The new owners of the Paris Opera House are told, after the sale, that there is a ghostly phantom haunting the place. The Phantom sends a threatening note, insisting that young, pretty singer Christine (Mary Phibin) be given the lead part that currently belongs to prima donna Carlotta (Mary Fabian; yes, two actresses with similar names). Christine isâŠnaive. She thinks the voice behind her mirrorâthat has been teaching her to singâbelongs to a holy spirit. Even when he says heâll be coming for her in the flesh, she sees it as some kind of spiritual joining as opposed to sex. The spirit is, of course, Erik, the Phantom of the Opera (Lon Chaney), a deformed artist who wants her for himself, and away from her fiancĂ©, Vicomte Raoul de Chagny (Norman Kerry). After terrorizing the audience at a performance, he kidnaps Christine, taking her into the labyrinth under the opera house where he plans to keep her forever. She is dismayed to discover who he is, and horrified when she sees his visage. She begs to be allowed to sing on the stage again, and he allows her to return to the world for a final performance. Once free, she plots with Raoul, and Erik plans his revenge.
You might reasonably ask, “What the Hell is the 1930 The Phantom of the Opera?” Well, I can only partially answer as itâs mostly lost. But then so is the 1925 version. You think youâve seen the silent version? You havenât. Letâs look at a bit of history to get this all in place.
The silent version, directed by Rupert Julian and starring Lon Chaney, had its initial test screening in early 1925. It wasnât received well, so it was massively re-shot by director Edward Sedgwick, who was known for cheap westerns. This version didnât do well at test screenings either, so a third version was made, keeping the ending of the second, but made up mostly of shots from the first, though overall trimmed and tightened a great deal. The biggest plot differences between the first and third was the character of The Persian becoming a policeman, and with that, Erikâs Middle Eastern background was changed to make him an escaped convict, and the ending was altered such that Erik no longer died of a broken heart, but by the actions of a mob. This is what was released and became a huge hit. Judging it from what has survived, it was exciting and frightening. It also made clever use of tinting to indicate where and when events were happenings. And it used Technicolor in a few scenes, bringing a beauty previously unknown in film; really, the masked ball is breathtaking. Julian was not a great director, but the production had love and money lavished upon it resulting in some amazing moments.
Then came talkies. It was not uncommon to attempt to re-purpose silent films, either by looping sound for a re-release, or by combing the silent sections with newly shot scenes. The 1930 Phantom is a case of the second. While the story was kept the same, roughly 40% of the film was re-shot, with Mary Phibin and Norman Kerry brought back for new versions of their old scenes. Unfortunately, the few years showed on them, particularly on Phibin who looks much different. Virgina Pearson, whoâd played Carlotta, couldnât sing, so she was recast with Mary Fabian. However, they still wanted to use Pearsonâs scenes where Carlotta interacted with the managers, so in those cases Pearson was now said to be playing Carlottaâs mother, speaking for Carlotta. But they had a big problem. Lon Chaney had left Universal for MGM, and his contract dictated he couldnât be dubbed, so they were stuck. So while scenes without Chaney now had voices, as well as music and sound effects, those with Chaney used the old intertitle cards, along with the music and sound effects. Their workaround was to add a new characterâErikâs servantâwho could now speak for him, at least when he was off screen. So the voice coming through the mirror was no longer The Phantomâs.
This mostly-sound version was released in early 1930 (though itâs often called the 1929 version, perhaps because thatâs when the new material was shot) and did very well at the box office.
Enough history? Not yet, as that doesnât explain what weâve got now. The filming of the silent The Phantom of the Opera was odd by current standards. In order to have two negatives, they set up two cameras next to each other, so every scene has two versions from slightly different angles. And when they shot Technicolor, they had a separate camera nearby recording the scene in B&W.
