Love Never Dies....Or Does It?

So in scanning Broadway.com today I came across an article stating that some big news will be released on October 8th concerning Andrew Lloyd Webber's sequel to The Phantom of the Opera entitled Love Never Dies (http://www.loveneverdies.com/). When the website loads a letter from "The Phantom" appears and you can click it to watch a teaser trailer with scenes from the Las Vegas show which features actress Sierra Boggess as Christine who will be reprising the role for the sequel.

The new musical was supposed to be based on the novel The Phantom of Manhattan which was written as a sequel to the musical not the original novel. It appears most of the plot has been used as Love Never Dies is set in New York and involves an amusement park. Having read the novel, I thought the plot was a bit weak and the ending left a great deal to be desired. It's a short novel and a fairly quick read. My main complaint was that all of the narratives are told from secondary characters' points of view instead of focusing on Christine, Raoul, and, of course, the phantom himself.

My opinion is that Andrew Lloyd Webber should have left well enough alone. The movie was bad enough. The Phantom of the Opera is perfect as is, and the story is haunting as it leaves the theater goer able to come up with their own conclusions of what might have happened after the Phantom disappears from his lair. To me this is the quickest way to put to death one of my favorite musicals.

Making Smart Casting Decisions

I have been pondering this topic for the past few days, and it actually seems a pretty popular subject at the moment, so I figured, why not? It also very much pertains to me and some decisions I might have to make shortly in my own show once the auditions role around. So, I have been thinking on it a lot lately.

One of the toughest things about auditions is making a smart choice based on who comes out and shows an interesting in the show. There will always be hurt feelings, and I am sure someone will always question what the director was thinking. Personally, I believe it's the director's vision and no one should question that....most of the time. There are examples of casting situations that make me wonder if propriety was even considered for a millisecond. Only in community theater it seems does someone think it's ok to have teenagers lusting after someone old enough to be their father, and vice-versa.

I think I've seen it all. I've seen attempts to age people with facial hair to make it seem like the age gap between a twenty something year old and someone who was at least in her fifties wasn't so great. I had a character aged a few years to make it more believable for me to play her, and make her story a little less creepy since the man lusting after her no longer seemed like a complete pedophile. And of course I've witnessed various transformations brought about with the wonders of stage make-up.

Yet, as I think about the character of Lynn in Red Herring, a young woman her twenties, I'm there there are a few teenagers within the community who could carry the part. Yet, I still couldn't see putting a sixteen or seventeen year old, no matter how mature she may act and look, in the part, especially if the actor playing James is actually in his twenties. It seems to me like it would be completely inappropriate to ask that such a pair be romantic even on stage. It also seems like a huge risk for the actor playing James as these days people get accused of so much, or for the theater company as you never truly know who you can trust. Hopefully, I will not find myself facing such a decision.

Life is the farce which everyone has to perform. - Arthur Rimbaud

Last night I finally started to give a bit more thought to Red Herring. I'm excited and nervous at the same time. It's my first shot at being a director and I think I picked a good show to start with. Of course I'm currently stressing out over casting and finding the right people for roles and probably will be until the actual auditions on the 28th and 29th of this month.

I know there are several people in the community who can fill each other roles, but waiting for the end of the month to see if they show up for auditions is causing a bit of anxiety. There's quite a bit going on in the theater community in the next few months. I have to wait to see who will be doing a musical that will be running directly opposite my show before even truly thinking about who might come to auditions and who I might want to try to nag into coming to auditions.

However, last night a couple friends helped me sit and read through the script out loud as a favor, and it gave me fresh inspiration for the direction of the show. To actually hear the lines out loud was a much different, and much needed experience. I have a vision for each scene, and for each character in those scenes. As much as I love the freedom as an actor many of the directors in our community provide when doing blocking, I believe in giving more actual direction.

I don't want my cast to guess if they're doing it right or to my liking. A director's job is to give direction on characters and staging - how they speak, how they move.... not just entrances and exits. Having been in shows where my director has given so many blocking notes one can't focus on their performance and shows where I've received absolutely no blocking, I find to find the happy medium for my cast. So I'll make my notes with the thought in mind that things will probably have to be simplified and changed based on what can be done in reality. Sometimes something looks wonderful on paper, but not so much in life.