them English and like part of the story so he uses music from um composers like Verity gunod Offenbach Mozart Weber donazetti and Bueno and then he like completely just writes new lyrics which is like kind of a cool thing that's cool physical concept Sarah Brightman was asked to play Christine which she turned down so Sarah Brightman originates the role of Christine in the West End just two years later uh which leads me to Sarah Brightman was married to Andrew Lloyd Webber so Andrew Lloyd Webber and Cameron McIntosh go to her performance in 1984. they approach

29:13 um Ken Hill and afterward they were like if we thought it was great we'd love to turn this into a huge West End big budget production because apparently Andrew Lloyd Webber and Ken Hill had worked together on like a local or a regional Revival of Joseph before so they had like already a rapport um but in the end Angelo Weber is like just kidding I'm just gonna do this without you and then he proceeds to like work on Phantom of the Opera so the fan of the Opera story oh I will say there was also a 1991 if you're interested there was a 1991 West End run um but it closed early even though it like garnered really good reviews um most likely due to Phantom also running in the West End like Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom was running and

29:59 I'm sure that it already opens and so I'm sure people were like oh he's this other person's trying to capitalize on like the same story what a [ __ ] head or whatever and so they just didn't go see it so they they closed like six months later but apparently it's really good and there is like a 1993 recording of the whole show at the West End cast you can find allegedly this sounds like has real potential to become like a cult hit you know someone could revive This and like really do something like this last performance was I think 2015 in like Tokyo or something like that they put it on so um so the Phantom of the Opera okay now we're going to Angela Weber so this is 1986 music by Andrew Lloyd Webber lyrics by Charles Hardin Rogers still go Richard still go I'm sorry uh this story this is the story the story is the

30:44 Andrew contacts cabinet Macintosh about developing a new musical and Andrew suggests Phantom out of The Thin Blue Sky um the two previous filmed versions didn't seem viable to adapt from but he he amazingly found a secondhand copy in an old bookstore um because the book was out of print at this point and he was so swept up in the Romance of the story that that was why he was like he he found it so compelling because he was like for years I realized I've just been trying to write a great romance for the ages it's interesting because yeah I love people who mythologize their own lives like I to some extent I think it's fascinating but also like

31:31 you can't he's a clown he's a flop he's not a little bit of a fabulous which is such a good word that we're seeing a Resurgence of with George Santos and I'm so happy for that contribution to the side guys um I would say his only contribution to the zeitgeist um I think it's interesting because Lindsay I'll ask again my one source for this whole podcast talks about how the book is not very good like it's spawned so many adaptations and versions but it's not great literature in and of itself correct um really brought to the table was the whole but what if he was sexy like angle on the Phantom that almost like all of the other adaptations are very much like there's this question of like how much of a villain is he how much are we going

32:18 to humanize him are we going to emphasize them in the end that kind of thing with the idea that like Christine's actually really compelled by him it's kind of an Andrew Lloyd Webber invention yeah yeah um so yeah he just always wanted to write a great romance I guess uh Richard stillgo did a lot of original lyrics for the musical um he was originally partnered with Angel lady Weber for 1984 Starlight Express uh but then Charles Hart who was like a brand new Lyricist just out of college or something like that who obviously is a nepo baby he had like 10 connections to everybody I don't know it's Wikipedia page is interesting um he came in and Cameron McIntosh and Andrew Lloyd Webber hire him to rewrite most of the lyrics so it's mostly Charles heart and then there's some leftover stuff from Richard stillgo is

33:05 there a movie version of Starlight Express there is not but God I wish there was yeah you know the story um isn't it like a Greek God comes down or something like that or am I continuing okay honey it's the I'm not kidding I literally just listened to a podcast about this yeah it's cats but trains oh so each it's like episodic so each train so first of all there's I'm so sorry I'm talking about this but there's a framing device no this is a good background for for aldub yeah that's true yeah um there's like a child who's running like a train like he playing with trains so all these trains are being played

