Inmiddels zijn de hoofdrollen voor de Londense ‘Love Never Dies’ officieel bevestigd door Andrew Lloyd Webber.
Ramin Karimloo and The Little Mermaid’s Sierra Boggess, who have both starred in various incarnations of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera, will head the cast of the sequel to that international hit.
London’s Daily Mail reports that Karimloo and Boggess will star in both the London and Broadway productions of Love Never Dies.
Lloyd Webber told the London paper, “I personally feel that what will now happen is that Sierra and Ramin will open in London early next year and then go to New York in the autumn of 2010. I think once the album comes out, hopefully before Christmas, a lot of singers will come out of the woodwork and we’ll find new Christines and Phantoms for the other productions.”
The creative team also includes director Jack O’Brien, lyricist Glenn Slater, choreographer Jerry Mitchell and music supervisor Gareth Valentine.
A recent casting notice offered this brief description of Love Never Dies: “In 1907 New York, the mysterious ‘Maestro’ who runs the theatre at Coney Island announces a one-off concert by legendary Parisian soprano Christine Daaé. Her arrival in New York with husband Raoul, Victome de Chagny and son Gustave, and their subsequent meeting with the ‘Maestro,’ bring the cataclysmic events of 10 years earlier at the Paris Opera crashing back into all their lives.”
Sierra Boggess made her Broadway debut as Ariel in The Little Mermaid, which currently plays the Lunt-Funtanne Theatre. Her stage credits also include Christine in Phantom Las Vegas, Les Misérables, West Side Story and the world premiere of Princesses.
Ramin Karimloo, who was born in Iran and launched his career in Canada, has performed in the West End productions of Les Miserables, The Phantom of the Opera and Miss Saigon.
Bron http://www.playbill.com
Plus in de blog van Baz Bamigboye een aantal andere interessante details over ‘Love Never Dies’
Andrew Lloyd Webber has confirmed that soprano Sierra Boggess and baritone Ramin Karimloo will star in the world premiere in London of his Phantom Of The Opera sequel, Love Never Dies.
He told me that the £10million (probably more) show will open at the Adelphi Theatre ‘early next year’, adding that ‘if it’s any later, I’ll go crazy!’
The show’s award-winning designer, Bob Crowley, will test ‘magic’ scenes involving a life-sized automaton version of Christine Daae, the Phantom’s beautiful protegee, at the Adelphi in September or October.
‘I don’t want to wait till next year and find that we’re held up by some illusion,’ the composer said. ‘We’ll set it up and fix any problems in the autumn.’ Creating the automaton, and ensuring that it works, has been one of the problems that caused Love Never Dies to delay from an initial, hoped-for opening this year.
Another factor was finding enough sets of performers to play the two main leads on three continents simultaneously. One idea had been for Love Never Dies to open in London, New York and Shangai at the same time. Lloyd Webber conceded that it’s unlikely that will now happen.
‘Where will we find three voices like that?’ Lloyd Webber wondered aloud, as we listened to Ms Boggess’s soaring soprano voice during a playback session at a recording studio in Battersea, South London.
Lord Lloyd-Webber and his long-time collaborator, music producer Nigel Wright, were playing me excerpts from the Love Never Dies concept album. ‘She’s pretty wonderful,’ he added. And she is.
‘It’s the first time that the leads on an album of mine have gone on to open in the actual stage show. When Sierra and Ramin open in London, Broadway will want to see the original stars, so you can’t say to London: “OK, listen to them for two weeks and then New York gets them.”
‘I personally feel that what will now happen is that Sierra and Ramin will open in London early next year and then go to New York in the autumn of 2010. I think once the album comes out, hopefully before Christmas, a lot of singers will come out of the woodwork and we’ll find new Christines and Phantoms for the other productions,’ he explained.
My sense of Love Never Dies is that it’s the best score Lloyd Webber has produced, and that once he hands it over to director Jack O’Brien it can be moulded into the best musical London has seen in years.
However, Lloyd Webber, looking wistful as we listened to his powerful melodies, wondered whether there would be an audience for Love Never Dies. To be sure, nothing’s a dead certainty in this business, but I will be mightily surprised if Love Never Dies doesn’t excel, both artistically and commercially.
‘I’m just going to hand it over to Jack in January and start rehearsals,’ Lloyd Webber said.
I laughed and surmised that he wouldn’t be able to ‘just hand it over’. But that’s why O’Brien’s a good choice. He’s tough.
The show is set on Coney Island, New York, around 1907 - ten years on from the final actions in Phantom Of The Opera. A mysterious figure, Mr Y, has established a freak show attraction called Phantasma.
He works with former Paris Opera ballet mistress Madame Giry (sung on the album by Sally Dexter) and her daughter Meg (now famous as bathing beauty the Ooh La La girl), sung by Summer Strallen.
Christine, an opera star, is married to Raoul, the Vicomte de Chagny (John Barrowman on the record), and the mother of a ten-year-old son, Gustave. She is invited to perform at the Phantasma amusement resort.
Lloyd Webber explained that in those days, showmen always liked to present ‘opera totty of the day, like Katherine Jenkins now’.
I won’t give any more away, except to say that by the show’s dramatically heartbreaking end, there won’t be a dry eye in the house. By the way, I asked why Ms Jenkins couldn’t take over from Ms Boggess in London and he explained that Boggess’s range was soprano, and that she can go right up the scale: ‘Her B-flat is sensational!’ Jenkins is a mezzo soprano and her voice wouldn’t suit his score.
Essentially, it’s a musical about obsession, love and a composer’s life work. It may also, I suspect, be the final original masterpiece of Lloyd Webber’s career.
Bron http://www.dailymail.co.uk
