She goes to an audition and is knocked over by a falling sandbag, when she wakes up she is an opera singer in Victorian-era London auditioning for a role in Faust. We start out in New York City in the 80s as our lead character Christine finds a copy of a rare composition called Don Juan Triumphant written by a mysterious composer named Erik Destler. Well there was one adaptation of the novel which came after Webber’s awful musical, in fact 1989’s adaptation starring Robert Englund seems to have been released specifically to capitalize on the show’s popularity (as well as buoy Englund’s career.) The Phantom of the Opera keeps the subject matter closer to the novel while making it a lot more Penny Dreadful-like than it was originally. I despise Webber’s musical and the 2004 film that was based on it and how it has flavored every adaptation since. Webber’s stage play of Gaston Leroux’s novel has invaded the popular culture as what amounts to the “official” version of the story in much the same way that the musical versions of The Wizard of Oz and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street have over-ridden their respective source materials. One of my pop-culture white whales is a stage musical of Peter Jackson’s Braindead/Dead-Alive that was reputed to be so bloody that a curtain had to be hung between the stage and the audience for the play’s climax.) The problem with The Phantom of the Opera, as it is with many things, is Andrew Lloyd Webber. Horrible, Rock & Rule, Repo! The Genetic Opera, Crybaby, and Phantom of the Paradise) and I even enjoy musicals based on non-musical stories ( Little Shop of Horrors, Reefer Madness, and Evil Dead are all quite enjoyable. I don’t have anything against musicals per se (I enjoy Blues Brothers, Streets of Fire, Dr. This is to say, I hate that The Phantom of the Operais a musical now. I don’t dislike the story much, Gaston Leroux’s novel is a decent if fairly unremarkable yarn, but I absolutely despise what it has become. I have a blind spot for Jack the Ripper, Robin Hood (when not a cartoon fox or a man in tights), benevolent aliens (I have never remained awake for all of E.T. I assume it ends with a xenomorph bursting out of Elliot’s chest), and The Phantom of the Opera. There are certain topics that pop culture likes to revisit that just bore me to tears. The silver-throated Christine enjoys success through the arrangements of her new lover… until she realizes that he has been committing unspeakably grisly murders in her honer and won’t stop until he’s completed his masterpiece… in blood! Jill Schoelen, Robert Englund, Alex Hyde-White, Billy Nighy, Molly ShannonĪn aspiring opera singer finds herself transported back to Victorian-era London - and into the arms of a reclusive, disfigured maestro determined to maker here a star. “Boy, I sure love how stuffy and pretentious The Phantom of the Opera adaptations are, I just wish they could also be trashy and ultra-violent.”