33:51 with by a child but the trains come to life and each train is like I'm a steam engine train I'm a diesel-powered train I'm a caboose I'm a beverage car like and each one gets a song Wait are they separate trains or are they separate places both and um so only men are engines by the way the female characters are always a car or whatever um right yes absolutely um and then like the very end this is what's Wild so like if we remember cats the very end is like that's what's Wild yes if we remember cats the end is like one of them gets to die congrats to them

34:37 Express also all of this has taken place on roller skates a fact I didn't even mention but is integral to the show um in silent Express the end happens when the child wants them to do something and they all Rebel and decide on like personal decide on personal autonomy and they're like Golden Compass killing God situation yes it's crazy that's the end of the musical it's interesting that I we've talked before about Andrew lidweber's like relationship to Christianity and cosmology and such and this that I have said is his only good musical really

35:22 does not deal with that at all I get well Angels but like it does not engage with a an entire Cosmic structure in the way that cats or Starlet Express or I assume Jesus Christ Superstar I don't really know Jesus Christ that much but I don't know him in my heart personally very well I don't know him casually you know I know like what he does for a living so I've heard of him for sure um I like the idea they're like we've talked about Christianity with him before and I'm like we've discussed Christianity on this podcast before I I don't know I don't think we have ever I think it's never been brought up we're we're not interested in religion over here um but it is interesting how little it plays into other than the angel element

36:08 of this whole thing which is somewhat major but it's not yeah it feels more like grief yeah it's more like dealing with griefs type stuff yeah yeah so that's that's crazy Charlotte Express yeah let's go back to it for someone please make a movie out of it so that we can watch it really I want I want Thomas in the tank and I want Thomas or we go to Germany there's a town first of all you know how Germany is like it has a very Niche interest and very Niche media and stuff like that like they love David Hasselhoff that's like the big funny joke they have a a like 20-year running production of Starlight in a theater that they've built for Starlight Express

36:54 and then wait wait in like 2018 I think 2019 it was gonna close like they were like we're not making money anymore the town decided that they like the government of the town was going to like start paying for the musical because it was so important to their culture that's amazing to their culture i fellow trade I do think and like the lobby is designed to look like a training Lobby like it's like like this the list of the cast members is always the biggest residency of this that's like thank you I do think that like I feel like Starlight Express has also really cut off at the knees the idea of the musical on roller skates I feel like there's more legs to it and we need to like just actually so much and likes that are

37:41 attached to Wheels I think that we need more I think we need more musicals that explore that concept yeah we did everything on ice what about it on Wheels so the thing about it I can't believe I know this much because I just this is my Southern California things all of a sudden I said I want everything on Rollerblades instead of a night uh they they had to the reason like the Productions I think there was a West End and a Broadway production but the reason they like made no money is because they had to remove 10 rows of seats in order to like build out the stage to have because they have these ramps that go around basically the entire audience your margin should not be so razor thin that 10 rows of seats takes you longer yeah so that's poor business planning yeah

38:28 absolutely yeah um truly that that is where the Starlight Express conversation ends so uh [ __ ] so um the only ones things I wanted to note that truly are different from the um Stage production and the film are not many I'm going to be very honest it's simply the chandelier Falls at the end of act one instead of at the end of the show and the uh there is no dream sequence of the old circus there's no room of mirrors that happens in the movie there's no like Raul Falls in a water pit that doesn't happen oh yeah but pretty much everything else is like on obviously it visually is more interesting on on film because they can

39:14 do that but yeah it's pretty much beat for beat the whole show um let's talk about the awards it was nominated for the Tonys was Nami four and one so it was nominated for best book of a musical best original score and best choreography and then it won lightning design costume design Scenic Design Direction performance by a featured actress and performance by a leading actor for Michael Crawford as a phantom as well as best musical um I think this was also like a Crawford original Sweeney is he or a Revival Sweeney Patti LuPone Sweeney oh is he yeah I didn't know that uh he's also in a movie we've watched we he was uh Cornelius this is obviously much Liz 20 years

