![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Isaiah-Bailey-as-The-Phantom-in-The-Phantom-of-the-Opera-North-American-Tour.-Photo-by-Matthew-Murph.jpeg\")
Isaiah Bailey as The Phantom in The Phantom of the Opera North American Tour. (Photo: Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman.)<\/p>\nFor anyone unfamiliar with Andrew Lloyd Webber\u2019s classic musical, the Phantom is a masked composer who lives beneath the fictional Op\u00e9ra Populaire and becomes obsessed with the young Christine Daa\u00e9, and with teaching her to sing. He demands her devotion, sabotages performances and murders people who interfere. The production is almost entirely in song.<\/p>\n
The sets were the most sumptuous and decadent that I\u2019ve ever seen. The staging settles into an enchanting gloom that invites you in all the while warning you about what may be waiting there for you. A mirror in Christine\u2019s room reveals the Phantom\u2019s mask and then becomes a doorway. The staircase into his underground lair seems to build itself out of darkness. Below, his boat drifts smoothly across a layer of fog like Charon carrying a passenger across the River Styx.<\/p>\n
Isaiah Bailey as The Phantom in The Phantom of the Opera North American Tour. (Photo: Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman.)<\/p>\n
The world above him can feel just mobile. Bailey stands on a statue that turns toward the audience while the backdrop and cloudy night sky move with it. Later, the entrance to Christine\u2019s father\u2019s tomb looks like a summons into hell. Flares, explosions, candles and sudden flashes of fire keep danger close during the quieter passages.<\/p>\n
Bailey\u2019s singing often gave me chills. His physicality could change from suave and dramatic to wounded and stunted in an instant. He sometimes stood almost motionless while his arms continued working like those of a composer conducting music only he could hear. When his mask came off, he covered the exposed side of his face or kept it hidden from the audience in shadow.<\/p>\n
Jordan Lee Gilbert\u2019s Christine could alter the timbre of a scene through a small shift in posture. Her singing had the force to stop the room cold. Midori Marsh played house diva Carlotta Giudicelli with exactly the right amount of excess. Her voice earned awe from the audience, while her outrage drew laughter.<\/p>\n
Broadway San Diego\u2019s sound occasionally weakened all that precision. When several characters sang or spoke together, their words blurred. The Phantom\u2019s distorted announcements also became difficult to decipher. His voice traveling around the theater made him seem omnipresent, although a few of his words disappeared along the way.<\/p>\n
As songs, only a few numbers stay with me. However, the title number remains my favorite and has yet to leave my head days later.<\/p>\n
Theater fans should see The Phantom of the Opera at least once in their lives, and Broadway San Diego has given local audiences a terrific rendition. The show remains at the Civic Theatre through September 13. Keep an eye on the chandelier. It may be the only performer in the building dramatic enough to upstage Bailey.<\/p>\n
*<\/p>\n
Shor M. Masori is a freelance writer based in San Diego.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For anyone unfamiliar with Andrew Lloyd Webber\u2019s classic musical, the Phantom is a masked composer who lives beneath…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":456022,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[74,76,75],"class_list":["post-456021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=456021"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456021\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/456022"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=456021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=456021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=456021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}