Phantom outstrips Cats on Broadway

Michael Crawford, left, and Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Andrew Lloyd Webber's lush musical The Phantom of the Opera captured the title of longest-running show in Broadway history when the curtain went up for performance number 7486 this week.

Phantom surpasses another Webber extravaganza, Cats, when it begins its reign as Broadway champion with a special showing at the Majestic Theatre, where it has run for nearly 18 years since opening on January 26, 1988.

"It's overwhelming," said Webber.

"I must confess when I realised how Cats was going I did say to all my friends, 'You realise that something like this could not happen again,' and then, of course, Phantom happened."

Focusing on the romance rather than the horror of Gaston Leroux's 19th-century novel, Webber and collaborators fashioned a show full of special effects to create the life of the Paris Opera House and the shadowy world beneath it, inhabited by a disfigured composer who falls in love with a young soprano.

The numbers generated by such a long run are also eye-popping.

More than 1300 tonnes of dry ice have been used, and nearly 5.7 million litres of shot powder to create gunshot effects.

The Phantom has made almost 15,000 trips on his boat through the fog to his lair, and 7486 sets of foam latex have been used to fashion his deformed face, which is hidden by his custom-made, ghostly half-mask.

The Broadway production, which won seven 1988 Tony Awards including best musical, has been seen by almost 11 million people and grossed nearly $US600 million ($NZ883.65 million) another Broadway record.

The musical, which opened in London in 1986 and is still playing there, has been an international phenomenon.

It has been seen by more than 80 million people worldwide and generated more than $US3.2 billion, say the show's publicists.

"It shows no signs of weakening. It's cropping up in all sorts of places," Webber said. "It's most extraordinary."

It is in production in seven places - London; New York; Budapest, Hungary; Tokyo; Sao Paulo, Brazil; Essen, Germany; and the US national tour.

A new production is scheduled for Taipei, Taiwan, this month, and plans are in place to launch an open-ended Phantom run in Las Vegas.

Before bringing the show to those new frontiers, the busy keepers of the Phantom franchise celebrated the Broadway record with a ceremony after the curtain fell at the Majestic.

Among the special guests were Webber, producer Cameron Mackintosh and Michael Crawford, the first of 11 Phantoms to star in the role on Broadway.

Asked about the allure of his record-setting show, Webber said, "You find yourself in somewhat of an escapist, romantic world," and audiences seem to "surrender to the whole genre".

- REUTERS