40:00 later but yes uh so those are all the Tony's I think it's also the same year that into the woods was nominated um yeah a Perpetual thing in all musical theater kids Hearts yeah the Phantom beat into the woods so I'd love to talk for just a moment about Andrew Lloyd Webber and plagiarism okay so uh if you scroll with me in our notes section down to scroll with me what a turn um down to citations um we're gonna start from the bottom link which is I don't talk to strangers that link we're gonna start with this one um this I would say is not plagiarism I just found this interesting this song um was written by Andrew Lloyd Webber

40:46 for this Opera artist and then he just used the same song If you hear it friend [Music] right back other people have done that before I was like yeah sometimes reusing his own song yeah I don't mind that I just found it it's a beautiful Melody yeah yeah it's very pretty um so let's go to uh did Weber steel from Pink Floyd so start the video over at the beginning if you're able to I don't know that might be too much for me in my Boomer knowledge of technology so there first it starts out with uh the song Echoes by Pink Floyd [Music] yeah and then it's gonna play Phantom

41:33 right after [Music] so it's very cool looks pretty bad I gotta be honest it doesn't look good for a little this Weber no it does not look good um first I thought like maybe it's a quiz maybe it's just inspiration but then like the dude like that's what really come on it's pretty close and also phantom um the song Phantom the Opera which I didn't even write down in the list of songs we're supposed to listen to which is very funny um I would say in the musical is the most 80s something because it has the like techno the Cynthia so that's interesting this one is the one that's I think the most fascinating so um the link is four times Andrew Lloyd

42:19 Webber sounded like Puccini so a bit of context before we start the video um Puccini sued the the Puccini estate sued Andrew Lloyd Webber over what we're about to listen to and they did not win because it was settled out of court but the fact that it was settled out of court okay Rita's gonna write in with her lawyer expertise and tell you that this is not necessarily it's not an admission of guilt is that out of court and it's often more cost effective to Simply settle it and not you know continue with the dispute so it is in no way an admission of guilt to settle out of court it would be interesting to have Rita listen to all of these and tell us

43:06 what she every episode of showcase and just write in with all of the legal um so that we put out yeah would this would this would this fly so now Puccini I want to say before we start because I thought it was interesting that they could even sue him he Puccini was alive from 1858 to 1924. so but some of his music was still not in the public domain by the time that Weber was I guess I don't know how I don't know how I don't know how any of that works I thought it was 70 but also that it had been extended because of Disney specifically fewer than that it used only be like 30 or 40 years uh

43:53 uh Rita Rita Rita could you can you I know that you're an expert in copyright lawsuits um yeah I don't know I don't know for sure I'll have to assume I'm sure that they I'm sure that I'm sure their lawyers so yeah um so anyway so this this piece uh it's a little bit of Melody from an aria in La Fuchs oh God Adam um which is a Puccini I've never heard of but I'm also not huge on uh Opera in general I Know labo M and I know madama butterfly you're not a Puccini head

44:39 oh no Tosca wow I know three puccinis okay so um you can go ahead and press play whenever you want Molly it should it should start from 8 20. [Music] please [Music] um it's very similar [Music]

45:24 open up your mind so there is a bit of there's a bit of there's a little bit of a reference in I've talked about this before the musical musicals the musical um they do like an Android Webber bit and they make a joke out of this moment uh where oh there's like a there's like a joke that they play where he's like the character in the musical has written a musical for the other character Allah Phantom and Christine and he sings it might sound just a teeny like something by Puccini but no it's all brand new um so it's very funny uh so I just found that very interesting because I did not know any of that about

