LONDON – Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Phantom of the Opera” celebrated 25 years of musical success with a special celebration at London’s Royal Albert Hall. XL Video supplied all the cameras and crew and other video gear to make the digital scenery a major part of the production.
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XL Video for Phantom of The Opera’s 25th Anniversary Gala Event
LONDON – XL Video supplied LED screens, Video Projection, IMAG camera system, HD Playback and Control systems and crew for the three-night spectacular celebration event marking 25 Years of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Phantom of the Opera” musical, produced by Cameron Macintosh and staged at London’s Royal Albert Hall.
Jon Driscoll designed the high-impact digital scenery and projections for the anniversary show’s designer Matt Kinley and by Macintosh’s production manager Nic Harris.
Driscoll in turn asked XL to provide the hardware, with XL’s Paul Wood project managing their elements of the three Royal Albert Hall (RAH) shows. The final night was broadcast live to film theaters in the U.S., Japan, Australia, Europe and across the UK.
Driscoll, who has worked with XL in the past, said, “As soon as I was confirmed for the job I requested that XL came in to supply the equipment and expertise to deliver the show’s video. I have worked with Paul before at the Albert Hall. He knows the venue and its specifics and I thought he was the man for the job.”
The overall creative idea was to keep the show’s look and feel faithful to the late Maria Bjornson’s original Phantom design.
However, the use of digital scenery elements was vital in adapting the show to work smoothly in the 5,500-capacity RAH, as were certain classic set pieces such as the moving bridge and the opera house Proscenium arch.
The video was split into two sections. Upstage, above the raised central orchestra platform was a 20 meter by 10 meter grey sharks-tooth gauze, projecting onto this were 10 overlaid Barco FLM HD20 20K projectors located in the Grand Tier boxes.
Below, upstage on stage floor level, were nine 4.5m high x 2-3m wide tracking set panels filled with a total of 75 square meters of XL’s Pixled F11 LED screen. The five inner panels moved into a series of different entrance and exit positions for cast and scenery trucks to move on and off stage.
All video content was played in via two Catalyst media servers, one feeding projection and one for LED screens. All the images were controlled and output via a Barco Encore screen management system.
XL supplied 5 HD cameras for show content. Three were operated and directed by Ruary MacPhie. These were used for IMAG projection onto the projection surface both during the main show and a gala section after the end of the final show.
The gala featured a reprise of classic production numbers “Phantom of the Opera” and “Music of the Night,” speeches and appearances by past cast members including the original leads, Sarah Brightman and Michael Crawford.
Onstage, one of the two HD mini cams was positioned behind and shooting through the middle of the centre LED screen panel for a reverse shot of the stage and auditorium for specific show designed shots, and another was mounted on the set just below the conductor position for another reverse shot effect of the RAH.
Driscoll spent about two months compiling the source video material, working with his associate Gemma Carrington and animators Shaun Clark and Matthew O’Neil.
Most of the content was derived from Bjornson’s original designs, which were treated to appear digitally and work in the different setting, while retaining all their original ambience. Driscoll created some new content in the appropriate pastiche.
Matching the two different types of video once on site at the RAH was a great tribute to XL Video’s engineers in balancing and tweaking the LED to get a near seamless blend. They also had to accommodate the requirements and requests of the television broadcast crew and lighting designers, Andrew Bridge and Patrick Woodroffe, resulting in some close collaboration.
Paul Wood commented, “The timescale was the major challenge in building such an ambitious and high profile one-off show to such exacting standards of excellence, and one to which all departments responded, delivering a truly world class experience fitting the landmark occasion.”
“Phantom of The Opera” first opened in London’s West End in 1986. It is still there, more than 10,000 performances later. Since it opened on Broadway on Jan. 26, 1988, it has tallied more than 9,800 performances, with dozens of productions worldwide.
