Close Encounters with the Phantom

Close Encounters with the Phantom

Here you will find accounts of my exciting, strange, and sometimes mysterious Phantom experiences! (And perhaps some plain' ole dull ones!)

Well, this is not a very exciting story, but I thought that this was a funny thing....!

Today was my day for my organ lesson at the cathedral of St. Finbarr's in Cork, Ireland. This particular morning I met the organ tuner who had just come from England to fix the organ for the Christmas services.

I thought it rather apt to find that his name was Erik! : ) Not only does he tune organs, but he also builds them. And believe it or not, he was the one who supplied the pipe organ for the London Production of Sunset Boulevard! Pretty neat, huh?

For my 21st birthday my mother and I went to Paris from June 26 to July 3. When my mother and I arrived the first day, it was later than we expected due to bad weather and computer failures at the airport. We took the bus into the city center, which left us off blocks from our hotel. We could not flag down a taxi, and we had no idea how to use the Metro yet, so we walked the whole length of Rue Lafayette, dragging the suitcases in the rain to the hotel.

By the time we were shown to our room we were exhausted! We had planned that if we arrived on time, we would be able to spend the day at the Opera House, but by then it was late and we did not know if it would be open. I nearly agreed to wait until the next day as we did not want to be disappointed if after rushing back down to the Opéra we were to find it closed. However, I got the strangest feeling that I was to be there that day` and not to wait. I mentioned this to my mother so she thought we might as well try. In any case, we did make it that day. I was thrilled because I had waited seven years to see it! It was when we were in the Grand Foyer that I noticed some unusual co-incidents.

We started looking around at the right hand side as you enter into the Foyer and went to have a close up look at the clock which was at that end. I noticed that it had stopped at six o'clock, which reminded me of something that had happened to one of our clocks at home before we left--

The clock in question is antique and is of great sentimental value to us. A few months before our trip it had stopped for no apparent reason. It had just been wound up and was working perfectly, but suddenly it decided to quit! Mom tried to get it to work by gently swinging the pendulum a little each day, thinking it had stopped because it was over wound and that the spring needed to be loosened, but the spring refused to tick over and the pendulum did not want to swing. So, it couldn't have been over wound Just before we left I asked Mom to try again - by that time we had given up - and it still wouldn't work. Finally I asked her to try moving the hands - which she did, and suddenly the chimes began tp ring and the spring started to tick. -- The time she had moved it to was six o'clock.

I pointed this co -incident out to her in the Foyer and she thought that it was unusual, but it was the clock at the other end of the Foyer which made us stop and think.

Until we got to the other end, I thought that it was just an ordinary clock like the first, but on closer inspection we found it to be an annual clock which told the date. This clock had also stopped, and I took a look: one of the 'hour hand' was pointing to Thursday, and between June and July, but slightly more so towards June. I was a little stunned - we were going to spend more time in Paris in June than July, and it was a Thursday. I again pointed it out to Mom, but she did not seem to see too much importance in it then.

We continued to browse around, and were disappointed to find out that they had closed the auditorium to the public due to ballet rehearsals. We asked if they knew when it would be open, but were told that they did not know -- it depends on the ballet rehearsal schedules. They said we could try another day, but not to plan on it being open.

In any case, we decided to book - in for the ballet as a sure means of getting in! We went over to the ticket sales booths and asked what night the ballet was. The lady said it was on Monday the 30th. (The ballet was Sylvia). Then she asked us where we would like to sit.

She looked at us as if we were mad. She pointed to different boxes on the seating chart.

No answer. She asked us to show it to her on the chart. I pointed it out to her. She continued to look at us strangely... She continued to point out other boxes, with no reference to Box 5, not even to tell us if it was taken, or that they were selling it. My mother was beginning to think this rather odd. The lady pointed out a box closest to Number 5. Frustrated, we decided to take it: It was as close as we were going to get! (Which was great! It was the Upper half of the Royal Box, the 'round' section...) We would have understood if she did not know how to explain that it was sold or the like in English, even broken English, but she made no mention of Box 5 at all! She wouldn't even answer our questions about it! (Incidently, it was sold on the night, but you think she would have told us it was sold anyway - we did ask her. She was really weird about the matter.)

Before we left that night, I wanted to take another look at the clock to make sure I had not jumped to conclusions and also because I had not paid enough attention to the other hands. This time, my Mom was a little stunned....the other large hand was between 30 and 31, and was close to Monday - as I said earlier, the date night was Monday the 30th.

Then I looked at the third hand which pointed to February. When reading the clock properly, the date it truly stopped at was February, Thursday going onto Friday, 30 going to 31.

This did not make sense; there are only 28 days in February, so I assume that the third hand is wrong and should be at January. If that is the case, then another co -incident pops up -- it was around the end of January when we started thinking about going to Paris.

