![]() ![]() When the tours previous stop in Busan, South Koreas second biggest city, wrapped up in mid-February, the country was emerging as the latest epicenter of the pandemic. It was also a matter of sheer timing and luck, though it did not seem that way at first. ![]() That the show, at the Blue Square cultural complex in central Seoul, has gone on is a testament not just to the protocols in the theater, but to South Koreas rigorous system of test, trace and quarantine, which has kept the virus largely under control. And South Korea, he said, shows that it can work. We have got to make the theaters as safe for everybody as we possibly can, he said. I dont think we should just be sitting on our hands and saying, Its all doom and gloom, we cant do anything, he said in an interview last week. And it has remained open not through social-distancing measures a virtual impossibility in the theater, either logistically or financially, many say but an approach grounded in strict hygiene.Īnd it is one that its composer, Andrew Lloyd Webber, is arguing can show the way for the rest of the industry, a point he is hoping to demonstrate to the world, as he prepares to turn the Palladium, one of seven theaters he owns in London, into a laboratory for lessons learned in Seoul. The musical, with its 126-member company and hundreds of costumes and props, is believed to be the only large-scale English-language production running anywhere in the world. And it has been drawing robust audiences to its 1,600-seat theater, even after an outbreak in the ensemble led to a mandatory three-week shutdown in April. But in recent months, it has also laid claim to a more unlikely title: pathbreaking musical of the COVID-19 era.Īs theaters around the globe were abruptly shuttered by the pandemic, with no clear path to reopening in sight, the world tour of Phantom has been soldiering on in Seoul, South Korea, playing eight shows a week. ![]() The Phantom of the Opera has garnered plenty of superlatives over the years, including the longest-running show in Broadway history.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |