But how does he interpret the role? After eight Webber Phantoms, I can confidently say that Butler’s is the scariest. But he’s never Crawford (or Karimloo, or Carpenter, or Cudia, or…most of the Webber Phantoms I’ve seen). And then, actually, his singing gets better for most of the movie. There are some very badly delivered lines at the beginning. Because my biggest question with this movie is: why, why did they let Gerry sing? He’s an actor, not a singer, but he was cast as a character who is THE greatest singer ever. And the green eyes…! I’ve always said my ideal Phantom looks like Gerard Butler–but sings like Michael Crawford. First, I’m just going to be honest here: he looks really good in the mask. So let’s look at the Gerard Butler Phantom.
I always begin analysis of any version of Phantom ( for example) with the most important question. And because this will be long, let’s do sub-headings! My interest, as it always is with Webber’s Phantom, was the interpretation. The plot is the same as the play, the music is (basically) the same as the play, so I’m not going to get into that here. The story, of course, is about a masked man who lives under an opera house and falls in love with Christine Daae, the beautiful soprano, who is also pursued by Raoul, the Vicomte de Chagney. Although! I have a theory that addresses all the movie’s issues, so keep reading for that. And the movie was…not as bad as I feared. And ever since I saw the play, I’ve been afraid to go back to the movie… But I finally did, because I’m writing a retelling and this is research.
I liked this movie when it came out–but I was seventeen and I’d never seen the play. If you’re not familiar with it, the Butler Phantom is a movie version of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical–but very much not the play (for that you want the 25th anniversary/Karimloo Phantom). Since the last time I watched this movie, I’ve watched just about every version of Phantom I could find, including the stage production…eight times, actually! I know this, because I know I haven’t seen it since the first time I saw the stage production. I say “finally” because I haven’t seen it in…at least eight years. I finally watched the Gerard Butler Phantom.
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