Recently, I have just figured out that if the clock did not stop in January of that year, it did sometime after 1990. The offices scenes in the Charles Dance 1990 "Phantom" were shot in the anti-chambers right off the Foyer where the clocks are, and you can hear them ticking loudly in the show! However, I was curious to find out what other years could have the same dates in the same months that the clock stopped at, and I was a bit surprised at one year that popped up in particular - 1986 - the year Andrew Lloyd Webber's version opened in London......

Was it co -incidence? I finally put it to that, until......we went back to Paris in August 1998, and of course, I had to check the clocks. We didn't plan to go at all on that Thursday, (the 14th) but we had to as everything would be closed for the Assumption on Friday the 15th, and we didn't want to risk going to the Opéra on that day in case it too was closed. The clocks remained the same, unwound and in the same postion from when we were last there, except for one hand..... the "second hand" on the date clock had been changed to "Thursday".......it was pointing between Monday and Tuesday the last time in 1997......

Box Five is the third box from the stage from the left of the stage, on the same level as the Royal Box.)

Last year (1999) was my final year as an undergraduate student at University College Cork, Ireland. For one of our options we could do a major dissertation on a subject of our choice, provided it met with approval.

However, trying to get a full orchestral copy of the score was impossible! The piano version wouldn't do for some areas as I needed to study all the connecting elements between the songs.

I wrote so many letters to different music publishers that I think I am still suffering from ink poisoning! : )

I even wrote to R.U.G. themselves - but they said that the full orchestral score was not available for sale, nor would it be available for some time in the future. But I could rent Joseph, Requiem, etc. And that was the closest I got at first.

Okay- the year is half over, and I haven't even got a score to study! But as luck would have it - one of my letters floating out there actually made it to Lloyd Webber's publicist who said that though they couldn't sell a score, they could invite me over to London to see the actual thing at the RUG office!

For the next couple of weeks there were nothing but phone calls to the head manager at RUG, Caroline Skidmore, and also Emma Harvey, to arrange a time, and as fortune would have it - she said I could see it for two days on March 23 - 24 from about ten am to five pm. - and it fell right on the anniversary of my becoming a fan nine years ago that week! (I think we drove poor Caroline nuts with our phone calls!)

She also gave me a few ground rules: NO cameras, NO photocopies. Okay - no problem. It's the same with autograph scores all over the world.

Finally, Mom and I arrive in London and we found their office; a beautiful six storey brick Victorian building right in the heart of the West End in Tower Street. (It is a little street right across from the Palace Theatre were Les Mis. is playing.)

They were so kind! As luck would have it again - they actually had a whole room free for me to study in in peace. Caroline said that they wouldn't normally have a room free...every one in the building are usually taken. I got a huge desk to work at...and the girls in the office we so kind to see that I never wanted for coffee to keep going! (In Phantom and Sunsent Blvd. mugs of course!) : )

Caroline then went to get the score from the vault. She said if I wanted to see any others - that I had to give her notice for she has to go down to the vault each time.

The score to Phantom is HUGE! It is about two and a half to three feet long, one and a half feet wide, and five inches thick! I was lucky to even get a brief look at it for the two days!

What was the neat bit was that in the next office I could see all of Lloyd Webber's gold/platinum/silver/etc. records up on the wall! But what was more - in the suspended floor above on my first day there, the production team of the Joseph Video were working and I mom and I could hear the whole thing!

First guy: "Okay...so we pan the cameras over the stage this way.....with the pyramids...we got that scene....but what do we do after we throw Joseph down the hole....?

Second guy: "Maybe we should work on this next....." (He seems to have pointed something out.)

Then more discussion....on the chariots..etc. First guy must be getting upset......

Lunch time arrives - and they still don't know what to do with Joseph in the Hole.....mom and I leave for lunch...and they're gone when we come back--shoot! I wanted to hear more!

Well, Caroline asked us later not to tell what we've heard - "You've heard more that what you're meant to!" She laughed. (I guess it is okay now as the show is now out and is no longer a secret.)

The rest of that day pased in quiet study. Caroline said that everyone in the office that night was going out to see Starlight Express as it was its 15th anniversary.( We were going the next night.)

What was interesting was that in the score, bright clean sheets were added with sections of the new lyrics that are different to the Original Londaon Cast recordings....so I guess the new lyrics are now formally part of the show. The rest of the score had yellowed with age in comparison - you could tell it was the original part.

What was nice was that Caroline gave me two extra hours to study the score....she was going to a reception on the lower floor. She said it was for a Phantom cast member who was leaving....only later did I realize that it was for Glyn Kerslake! (I saw him the year before as the Phantom.)

And what was so unexpected-Caroline gave me the Highlight recordings of Sunset Blvd., and of course, Phantom as a parting gift. How sweet!

We were going to see Phantom tomorrow afternoon...Caroline said that her friend was conducting that night! pretty neat how everything is connected there! : ) We told her that we could only get the upper -circle seats...but she said in her opinion they were better! She said you actually see a lot more up there ther way Her Majesty's is...and that you don't miss anything from those seats.

Well, the next night, we were pleased with them! What a lovely way to have finished such an exciting week!