The Phantom of the Opera is part romance, part Gothic melodrama, and part spectacle.

This musical has appealed to theatregoers for over three decades, but after a record-breaking run that will go down in history, the music of the night will soon play for the last time when the show closes in February 2023. The Phantom of the Opera, by Andrew Lloyd Webber, Charles Hart, and Richard Stilgoe, is the longest-running Broadway show of all time. I've bracketed all changed lyrics.He's here, the phantom of the opera.and he's been haunting Broadway since 1988. There’s really no way of knowing for sure. He may have been asked by a certain director or record producer to alter them. He may have simply been unhappy with the lines and simply rewrote them. They may have been taken from earlier revisions of the show before Hart was brought in. After his most recent show, the sequel to Phantom called “Love Never Dies” received poor reviews he decided to pull it off its West End production for several days to completely rework it.Īs to the reasons why he made specific changes it would only be speculation. He is certainly not averse to making revisions after a show is already in production. This shows Lloyd-Webber’s notorious perfectionism. Some of Stilgoe's original contributions are still present in the final version.

Charles Hart, a young and relatively unknown lyricist was invited to rewrite the lyrics, even contributing almost solely to an unplaced tune by Lloyd Webber, which later became 'Think of Me'. However, the composer felt that Stilgoe's lyrics were too witty and clever, rather than romantic. Richard Stilgoe, who also wrote the lyrics for Andrew Lloyd Webber's Starlight Express, then wrote lyrics for the production, as well as devising most of the titles for the songs.

After his first choice turned him down.Īlan Jay Lerner was then recruited, but died soon after beginning the project, and none of his contributions remained in the show. Phantom itself went through three lyricists.

He later decided to rework it into Phantom. When Lloyd-Webber began his relationship with Sarah Brightman he wrote a song for her titled “Married Man” with lyrics by Trevor Nunn. The song actually started with a different title and completely different lyrics.

The phantom of the opera lyrics parts