46:10 um it's interesting that I I'm sure that this does not have any bearing on the legal case but it feels different if you're stealing from a totally different genre like Phantom of the Opera is not an opera if Lloyd Webber where it's taking from another musical I would feel on like a moral level more upset about it than him taking from Puccini because it feels like he's right taking poutine into a new realm somehow yeah and is it like him creating Opera ish for musical theater isn't it like I'm referencing the art of Opera and my thing is like what's the difference between referencing and feeling at that point and I mean like we do like pop music samples all the time now and I I don't know what the like exact like two I don't think the people

46:57 pay rights necessarily to sample music I don't know I think it depends I think they do I think they have to but that's also more recent that's true yeah yeah I think yeah um yeah I don't know I don't know I just think it's um I just think it's interesting I just I think it's a little B to put in your Bonnet of you know Andrew Lloyd Webber and his we just didn't didn't Hellas get mad at Beyonce for sampling her yes yes but they did I they did end up getting the rights from like the original like the actual company and so it was oh yeah that one wasn't she got she did sample it correctly but she was like but she didn't ask me personally if I could do it and I was like well that's not how much yeah okay [Laughter]

47:46 let's talk about the movie distracted by Joel Schumacher uh somebody we have talked about before because he wrote the screenplay for The Wiz if you remember we talked about that and we support gay artists famously gay um on his Wikipedia page I feel comfortable saying this because it's on his Wikipedia page but he boasts that he is so promiscuous that he has slept but he has passed away so I will use past tense uh he slept with ten thousand to twenty thousand men during his lifetime work wow okay how how old was he when he died that's a great question probably in his 70s should we say 75 okay we'll say that he didn't begin until he was 18 probably not true but let's just say he said he started when

48:31 he was 11. that was awesome yeah that was awesome it probably wasn't healthy okay so that's 64 years of sexual activity 95 days in a year okay so that is 23 360 days okay so 20 000 seems like quite ambitious yeah yeah in context and also like we took a cup maybe he took like a night off here a night off there you know and also like maybe in his like you know prime it was like there were multiple people at once so it's not like I would assume I would assume let's say it was like 15. was it was the real number that's a 64 percentile

49:18 64 of the tapes of his life he was engaging partner okay um that's incredible that's a lot I mean and he never had any did he never have any relationship are there any years we can account for of being at all monogamous or I don't believe so I didn't see like a he's widowed by or anything I mean good for you live your life that's that's great and it's it's impressive it's mostly impressive that he never contracted HIV AIDS especially because he's yeah he would have started so young I'd love to know about his safe sex practices doctors should have been getting information from him he was a case study yeah yeah yeah yeah great great he also did he also did

50:03 Batman he also yeah so I was going to talk about was Joel his other gay film Jill Schumer is a very interesting career time to do anything else is really what's most impressive about it yeah yeah he started like production and costume design and then he did screenplays and then he ended up being a director and he had a bunch of work in the 90s he took over the Batman franchise from these are the Clooney ears these are the Clooney ears but what is his name who directed the first two Beetlejuice Michael Keith Scissor Hands no the director Tim Burton he took over this the franchise from Tim Burton it is funny that video choose was your first timber Mike so he took it over and then it like the first one he did which I can't I never

50:49 can remember the specific names of them but the first one uh was like uh it wasn't a critical success but it was like the most money a Batman film had ever made at that point so then he did another one and that was the one I think with Arnold Schwarzenegger and I think that's Batman and Robin yeah and that one was like the Flop and then everyone talked about the nipples and the Batman suit which was funny because that was the formative Batman for any gay man for sure like it was that movie that was like oh Robin was so hot I am looking at Robin who is Robin again Robin was Chris O'Donnell yes Chris O'Donnell um he's very attractive in that film anyway so he's a very interesting career [Music]

51:34 um Silverstone was uh was um no girl Uma Thurman was poison ivy very famously iconic so the screenplay is written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Joel Schumacher it's based on everything that I've just talked about it is produced by Andrew Lloyd Webber we'll come back to that in a second it stars Gerard Butler Emmy Rosslyn oh Gerard Butler plays The Phantom Emmy Rossum is Christine Dia Raul play or Patrick Wilson plays Raul the vikon Miranda Richardson plays Madame gerhi and Minnie Driver plays La carlada the cinematography is by John Matheson it is edited by Terry Rawlings uh the production companies are Joel Schumacher Productions really useful films which is Andrew Lloyd Webber's um company and Scion Films it is

