‘Phantom’ Returns, but Without the Old Magic

Funny, it’s always worked before. “Sing once again with me our strange duet,” the masked stranger would entreat in his honeyed, hypnotizing voice. “My power over you grows stronger yet.”

But the spell of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “The Phantom of the Opera” is broken in its return to the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood. Instead of the seamless stagecraft that we grew so used to during the musical’s 4 1/4-year run at the Ahmanson Theatre, we get halting, scaled-down spectacle and mannered, scene-stealing performances. In the latter regard, headliner Davis Gaines, who rose to fame on the strength of his performances five years ago at the Ahmanson, is particularly guilty.

Compounded by conductor Roger Cantrell’s sluggish tempos and herky-jerky pacing overall, this rendition comes dangerously close to redefining “the music of the night” as a chorus of snores.

Yet in spite of all this, something special did happen at Sunday night’s opening. As the show entered its final stretch, the performers stopped thinking about themselves long enough to become caught up in this story of a man who is horribly misunderstood just because he’s different. Gaines became a boy in a man’s body--hissing threats one moment, weeping a child’s lonely tears the next--and the denouement was shattering.

Gaines’ Phantom is not the magician-Phantom of original star Michael Crawford. Rather than inducing a state of erotic hypnosis over the object of his desire, Gaines tries to win her by sheer force of will. His versatile baritone is capable of whispered falsetto sweetness and ringing, full-voiced power, though his shifts among these qualities are too consciously calculated for grand effect. He grandstands further by holding climactic notes extra-long.

Gaines will log his 2,000th performance as the Phantom sometime in mid-October and, sadly, he has developed bad habits along the way.

As the Phantom’s would-be lady love, Marie Danvers is excessively tremulous, her voice quavering with the same intensity whether she’s swooning with passion or in fear for her life.

Other than Gaines and Danvers, the cast is mostly the same as the one that visited the Pantages just seven months ago. Patricia Hurd returns with her humorously exaggerated diva-isms as the clueless Carlotta, and Lawrence Anderson is affectingly human--if a bit too bland--as rival love interest Raoul.

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* “The Phantom of the Opera,” Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd. Tuesdays-Fridays, 8 p.m.; Saturdays, 2 and 8 p.m.; Sundays, 2 and 7:30 p.m. Ends Nov. 1. $17-$67. (213) 365-3555. Running time: 2 hours, 40 minutes.