THE MAGIC OF PHANTOM’S CHANDELIER
Just like the Phantom himself, the chandelier that is the key prop in The Phantom of the Opera has a few tricks up its sleeve. In Cameron Mackintosh’s remake of The Phantom, which opened at the Princess of Wales Theatre last week, the chandelier is more opulent and sophisticated than ever before. Designed by British engineer Howard Eaton, whose company created the rings for the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympic Games in London, the 680-kilogram chandelier rattles, shoots firecrackers and plummets. Heather Chockley, Phantom’s production stage manager, has seen nothing else like it in her 14-year career. She gave the Star an idea of how it works.
Winch truss Inside, there is one large motor that controls the chandelier’s movement. At its top speed, it drops three metres per second. To terrify spectators below, the theatre’s lights go off before the chandelier has finished falling, according to Chockley. “If you’re sitting under it, it’s quite scary,” she said. “My mother hasn’t forgiven me yet.”
Core It takes carpenters half an hour before each performance to install the chandelier and wrap it in silks. In the opening auction scene, a system of magnets and a weight in a tube at the bottom of the medallion sucks the bag inside the chandelier, revealing its splendour, Chockley said.
Pyrotechnics There are 50 wirelessly controlled pyro elements concealed inside the chandelier. It launches three fireworks called “gerbs.” “They shoot through the sky like a falling star,” Chockley said. There are also 40 smaller firecrackers that go off like gunshots. The pièce de résistance is the “micro det,” which lets off a deafening boom when the chandelier reaches its lowest point.
Frame The chandelier is made to look like it’s brass, but the frame is in fact steel. It supports 20 LED external globe lights and decorative elements made of fibreglass or cast resin with gold leaf. The chandelier travels in a three-square-metre cart that takes up the entire back of a semi truck, Chockley said.
Crystals The chandelier has more than 6,000 crystals: 632 on each strand. The beads are individually knotted so if one strand were to break it wouldn’t burst like a pearl necklace, Chockley said. Paul Brown, the set designer, modelled the chandelier after one in the Palais Garnier, Paris’s opera house.