52:22 distributed by a bunch of different people so in the UK it was distributed by entertainment film distributors in the United States it was distributed by Warner Brothers and the internationally was distributed by Odyssey entertainment um it was released on December 10th 2004. it's writing times 143 minutes its budget was 70 to 80 million give or take and the box office was 154.6 a hit because we never know if the budget includes the marketing budget which it almost probably never does it's probably just the production budget so if they if they broke even they came close that's my guess uh based on how much marketing they did for the film which probably is a lot because this is post Chicago so everybody thinks they have the new Chicago by just doing a new musical

53:07 so interestingly Warner Brothers purchased the rights to the film in 1989 and Joel Schumacher is immediately attached direct because Android Weber sees his film of the Lost Boys which is a vampire movie set in SoCal and loves his YouTube Sutherland yes he loves his use of Music in the film so he was like oh he really understands he should direct which is crazy because he really hadn't done anything that that huge at that point um it was supposed to start in June of the production was supposed to start June of 1990 then it was pushed in November of 1990 and then there was a delay due to Sarah Brightman and Andrew Lloyd Webber getting a divorce so that delayed things and then Schumacher's career like took off so he really didn't have time to do this project um in in 2003 Andrew Lloyd Webber's

53:54 company which I just said was really useful films they buy the rights back from the Warner Brothers uh in order to produce the film independently but Warner Brothers retained the first look option in order to have access to distribution so that's how that is that do we know what First Look means it just means that they got the first cut of the film to see if they wanted to buy in to do the Distributing or if not they could pass them that they would go to every other Studio basically so cool so is this it's it's independent in a sense that it was independently produced correct okay almost like this is a weird way to think about it but almost like how the uh uh uh prequels for Star Wars were independently Yeah by George Lucas they were not done through 20th Century Fox

54:42 so obviously it was originally in 1990 supposed to be Michael Crawford um with the times as the time kept being pushed along there was uh Hugh Jackman John Travolta Antonio Banderas meatloaf Heath Ledger and Matthew McConaughey were all considered at various along the line um I would say a Heath Ledger would be fascinating yeah I mean I would say I mean those first three names at least we know that they can like Butler yeah at least they've proven that they can sing yeah so Christine um originally obviously was supposed to be Sarah Brightman and then during the course uh Katie Holmes and halfway and Karen

55:29 Knightley are all considered as well is this is this current Tom Cruise Katie Holmes 2004 yeah I believe you determined in the previous recording that it was pre-tom Cruise it was well because okay are you I'm saying I I don't know you're asking but like the no I'm saying the last the last episode this film was filmed before because I was gonna say I because I didn't know if this was Katie Holmes coming in with the energy of like I love Christy I love I would love to be a part of this project or is it like when she was trying a gun for nine and she's like I have the I know what it's like to be this this wife character um what was Katie Holmes big thing she was

56:16 Justin's Creek which I believe was still happening it had to have just been like star power and I'm sure she's probably a singer because Andrew in April of 2005. okay wow so yeah interesting um I mean Anne Hathaway could absolutely sing it I'm sure absolutely I would have loved Keira Knightley because I have a huge crush on Keira Knightley but I don't know if she could sing it at all but I will say so apparently every awesome was 17 when they filmed yeah uh when they started filming she was 16. yeah which means she probably auditioned at 15. is my guess yeah so that's a that's a yikes for me personally um but I do like the fact that she is so young because I think that that makes this character make more sense something