Over the years the sound version, as a whole, was lost (Iâll return to this in a moment). And at the end of the â40s, in an act that seems insane now, Universal destroyed all of their silent films. So all the original negatives are gone. So how do we have any cut of The Phantom of the Opera? Several ways. First, Universal would sell 16mm prints of films back in the â30s for home use. The construction of these prints wasnât given much care and they didnât always match the theatrical versions, as in this case. The tinting and color werenât included. Scenes would be missing and the shots from the second camera sometimes replaced the ones used for the theatrical cut. The home prints deteriorated over the years, so film preservationist John Hampton gathered as many copies as he could and spliced the best bits together. The result also has a few minutes that seem to be from the sound version. Itâs faded and filled with scratches, but it is considered close to the 1925 version.
The second source comes from the George Eastman museum which had been given a 35mm print in 1950. This is a high quality version, and with some cleaning up, looks beautiful today. But itâs a strange hodgepodge of bits from the 1925 theatrical cut, alternate shots from 1925, and sections from the sound version but missing the soundâfor example Fabian is Carlotta and Pearson is her mother. Itâs also entirely in B&W, meaning the tinting and Technicolor scenes are missing.
And weâre not quite done yet. The Bal Masque scene, in glorious Technicolor, was discovered separately, and has been spiced into place in the Eastman cut (as well as a poorer version of it sometimes appearing in the videos made from the Hampton source). Re-tinting the film is easy now, and a scene where the Phantom appears in color while the rest of the scene is still B&W (actually blue & white) has been recreated via computer.
Which gives us a poor print of something close to the silent 1925 version, and a very good print of something less close.
As for the 1930 sound version, the sound disks for the whole film were rediscovered, though without the images except for one reel, where we have it all. Outside of that one reel, the sound canât be directly synced to any surviving rendition of the film.
So, how do I review the 1930 version? Well, I canât, but I can speculate. The Eastman version of the silent film is a masterpiece. Scenes are gorgeous, the pace is rapid, the metaphors are thoughtful, and Chaney is truly unique. His Phantom make-up is wonderfully ghastly, yet heâs so expressive in it. And oh, the masquerade ball, in color is a thing to behold. I think less of the Hampton version, partly because the lower quality saps away much of the beauty of the images, but also because the pacing isnât as good. A few nips and tucks help the picture.
But this is about the 1930 version, not the â25. Iâve heard the sound from the â30, and while the sound effects and music are nice (really niceâI wish someone would add sound effects to the Eastman cut), the voices are less so. These are not great voice actors, and it shows. As for the visuals, I can say less, but from what little exists, the changes in Mary Phibinâs appearance is distracting. And the switch from dialog scenes to intertitles whenever Chaney appears is even more distracting. Finally, the silent The Phantom of the Opera is a very stylized film. No one is trying for reality. The acting is exaggerated and subterranean sets are there to invoke visions of Hades more than to suggest anything that could actually exist. Attaching voicesâmore or less realistic voicesâto something so far from reality just doesnât work. You need that dreamlike otherness or the whole story comes off as rather silly, and spoken dialog punctures the dream.
You canât see the 1930 cut, and I donât think thatâs a problem. Just watch a silent version. As itâs fallen into public domain, multiple videos have been released of various quality and with dozens of different soundtracks, each giving the film a different feeling. I recommend one based on the Eastman source and using the Carl Davis symphonic score from 1996, which flows with the film, raising the tension when needed. Itâs a solid score. The Gavriel Thibaudeau score is good enough, though a step down. I am not impressed with any of the organ or piano ones Iâve heard, nor those made up of well known classical works.
Still, the talkie version is important. Universal was looking at making horror films, and while itâs easy to think of The Phantom of the Opera as outside of that genre (the book is pulp, the feel is melodrama, and since Andrew Lloyd Webber itâs a teen-girl romance), the silent version is meant to illicit screams, and apparently did. The Phantom lives in an impossibly complex underworld that includes a torture chamber and an analog for the river Styx. He can strike anywhere, invokes fear in all, sleeps in a coffin, and of course, has a skull-like face. So yes, this is horror, and its box office success in 1930 gave them the confidence to produce Dracula, making The Phantom of the Opera the first Classic Universal Monster.