The Phantom of the Opéra Garnier

Hey everyone!!

I don't feel like writing about Rennes right now, I have too much work to do. However, I do have a short post on our visit to the Opéra Garnier yesterday!

Friday morning I woke up around 10:00 but I didn't feel like getting up yet, so I stayed in bed and got up at 10:47. Someone had mentioned the previous evening that they thought we had a scheduled visit and tour of the Opéra on Friday, but they weren't sure. I remembered that it was indeed supposed to be on a Friday, and I remembered it had been scheduled for noon.

I was wrong.

Sleepy-eyed, I checked my calendar to make sure. It said "Opéra- Oct. 15th- 11 am." I quickly ran next door to ask my neighbors if they were going, I found them pulling on their coats, ready to leave. I didn't want to miss the tour, and at this rate we were going to be late anyway so I hurriedly pulled on some jeans and my leather jacket, stuffed a granola bar into my purse, and left.

The metro stop for line 10 is directly across the street from our dorm. Once we descended the steps to the metro platform, the train going the opposite direction pulled up. I heard someone shouting "Hillary! Other side! Other side!" My friends and I looked over and our friend Shainee was boarding the train going the other way. I panicked for a second until Hira said we were just taking a different route than she was.

We boarded the train at 10:54. We had one train change and at least 10 stops in between our dorm and the Opera. I asked Yomna and Hira what time we were supposed to meet the group. They said we were supposed to be there at 11:15 but that the tour was for 11:30.

Phew! I relaxed a bit.

Once we reached the Opéra, all of us Northwestern kids waited on the steps for the rest of us to arrive. At 11:30 our french teachers lead us around the back of the Opéra to the back entrance. (Apparently this was entrance was built and used by Napoleon III).

On our tour we learned a lot about what going to the opera really meant back in the day. Monday night was meant for men to go to the opera with their wives. Wednesday was for business, and Friday was for men and their mistresses. In the box seats the curtains were pulled while men played cards, talked, or fooled around with their wives or mistresses. The hanging chandelier remained lit throughout the entire performance so that the wealthy, seated in the front boxes, had enough light to be seen by the rest of the attendees.

The tour guide sat us down in the Opéra orchestra seats and told us the real story of The Phantom of the Opera. The theater was completely dark except for a couple stage lights that were being adjusted. She told us that the movie that came out a few years ago got it very wrong. But as she told us the story, it seemed that the only part the movie got wrong was the appearance of The Phantom (who was named Eric), and his personal history.

In the movie he was handsome except for the patch of skin beneath his mask, but the real story says that the Phantom was horribly ugly looking, so much so that his parents never loved him and his mom never kissed him. His dad was a house-builder. The Phantom spent many years traveling around France on his own building houses and learning random trades like juggling. He had the most beautiful voice ever heard, and he auditioned for operas, but because of his face they could never cast him. He loved the opera. He knew how to move so that he wouldn't be seen. He was eventually hired by many sultans who wanted palaces with hidden passageways and he did a very good job building them. However, eventually he knew too much about the secret and hidden areas of the Sultans' castles- so the Sultans wanted him dead for his knowledge. He returned to France and got a job doing construction on the Opéra Garnier. Eric dug himself a large cavern underneath the Opéra Garnier next to an underground lake. He paid Madame Giry to keep his secret and to leave box number 5 open for him so that he could attend the Opera. Box number 5 had a spiral staircase that led to his underground cavern. For a long time he attended the ballet and opera performances, and he was never seen. He slipped out of his box at the end of each show and moved about with swift movements. Some of the dancers saw shadows and heard movements from time to time, and they began to whisper about a Phantom. One day Joseph Buquet, a light engineer, decided to try to find the Phantom, so Eric hanged him from the beams above the stage. The opera house had to hire new management and new dancers that would not be afraid of working there. The rest of the story goes exactly like the movie; Christine Daaé shows up, he falls in love with her and teaches her music lessons while she thinks he's her angel of music, she falls in love with childhood friend Raoul, Raoul doesn't believe in the angel of music and he becomes concerned, the two plan to meet in a cemetery and escape but Christine is taken off stage by the phantom during her last performance and is imprisoned in the Phantom's underground cavern. Raoul gets a worker at the opera house to show him how to get down to the Phantom's cavern and he tries to save her. The Phantom almost succeeds in drowning him until Christine gives the Phantom a kiss on the forehead. The Phantom releases Raoul after he realized she will never love him. Christine and Raoul leave France and the Phantom dies 3 weeks later.

Our tour guide said that the story was written to show that not everyone who comes to the Opéra Garnier comes only to be seen. She was a really good story teller! Almost as good as Mrs. Wagner- my 5th grade teacher. I was listening raptly, but this girl next to me kept shifting around in her seat, messing with her purse, whispering to the girl on her other side, and asking me dumb questions. I didn't let her ruin my story time, I just ignored her. We also learned about the man who painted the ceiling (and refused to be paid), and one of the famous composers (it might have been Mozart) who wasn't honored after his untimely death at 35 years old because he was a part of the Free Masons (National Treasure anybody?). The free masons used a lot of symbols, and there were apparently many of these symbols in his music. There are also rumors that this composer was poisoned, thus the reasoning for his body to be tossed into a grave in a common cemetery outside of Strasbourg.

Here are some pictures from the Opéra Garnier!

After the Opera I had sushi with a few friends. I drank some green tea and miso soup because I'm in the throws of a slight cold. It definitely helped.

I hope you enjoyed reading about my trip to the opera! I am dying to see something here. Apparently Swan Lake is playing in Paris for the first time in 7 or 8 years near the end of November- but it's only playing at the Bastille opera house which is way less cool.

Love,

Hillary