57:01 that I'm sure is going to make those who know Phantom through soundtracks very angry is that I haven't known the film first I'm often off put by how like mature and full sounding the seasons the stage Christine said they always sound like 35 year old women and I feel like the character is supposed to be like yeah yeah I think in this one too especially like her contrast with Carlotta is so extreme that it like helps the story narratively in terms of like why everyone was like whoa this voice um so yeah that's yeah it's very interesting that she was extremely young and Joel Schumacher allegedly only wanted girl like actresses under 25. so um is fine yeah yeah over eight there

57:47 should have been this officials yeah over 18 should definitely be the floor yeah because even if you had cast like a Katie Holmes or an Anne Hathaway I mean Anne Hathaway's first big breakout role was she was a high schooler so it's like you could have cast someone like late teens early 20s that would still easily read off a super yo so um it was shot on eight different sound stages at Pinewood Studios so it was all built like for this movie basically which is very impressive because it's the art direction is very very impressive in my opinion strong and they actually did burn the theater set down for the end for the fire more practical more practical stuff for movies

58:34 cost 1.3 million and it was provided by Swarovski um and I remember watching the movie and there's a point where like present day uh Raul is looking at like two lovers look at a Swarovski window yeah and I was like what a weird moment this is in this movie and now it makes sense because I was probably like you have to put our name somewhere in this movie ah that was product placement yeah yeah it was weird so at the Oscars uh this movie did not receive a ton of Love um it was nominated for a few though so it was nominated for best original song for the credit song learn to be lonely back when the credit songs were allowed yeah I was nominated for best cinematography and best art Direction but did not win any of them um the week uh this comes out in the

59:22 theaters here is the box office lineup in 10th Place Phantom of the Opera uh number nine The Life Aquatic with Steve suzu eight is Spanglish seven is Darkness I don't know that one that's the first one I don't know six is Polar Express five is Ocean's Twelve four is The Aviator three is Fat Albert yes two is A Series of Unfortunate Events and one is Meet the Fockers just just to put us in a point in time I'm in place I loved series Unfortunate Events books I did not like the movie initially but then my parents got it for me for Christmas so I watched it like several times over because I owned it and I came to really love the movie yeah Meryl Streep Meryl Streep Jim Carrey uh

1:00:10 Neil Joseph no Neil Patrick Harris is in the remake the person I don't remember who the second one is because it's the first three books he's an English actor yeah anyway yeah I don't remember okay okay the last thing I want to tell you and then I swear to God we can talk about this movie is I have to tell you about the plot of Love Never Dies absolutely they're not gonna make a movie of it and they better here so Love Never Dies is the sequel to Phantom of the Opera that debuted on the west end in 2010 and it was so poorly received that it never even had a Broadway debut runs in other cities want to make this happen so badly yes it

1:00:55 did have an Australian run where they retooled the script a little bit uh to a bit more generous Acclaim um so the music is Andrew Lloyd Webber lyrics are by Glenn Slater so different person from Phantom of the Opera they were like we're not going back to the same well of knowledge here is The quick summary that I have written it is 10 years since the events of the original story in family Opera Christine with Raul and Son Gustav they are invited to phantasma on Coney Island so this takes place in New York it is run by the Phantom who has been aided by Madame magiri and Meg who apparently now performs sexual favors to help the Phantom realize his vision of a theme park I don't know Christine hasn't sung in ages Raul is a

1:01:41 drunk and a gambler things are on the Rocks this is a fun summary the Phantom reveals himself to Christine alone when she's there they reminisce about a wonderful night they had together allegedly and Christine was going to choose him wrote over Raul but when she woke up she reveals that he was gone um and he was like oh I left because I was so scared you would be afraid of my face so I fled and she was like well then I chose Raul because of that so that's very much not what happened but okay in a late oh yeah this is all do you see on stage or something but it's not yeah uh in a later scene the Phantom bets Raul that if because Raul can't he's a gambling the Phantom bets brawl that if Christine won't perform the Arya that the Phantom has written then the Phantom will pay off all their debts and

