The first Russian screen adaptation of "The Phantom of the Opera"

By Tatiana Kolyuchkina
English text - Frakir

In the end of November 2010, Making Pictures creative group has finished the filming of the slide-film based on the novel The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux. Finally, after two and a half months of production, it’s ready to come out.
I had an opportunity to interview Itein Morrigan, the director of the slide-film, about the story and secrets behind the slide-film adaptation of the The Phantom of the Opera.

Good morning, Itein. As we know, slide-films as an art form quickly receded into the background, replaced by a rapid development of the film industry. The new generation, in its majority, has never heard of slide-films. What made you start working in this genre? What’s so appealing about slide-films?

- At first, I didn’t even consider making slide-films. The box with them was long forgotten in the entresols. As a form of creation it started in 2002, when my co-author and I had to make few illustrations to the book. We dressed up as characters and took some staged shots. In 2004, at a holiday celebration my friends and I had an idea to improvise on Notre Dame de Paris. We staged the scenes, took shots of the key moments and later I added text to each frame. Then came the turn of Romeo and Juliet. This time the shots were staged intentionally, and I laid the figures on new backgrounds picturing the palaces and streets of Verona. Thus, year after year, the quality of my work improved and now I can proudly say that, yes, I make slide-films. I’m also the only one in the Internet who does that.
Actually, a slide-film is a specific genre. It is much more than a photo session. But it is also much less than a play. Actors don’t have to have a scenic talent, it is enough for them to prepare themselves beforehand, feel their character (I support the Stanislavski's system) – and then it’s just a technical matter. I think it could be best compared to silent films – you have to show the emotions and actions of your character through your pose and mimic. That’s why, actors not just read the script and take part in its writing, but also study source materials, discuss the characters’ motives, choose costumes and try to put themselves in their character’s boots. However, I’m not going to describe the whole process.

Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera... It’s one of the best, and I’m not afraid to say so, romances of the 20th century. After the musical of 1986, the novel became very famous. What has inspired you to make the slide-film adaptation of this book?

- The musical. I’ve been a fan since 1998. A downright fan – I read the book in English (it wasn’t available in Russian at that time), performed at concerts with arias from the musical. And all these 12 years I’ve been listening to the music, singing and dreaming about staging this story. I also realized that it was impossible to make an adaptation of this musical in our conditions and the chances of me being cast as Christine were almost zero. But the success of the slide-film based on Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, which came out in spring 2010, encouraged my creative team to turn our attention to the sacred work. My old co-author Anna Ferrum and I gave it much thought, watched several film adaptations, re-read the book and decided that the slide-film was to be made.

Last year, in 2010, there was a premiere of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s new musical Love Never Dies that may be considered a sequel to The Phantom of the Opera. Did it have any influence on the slide-film’s script and characters’ images?

- In no way. We directed our attention only to the book and our perception of it. From Webber’s musical we have fairly borrowed only the changed roles of Madame Giry and little Meg.

Your slide-film’s motto: “The Phantom of the Opera you all wished to see!” But there have been already known several adaptations of Leroux’ novel that bear a very little resemblance to the original. Itein, aren’t you afraid of the criticism from fans of the canon?

- Every reasonable person with an analytical mind will expect criticism. We have studied the book thoroughly, watched all the available adaptations of the plot, paid attention to mistakes and successful choices. But we based our adaptation on nothing else than Leroux’ novel, with exact quotes from the text. From the point of view of a person from the 21st century, the concept and contents of the book may seem strange, not very well thought-out, if I may say so, the psychological portraits of Christine and Raoul are illogical, etc. That’s why, while our whole creative team was preparing for the shooting and began writing a script, there was a lot of discussion and arguing about the main characters’ development. As a result, our Christine, Raoul and Erik turned out to be more serious and more responsible, with more sides to their personalities. Erik became a reserved man of chivalrous character, as sensitive as he was shown in the novel in dialogues with Christine. Raoul’s character was a mix of Viscount de Chagny and his brother, Count Philippe. We made him older and we made him realize his dream of the polar expedition, so he came out as a serious, mature man. Christine turned out more responsible, though still romantic, delicate and innocent. We also turned the directors of the Opera into a married couple: serious Madame Firmin, a business-lady of her epoch, and amazing and emotional Monsieur Firmin (I invited my old friend who is a very talented person to play his part). Madame Giry’s character is the same that she was endowed with by Leroux. She is active, but inclined to misinformation. Little Meg is sincere, charming and sympathetic, her smile lights up the pictures. Carlotta is a classic prima donna, capricious and troublesome. Carolus Fonta is the ideal partner for her, because can tolerate all of Carlotta’s eccentricities with Spartan composure. And, of course, we have changed the ending a bit. My female director’s heart couldn’t refuse the dreams of the fans of this novel.

