Whether speaking of its various adaptations or its title character (or the divided opinions about Broadway's longest-running musical), it seems you can't kill The Phantom of the Opera. Now there's Part 2: a new show, just opened in London, with the Phantom alive and well and living in Paris no more, but in Coney Island. Passion and music might "never die," but people do, and that theme of mortality is the basis of a cabaret show recorded live, also reviewed this time.

LOVE NEVER DIES
DEBUT RECORDING
(WITH MOST OF THE 2010 LONDON CAST)
Really Useful Records/ Decca Broadway

They're back—some of them—ten years after the "end" of the spooky story of The Phantom of the Opera. The long-gestating / once or twice abandoned musical presenting the continuation of the lives of several of its characters has just opened in London, with an album of the score released at the same time. As you'd guess, it's a highly dramatic and grand enterprise, with not just its characters returning, but its moods, sweeping and soaring music, and emotions all "larger than life" (or death?). We get a lot of what we've come to expect from composer Andrew Lloyd Webber as he revisits the people he musicalized for what became such a smash for him. But there are new colors, too: some muted, some gaudy, in addition to the boldness of melodrama and bombast. The recording is sumptuous and intense, with some singing and musical accompaniment more (relatively) nuanced and intimate. Some is more subtly psychologically haunting ("The Coney Island Waltz") rather than thunderstormishly scary. And there's some relief from the oversizedness with the light, goofy pastiche – what one character refers to as "that trashy vaudeville music." There are surprises here, many welcome, and much to enjoy if you come along for the carnival ride and the roller coaster of suspended disbelief. A taste for extremes of all kinds may be necessary for appreciation/enjoyment of what can be the Niagara Falls of music with the sweep and creepiness elements sometimes at full force.

Performances are quite impressive and committed with some rapturous singing. As the reunited Phantom and Christine, Ramin Karimloo and Sierra Boggess, who've played the characters in productions of the original Lloyd Webber/Hart Phantom of the Opera, have real electricity and tension together. They sing powerfully without making everything huge and crescendo-like, although certainly there is some floridness and overstatedness. Some lines, delivered with punch or spat out, are followed by pauses (and silences in the orchestration) long enough that, on first listening, they made me suppose that the song must have ended abruptly. This is also true in some of the accusatory lines and lamenting delivered by Sally Dexter as Madame Giry (this role is being played by Liz Robertson in the London cast, but other leads are the same.) The new character is the son Christine gave birth to, a role played on stage by a few alternates, including Charlie Manton who is on the recording. His performance is remarkable as he has an arrestingly lovely boy soprano voice that is not coy or overly pristine: he's acting, too, and is rewarding to hear on all levels. His scenes with the Phantom are disturbingly unsettling but powerful. As Raoul, Joseph Millson doesn't get to show much more than scowling and moping and threatening, but does it all effectively and with panache. As Meg, Madame Giry's daughter, Summer Strallen gets more of a chance than others at variety, as her songs allow her to fret, flounce and flutter, be sweet and explosive.

In several of the lighter songs, lyricist Glenn Slater shows some flashes of the playfulness and bite demonstrated in his collaborations with Alan Menken, but generally he keeps them in check and writes on a plainer plane. Lyrics about kisses and caresses and expressions of torment and tumult abound, the bigger melodies often having the simplest language and rhyming, with more repetition. "Dear Old Friend" with all the leads and the ensemble is a major highlight of delicious writing and performance. In this number, characters profess to be thrilled to see each other again but we are privy to their real feelings and suspicions and jealousies. The mega-musical moments may be perhaps manipulative and obvious giants, like the title song and "'Til I Hear You Sing," meant to thrill and soar and score and push buttons and pull out handkerchiefs. I find myself preferring the side dishes rather than the main courses of this musical feast. Somewhere in between is the wistful "Once Upon Another Time," warmly sung.

It's not the relentless grand guignolia some may have anticipated. There is more aural variety, with the lush melodies and heavy moments given respite with: jauntier numbers; recitative; moody instrumental pieces; an Entr'Acte; and prologue and ending which have the sounds of the waves. The orchestral feel is not as lush and plush as I'd wish for, with the words "keyboard programming" explaining some of the somewhat synthesized feel supplementing the acoustic instrumentals. However, it's well produced and theatrical to the max.

Submitted for review was the standard issue, which is a two-disc audio set. A deluxe edition is also available with DVD footage, interviews and a full booklet. Included in the basic version are some notes about the show's stop-and-start development from the composer and a description of the old days of Coney Island, but not the lyrics or a plot synopsis. However, diction and sound clarity and balance are quite fine and you won't struggle to hear lyrics nor be confused about who's doing what to whom (no more spoilers here!).

HECTOR CORIS
LIFE IS WONDERFUL

A cabaret show about death? Well, yes. And more specifically, it's also accepting mortality and making the most of life. But maybe Hector Coris is just the guy to pull it off without filling it with gloom and doom or Pollyanna preachiness. A down-to-earth performer with a strong sense of humor and irony, he pulls his songs from various musical genres into an eclectic mix: Two songs each from William Finn, Ben Folds and the team of Kander & Ebb are parts of the repertoire.

Seen in a couple of revues with his own clever lyrics (alas, none in this debut solo show), Hector is good at directly communicating with an audience, as can be gleaned from this live recording from his Life Is Wonderful show which has had several performances at the popular club Don't Tell Mama in Manhattan's theatre district.

On the more tenderly crooned and pensively rendered songs, he reveals a gentle, attractive sound imbued with vulnerability. He is perhaps at his best with wry observations in song and those which tell little slice-of-life stories like "Another New York Afternoon" by Christine Lavin. An interesting choice that gives him a chance to act and question life and consider death is David Caldwell's "A Tomb with a View" about buying a cemetery plot. "Every Day with You" is another satisfying choice; its music and lyrics are by Brett Kristofferson, the young songwriter honored at this year's Bistro Awards, and he's someone whose work Hector has had on his plate as a director of cabaret shows with singer Angela Shultz who, in turn, directed his act. There are humorous moments here, too, with a couple of slices of ham and some that happily insinuate themselves into the story-songs and the included patter. The Drowsy Chaperone's "As We Stumble Along" starts off in a low-key, sweet way that is surprisingly effective and builds to a blustery, brash conclusion. Here, Hector shows his musical comedy side, something loopy in case we feared things would get droopy. But the mood is more life-affirming than mournful. Having two songs about the deaths of animals lets us stay on topic with some variety and whimsy.

This is a performance which has as its key strength its thought-provoking communication rather than bravura or weepy singing or anything grand scale. (Accompaniment is just pianist Ray Bailey and Dale Henderson on cello, who generally keep things appropriate intimate—and there are bursts of energy when needed.) While taking us on some diverting side trips, Hector still keeps the focus on the spoiler alert news flash that we are all destined to die so we need a little carpe diem when we can get it. In other words, he never ignores the subject at hand of Death, the "elephant in the room." That is literally addressed with his plucky performance of "The Elephant Song," from Kander & Ebb's 70 Girls 70 about the demise of a favorite zoo animal, and confronted plainly in William Finn's "You Gotta Die Sometime." But Hector wisely keeps coming back to the here and now, savored as something more precious with the sober reminder of limited time ... tick-tick-tick.

We'll be back in two weeks with some more recordings, including some old standards that, like love, never seem to die.

- Rob Lester

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