1:02:27 allow them to leave together but if she does sing the Arya Raul must leave Christine for good and he agrees which seems crazy she is of course swept up by his soaring Arya and performs Raul accepting defeat and leaves meanwhile Meg has lost her [ __ ] mind and the jiris Have Become full villains of this story she's frustrated at the realization that the Phantom will choose Christine yet again she is so upset she kidnaps Gustav who has been revealed to be the Phantom's actual child at this point and is going to drown him in the ocean they rushed to the dock the Phantom apologizing for not realizing Meg's contributions while Meg is brandishing a gun at him however upon mentioning Christine Meg becomes enraged and shoots the gun mistakenly shooting Christine

1:03:14 and killing her the Phantom and Christine share a kiss as she dies in his arms Gustav slowly unmasks the phantom without fear curtain this is giving me Harry Potter fan fiction it's giving fan fiction it's total fan fiction yeah um yeah it uh apparently wasn't good and it wasn't even it wasn't even bad enough that it was like fun to see it because it was bad either it was just like sad bad sad bad here's my question why not do a prequel if you need more Phantom if you need more Phantom well because because a sequel had already been written in the form of a book so they're in 1999 some writer had been like it's

1:04:02 my job to write a sequel to The Phantom of the Opera from 1911. oh and so writes The Phantom of Manhattan and that is what this is based on um because I'm sure it's a lot more different but yeah there you go that's Love Never Dies we're never doing it on the Pod so there you go all right we must move on [Music] Molly what are your general thoughts on

1:04:48 this movie you too visually great and I don't think Gerard Butler is bad in it I don't think he's amazing I'm not saying he's a great voice but even though it's a very operatic and like musically based movie it doesn't bother me that the voices aren't amazing in it I I think that they hit the right balance of like enough musicality to keep it going and you know I've seen the criticisms I understand the criticism but it it I they can't get under my skin enough to make me dislike the movie yeah I just

1:05:34 love it Minnie Driver is truly everything oh come on mini driver is one of those actresses that has a career that like I in my head have a fantasy that like if I became an actress that would be like the type of the type of career that I would have had um I don't know it's just good it's just a good movie yeah I wouldn't say yeah so I would say it's good I definitely really like it um I understand obviously the criticisms of it I think there's some weird criticisms that I'll read later when we get to the end but for the most part I don't mind Gerard Butler I would say it's only Music of the Night where I'm like this probably should be a little bit better honestly but that's really everything else I'm like pretty fine with um also this is maybe a hot take that I think that some of the criticism of

1:06:20 Gerard Butler in this movie is like boys who wanted to be their 300 Daddy and like don't want to square the circle of like he was in Phantom of the Opera and he's also this big action star like yeah let him live let him be a multi-faceted person who is also the Phantom of the Opera which is so weird because I feel like Hugh Jackman was able to do it like I feel like he gets more respected as like he does musicals he's The Boy From Oz that then also is Wolverine and that's okay for some reason well yeah but that's I mean he didn't really do a musical until he didn't do a movie musical I should say until Les Mis which is 2012. I think also Wolverine's last fashion fashion sure yeah that's true yeah it's true that is true that is true

1:07:05 um RJ General thoughts I will say like when I was for in our first version of this podcast of this movie because at the time we were just basically like going plot By plot like by beat we were a lot more harsh on it and more or more just like negative I don't think like we both were like did we like this or not like we just kept kind of like trying to just like tear it down um so it makes me believe that like truly my big faults of phantom are just like more so in the actual Source material but then like I was watching it I was like and like watching it last night I was like this is a fully realized vision like this is Joel Schumacher being like I we are accepting how melodramatic this

1:07:53 Gothic romance is yeah I'm gonna film it that way I'm gonna present it that way yeah I don't I don't think you can say that they were unclear on what they were trying to do like yes maybe they were taking it a hair too seriously like yes I guess that like and that's part of why many drivers so great and it is that she's like not taking it she's the greatest person having fun in this movie yeah but and I also from my understanding of the criticism and the difference between stage musical I do see the point of like the Phantom should maybe be less like on screen that he

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