The slide-film’s finale is rather unusual. Where does this idea come from?

- Probably from the dreams of all the fans of the story about the Opera Ghost. Many people would like such a talented man, who loves so selflessly and does his best to help his beloved one to reach success, to be returned his feelings and find his happiness that he’s been dreaming of for so long.

What about casting? Did you have anyone in mind when you were writing a script?

- It’s a bit different from what they’re used to in film making or theatre. Let’s start by saying that I have a group of actors whom I’ve been working with for several years. The Ferrums, Anna and Flex, have been with me since the very beginning in 2002. In 2009, I had a new team of actors for Hart's Fraud, the adaptation of BBC's popular TV series Torchwood. After that, Vipera_Berus joined the regular cast, as well as photographer Danilov with whom I've been working since then. In spring 2010 I was looking for people to cast in my new project Happy Birthday, Death!, based on the books by Terry Pratchett, and then our team was joined by Raniana, Inquisitor, Jacky Glayhem and Frakir (who in this project serves only as a translator, as we always make our projects in two languages and they are appreciated by English-speaking audience as well). After the release of the last slide-film, we were planning to make another adaptation of Pratchett's novels and Sister of the Wind proposed herself for the part of Angua, and she gladly accepted the part of Meg. In short, by the time we started to work on this slide-film, we had had a team of very creative people, with two talented young men for the roles of Erik and Raoul, so when we made up our minds about which part is closer to whom, we started discussing the characters, their background and the whole story. And then, Anna and me wrote a script for our amicable team.

The Phantom of the Opera takes place at the end of the 19th century. This is a completely different age. Tell us a bit about the costumes for this project.

- We intentionally studied the literature on art that referred to the beginning of the 1880s, examined the paintings and photographs available from that age, and we put a lot of effort and inspiration into the creation of the costumes. We managed to borrow Raoul's tail-coat, the Red Death's costume and Faust's costume from the theatre and bought Erik's waistcoat in the wedding salon. Blouses and skirts for women were kindly donated by our friends' wardrobes. Our wedding and graduation dresses also were a great help, although the girls had to make some alterations so that they matched the epoch. Madame Firmin's masquerade costume was made by Vipera_Berus (and she is very clever with her needle) and Carlotta's jacket is my family's heirloom. It dates the end of the 19th century. I must mention the beautiful bustles that we made from large pieces of fabric with pillow “linings” underneath.

Please tell us about the actual shooting process.

- The shooting is the second stage of the slide-film making. At the first stage you form a creative team, discuss the project, write a script, select backgrounds and prepare costumes and props. The third stage is montage. So, the shooting took place at the professional photo studio and lasted 8 hours without a break. That is, the actors not involved in the actual shooting were preparing themselves for the next scenes and helping others. Our photographer Danilov and make-up artist Karina (not to mention myself) didn't have a moment's rest. All in all, the process was active, emotional, highly creative and entertaining.

If you compare the photographs made in the studio and the finished material, it's clear what an enormous work has been done. Montage of the scenes wasn't just color correction and cosmetic editing of the shots, but also a complete background replacement…

- Not only I had to correct little defects, I often had to "transplant" heads and use 3 or 4 frames to make one picture. Not to mention drawing and creating something that wasn't in the initial shot... As for the backgrounds, that's one separate hell of a job. I had to think up and search for a suitable background picture in high definition and of a large size for each shot. For some scenes we needed one interior, but shot from different angles. We contacted the rights owners of those photographs and people gave us their kind permission to use them, and sometimes even made extra shots required for the scene as it was with Annemarie Kwikkel from the Netherlands, the most talented creator of dolls and doll houses. It was her work, which fits into the ordinary shelf, that turned into Carlotta's make-up room. As for the Ghost's caves, that's entirely my computer montage based on the photograph of the brick cellar. The photograph of the organ was made by Vipera_Berus and Jacky Glayhem, who for this reason visited the Catholic Cathedral and gained permission from the surprised sisters. The photographs of the Paris Opera House were kindly donated by Irina Emelianova (aka Madame Giry). And the church in Perros-Guirec is the actual one that was mentioned by Leroux; we received the kind permission to use it from Nigel (aka Herby!), one of Wikimedia's admins. So our project turned out to be international and we would like to thank all those people who helped us and supported us in this complex but very interesting affair.

Itein, thank you for this interesting interview. Good luck to you and your team in all of your creations!

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