Psychiatrists in select cities nationwide have reported a surge in Post-Melodramatic Stress Disorder cases following the Dec. 22 release of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom Of The Opera.
“We’re seeing a barrage of psychological consequences in those who have been exposed to the violently overblown acting and protracted, heightened emotions in The Phantom Of The Opera,” said Bill Lambert, a psychology professor at the University of Chicago. “After such intense abuse of their artistic sensibilities, melodrama victims are finding themselves plagued by extreme sentimentality, flashbacks to especially torturous scenes, and canned-emotional detachment.”
According to Lambert, a good portion of PMSD sufferers are experiencing distress so great that it is interfering with their jobs as overweight receptionists, struggling fashion designers, and community-theater actors.
“PMSD sufferers walk through their days with the specter of an unnecessary musical number hanging over them like a mask,” Lambert said. “The prelude is constantly playing in their unconscious minds, threatening to crescendo into exaggerated, choreographed action at any moment. Anything can set them off: a chandelier, a strain of saccharine music, a gaudy outfit.”
Okay, okay, I’ll admit it — I actually like The Phantom of the Opera. It goes beyond that, too — I like quite a few of Andrew Lloyd Webber‘s musicals…in fact, I tend to like musicals. I’ve even seen quite a few of them on stage (Phantom, Cats [twice], Jesus Christ Superstar [three times], Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Tommy, Les Miserables).
In my defense, though (if a defense can even be mounted), I couldn’t help it. I’ve been brainwashed!
For a full ten years — some of the most formative years of my childhood, and nearly a third of my life to date — I was a member of the Alaska Children’s Choir (well, first I was a member of the Anchorage Boys Choir, then the Anchorage Girls and Boys Choir, then the Anchorage Children’s Choir, then the Alaska Children’s Choir). As such, I was exposed from an early age to a wide range of choral music, both classical and popular, and of course, the Webber repetoire was well-represented. There’s hardly a song in Webber’s most popular works that I don’t still have memorized, as if I wasn’t singing one piece or another in one of our concerts, I had the soundtrack albums at home.
Some of us just can’t be helped (though on the bright side, I’m probably immune to PMSD).
Of course, while I do like it, Phantom is hardly my favorite of Webber’s works. That honor is reserved for Jesus Christ Superstar, which is not only my favorite of Webber’s musicals, but my favorite musical across the board (though Chess does come in a very close second — pity I’ve never had a chance to see that one on stage). Three versions of the JCS soundtrack show up in my music collection (the original, the 20th Anniversary, and the Resurrection)…one notable version that I don’t own, though, is the actual soundtrack to the motion picture, for as good as the movie is visually, it is by far the worst version I’ve heard from a musical standpoint.
As far as the Phantom movie goes, I’m really not sure if I’m going to see it in the theater or not. As appealing as it sounds (speaking as an admitted fan of the show), two things worry me. The first is simply that Joel Schumacher is directing — but then, he has done things other than Batman and Robin, some of which I actually enjoy (The Lost Boys, Falling Down), so that doesn’t entirely rule things out right off the bat.
The bigger worry is simply that what I’ve heard of the music so far entirely fails to impress me. Admittedly, it’s only snippets in the trailer and 30-second samples on the iTunes Music Store, but the feeling I’ve gotten so far is that it may be falling into the same bin as the theatrical version of JCS, where the movie is fun visually, but disappointing musically.
So far, the reviews aren’t promising, either, as they seem to be boiling down to “if you already like Phantom, you’ll like it, otherwise, find something else to do.”
At the moment, I’m leaning towards renting — so I can’t be that rabid of a Webberphile, can I? ;)
(via Dad)