From the Barricade to the Opera

Well my theatrical adventures continue as I went to see Les Miserables and Phantom of the Opera. Les Miserables was so amazing! I’ve seen it before so I wasn’t that excited or anything about it, but it was great. Jean Valjean, played by Simon Bowman was not the greatest though. He couldn’t hit the high notes very strongly. Also he was backtracking so badly in the songs. I forgot what the term is but he was always behind the music and would slow down and then speed up singing to catch back up with the music. It was distracting. But he was a good actor. Although I saw a much much better Valjean in the US tour. My FAVORITE character is Javert. Poor guy. But in my opinion he gets the best song and he has to have the best voice in the show. Hans-Peter Janssens had a tremendous voice! I love it. He was a very stiff Javert so he needed to loosen up a bit, but other than that I really liked him.

Eponine was played by Nancy Sullivan. So good. Eponine drives the show in my opinion. Although she’s really not onstage for the majority of the play, that character really impacts me every time. And the reaction form the audience for her was awesome.

One thing I was really impressed with was the ensemble. It was stellar! They were spot on in every scene. Then ensemble usually only sticks out to me if they were bad, but these guys were great. Every person who opened their mouths could sing so well. I really don’t know how to describe them.

Last people I was impressed with were the students. There was an understudy for Enjolras and other than fumbling some words (I think, maybe I just couldn’t understand him), he was fantastic. I usually get annoyed by that story line because I never feel any sympathy for their cause, and I think they are just dumb. The passion these actors showed for their cause in this production really fired me up and made their downfall impact me much more. “Red and Black” gave me goosebumps. The Thenardiers were hilllaaaaaarious too!

Final anecdote on Les Miz. First of all, I never cry. Second of all, I never cry in musicals. So when Valjean sings “Bring Him Home” to Marius before the battle I wasn’t really expecting to be impacted. This Valjean’s upper register was weak and I don’t like Marius because he’s a player. The song goes “God on high hear my prayer…Bring him peace bring him joy, he is young, he is only a boy”. I was kinda tuned out until I saw the man in front of me reach out and hold his 8-9 year old son’s hand during the middle of the song. Aaaaaahhhhhh I started to tear up. It was so sweet!

Then I saw Phantom of the Opera. I did not really love this play to begin with but I was open to having my opinions changed. I had only seen the movie so I was hoping that seeing it live would get me really into the show. Erm, hardly. I know lots of people really love this musical, but this production was a mess.

I did wholeheartedly love all the character actors in the play. Monsiuer Andre, Monsiuer Firmen, Carlotta and the male opera singer were all fantastic and hilarious!

The thing that really made me not like it was the Phantom. We had an understudy for the Phantom and Christine. Usually understudies are just as good or better even than the regular actor. They didn’t even announce or put a piece of paper in the programs saying who was on that night.

Phantom was not very good in my opinion. I really want the Phantom to make me feel sorry for him and side with him throughout the play and hope that somehow Christine falls in love with him. Well this time I was pulling for Raoul. Nigel Richards just didn’t have a powerful voice like I expect the Phantom too. Not even like a great singing voice, just a commanding character. One really weird scene, which isn’t the actors fault, was during the masquerade scene where the Phantom busts in on the party. He comes down dressed as a skeleton. Supposed to be scary, but I was laughing because the skull mask he was wearing was an animatronic mask so that his mouth would move! It took everything in me not to laugh! And I guess that's how they must do that part in every production of Phantom. On the plus side I did figure out how the Phantom disappears into his chair at the end of the show.

Christine was also the understudy or standby, I don’t know which. She had a good voice, it was just kind of abrasive. I don’t really like that high kinda true soprano opera voices, but it is a story about an opera sooooo. She was just all over the place as far as acting goes. Really jerky and ran around the stage anxiously all the time.

Finally, I saw the show with a friend on the trip who was a former ballerina. A large part of the opera scenes are a chorus of ballet dancers. She said the ballet was just horrible. We’re not sure if it was supposed to be that way or not, but for a professional level show, it should be better.

All that to say, some people may LOVE this show. And if I had seen a different production I might have liked it too. Just definitely not my favorite by a long shot.