Music: Andrew Lloyd Webber
Lyrics: Charles Hart
Director: Harold Prince
Design: Maria Bjornson
Details: Her Majesty's Theatre, Haymarket, SW1
Tube: Piccadilly Circus
In Short: Rum goings on behind the scenes of an opera house.
In Full: Often regarded as Lloyd Webber's most effective contribution to the musical form, Phantom has toured world wide but fails to deliver the scarey thrill promised by its cast of ghosts and sickly lovers.
More sinister at a time when grand old singalongs are failing to win an audience is the threat this ghost of a story poses to future musicals. Yes, it's sumptuous, visually spellbinding and all that kind of stuff, and yes, Lloyd Webber's tunes are a cut above his usual efforts, but it still must rank as melodrama of the blandest kind.
