Phantom of the Opera Theory

From his hideout beneath a 19th century Paris opera house, the brooding Phantom schemes to get closer to vocalist Christine Daae. The Phantom, wearing a mask to hide a congenital disfigurement, strong-arms management into giving the budding starlet key roles, but Christine instead falls for arts benefactor Raoul. Terrified at the notion of her absence, the Phantom enacts a plan to keep Christine by his side, while Raoul tries to foil the scheme. Based on the book by Gaston Leroux, the musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber, and it is one of the most popular musicals of all time. But what if I told you that there are theories hidden beneath the surface of this passionate, beautiful musical opera? Please enjoy! 

Phantom of the Opera is an adaption to Beauty and the Beast: Once upon a time there lived a wealthy merchant and his three daughters. Suddenly, a ferocious looking beast sprang out of the bush. He was wearing fine silk clothes and roared, “I gave you food and a bed to sleep in! And now, you are stealing my roses!” The merchant was frightened and told the Beast about Beauty’s gift. The Beast decided to let him go only if he promised to send Beauty to this castle. The merchant agreed and ran back home. He cried and told his daughters about the Beast. But Beauty loved her father a lot and agreed to go stay with the Beast. The Beast treated Beauty with a lot of kindness. He was never rude to her. He let her stay in the biggest room and let her roam in the beautiful garden. Beauty would sit near the fireplace and sew while the Beast kept her company. At first, Beauty was afraid of the Beast but slowly, she began to like him. One day, the Beast asked Beauty to marry him, but she refused. She was still afraid of his fearful-looking face. The Beast still treated her kindly and with a lot of love. Beauty woke up and went back to the castle because she did not mean to hurt the Beast. She cried and said, “Please don’t die, Beast! I will live with you forever!” The Beast miraculously changed into a handsome prince. He said, “I was under a curse all these years and could only be relieved when someone fell in love with me. I am now cured of the curse because you truly love me.” And then, Beauty and the Beast were married and together they lived happily ever after. The Phantom of the Opera sounds quite like that but not all ends in fairy tales, Christine is let go and gives her ring to the Phantom as a way to remember her. Bittersweet and sad, right? Here's food for thought, you know how The Phantom likes to torture the prima donna Carlotta? Humiliate her? Mock her? And destroyed her by killing her husband? It almost sounds like how the beast when he is human and how he was wicked but the enchantress teaches him a lesson! 

The Phantom Being Handsome is Intentional: Remember in the 2004 movie where his scar doesn't look that bad but don't blame Hollywood, there is a reason behind this. As a kid, he might have looked worst and as a grown man it looks better. He's in the circus as a freak because he was genuinely bad-looking enough at the time for that to work—barely (and the fact that he was so starved/scrawny was necessary for it to work). As he grew, his face got better, but he was so conditioned to believe otherwise that everyone else believed it. When Christine takes off his mask, he yells at her while...covering his face, so she believes it. When he's on stage, no one could see his face at all since he was facing sideways—they gasped at the dramatic reveal and assumed that the person who had kidnapped their beautiful young star must have been ugly, since that's how it works. Except he was facing stage left during the unmasking, meaning the "ugly" right half of his face was facing the audience. Isn't that interesting? 

Madame Giry and the Phantom--Married Couple: Though this a speculation; Not quite sure about the timeline matching up, but come on! There's some sort of subtext between Madame Giry and the Phantom- there has to be some reason she puts up with his murdering psychopathic ways- and I don't believe Meg's father is ever mentioned. Seconded - and I thought I was the only one who ended up shipping the Phantom with Madame Giry before the novel was over. If so, then the plot of Love Never Dies just got a lot more Oedipal - not only a spurned adorer, but a rejected daughter! Nope, Madame Giry says her husband's name was Jules, and he died years ago...Just because he was her husband doesn't mean he was Meg's father...I always thought that, barring the lack of the nose, Meg's physical description in the book vaguely is reminiscent of Erik's. Not that I take those thoughts seriously...

The Phantom is a Half Vampire/Dhampyr: Well he doesn't have fangs but his seduction towards Christine are hinted in there! Working off of novel continuity here- he's born looking like a corpse (as traditional vampires did), he never knew his real father, and his childlike psychopathy is very much like Dracula's childlike psychopathy. Also, he manages to treat his prospective wife like total crap and have it romanticized, which seems par the course for most vampires.

The Composer to Phantom of the Opera could be The Phantom or the Phantom's son Gustave from Love Never Dies: Think about it, folks! The Phantom (and, it is implied, Gustave) is a musical genius and has a passion for darkness. Andrew Lloyd Webber is most definately a musical genius as well as the darkness...In support of this, the fact that Lloyd Webber and Sarah Brightman (who originated the role of Christine) were married at the time. The role was specifically written for Brightman, after all. It wouldn't be surprising if the Phantom was supposed to represent Webber, especially when you know how the two met each other. The song "Music of the Night" is actually how Andrew felt for Sarah. Sound queer but it also sounds romantic how it was until those two divorce sadly! 

Sequel to Phantom of the Opera could be a parody of bad fanfiction:  At least this is why it is speculated to believe from the sequel to POTO, Love Never Dies. Several aspects of the musical—the shaky chronology, the Phantom and Christine drifting into Mary Sue territory, the extraordinary Character Derailment (especially for Raoul), the Phantom and Christine conceiving a child under extremely improbable circumstances, Meg being attracted to the Phantom, enormous amounts of Wangst all around—appear so often in Phantom fanfiction as to be cliches. Since there's no way a bunch of renowned, respected artists would present, in all seriousness, a story that could have been written by a fifteen-year-old under the alias of "The Future Mrs. Gerard Butler," they must have intended it as a satire....right? Frederick Forsythe, the author of the source book, claimed that he wrote Phantom of Manhattan as a Take That to gothic literature, so the music could be an adaptation of a parody. However, as ALW commissioned Forsythe to write that book for future sequel purposes, it would be in pretty bad taste to screw over a commissioner like that. So, Forsythe could have been commissioned to write a serious sequel but intentionally secretly made it a Stealth Parody without ALW catching on. This opens theories of Forsythe as a Christine/Raoul shipper (showing the absurdities of the pro-bad boy side of Gothic fandoms) and of ALW as a Christine/Erik shipper.

An Alternative Character Interpretation: There's many things about the characters' intentions: In the case of the Phantom, it's done on purpose in the Broadway production. However, the original novel is much more straightforward about how we're supposed to interpret that character. On the other hand there is a lot of this concerning Raoul and especially Christine. She has been interpreted as a child-like idiot savant, a young woman suffering from a severe Electra complex, and even a straight-out victim of sexual abuse. And how! Erik has become more or less the poster-child for woobiedom. Try to find a fic where he ends up miserable and alone. The fan base is quite split over this, but a strong majority finds Erik to be by far the most sympathetic character in the book/play/film. And how you feel about this will make a difference on what you think of Love Never Dies. Fan works aside, there's been a lot of different interpretations of who Erik actually is—he's been portrayed as everything from a doomed romantic who just got pushed a little too far to a slasher-style killer who sold his soul to the devil and flays the skin from his victims. Christine. Is she genuinely in love with Raoul, or is she unconsciously attracted to him simply because he can save her from her Stalker with a Crush? Notice on the rooftop scene, after Raoul declares his love for her, Christine immediately says, 'Order your fine horses, be with them at the door...'
When she kisses The Phantom at the end, is it because she really loves and/or pities him or because she's trying to save Raoul? It's interesting to note in the stage production that while both Raoul and The Phantom explicitly say they love Christine and make that declaration to her, she never says it back to either of them, not even in song.