By Roger Chambers
The Phantom of the Opera by Andrew Lloyd Weber was one of the largest hits in American musical theater in the modern times. The sequel has the Phantom return, though this time the story takes place in Coney Island, New York.
As part of Broadway Utica’s 60th season, the Stanley Theater in Utica hosted the premier of “Love Never Dies” September 22. Cast and crew of this production spent several weeks in Utica setting up for the performances in Utica, beginning their lengthy multi-city tour.
Like “The Phantom of the Opera,” it is full of lush melodies, with a nearly twenty piece ensemble supporting but not overpowering, the singers. Meghan Picerno, playing Christine, provided a very strong leading voice, with occasional very challenging high notes. Gardar Thor Cortes played the mysterious phantom with a lofty tenor voice. Casey J. Lyons was outstanding as boy soprano singing the role of Christine’s son Gustave.
The story takes place in New York, about ten years after the story at the Paris Opera. Christine comes to New York with her son to for an special opening production of an opera for Oscar Hammerstein. The encounters between her and the Phantom, along with her son, are poignant yet disturbing.
Much of the story takes place at Coney Island, the Phantom’s new stomping grounds. There is a dancing freak show, appropriately labeled as Phantasma, indescribably performed with a near hallucinatory effect of a bad dream. Unfortunately, a technical malfunction of the curtain broke the spell on opening night, and the show was briefly interrupted to fix the problem.
The high tech staging aspects of this show were quite remarkable, though difficult to simply explain. Various towers and lights simulated the midway carnival atmosphere of Coney Island. In addition, rotating sets seamlessly merged varying scenes, changing from one side of a room to another site, using a large coach in once scene. Monolithic revolving prisms and creative staging, as well as sometimes outlandish costuming dominate the Phantasma scenes, particularly Gustave’s dream like sequence in the second act.
While overall bittersweet in tone, there are some breaks in the generally somber and tragic aspects of the story. Bathing Beauty, a group ensemble dance was quite well done. That number, (reprieved in the second act), and the Phantasma scenes provided humorous interludes.
There are twists and surprises in the story, with purposely no spoilers here. Like many musical productions and operas, it ends tragically, but also with hope as the Phantom is revealed. The premier night was well received with a sold out crowd providing a well-deserved cheering and standing ovation.
The Stanley Theater, with several crucial upgrades over several years is perfect for hosting state-of-the-art high tech stage productions. We are very fortunate to have such a facility, and to have Broadway Utica bring consistently high quality theater to Utica.
