After dedicating the final Broadway performance of "The Phantom of the Opera" to his late son Nicholas Lloyd Webber on Sunday, renowned composer Andrew Lloyd Webber publicly said goodbye to his eldest son and to the show in an essay about the future of Broadway.
"Nothing's worse for a parent than the death of a child. In my bones I feel it wrong to write about the closing of 'Phantom' or where Broadway's going right now" the EGOT honoree wrote Monday in the New York Times. "But I'll try. I owe everything to my love of Broadway and its glorious legacy of musicals. So everything I write comes from my childhood dream that I'd make it to the Great White Way."
The opinion piece reflected on his own career and his work with Broadway legend Hal Prince, who died at 91 in 2019, as well as "Phantom's" 35-year Broadway run.
"It's a personal loss to see the close of this wonderful creation, the last Hal Prince production on Broadway, with its almost 30-piece orchestra and one of the grandest designs that have ever been seen in the theater. The irony is that this past season was its best ever. Perhaps it will rise again," he wrote.
He also asserted that the end of that production is not the end of the Broadway era, but lamented the "ever-daunting challenges of producing Broadway musicals," soaring and "unaffordable" ticket prices, and issues with theater-going experiences and theater unions.
"This has been a season of goodbyes, personal and public. With the curtain now fallen in New York on the musical that has been the biggest of my career, I passionately pray that Broadway rediscovers the appetite for new scores and original work that made me so excited when I was, as Hal always called me, a kid," he wrote.
On Sunday, the 75-year-old "Cats" and "Evita" composer made an appearance during "Phantom's" final curtain call at the Majestic Theatre, taking the stage with the cast, crew and members of the original Broadway company, plus show producer Cameron Mackintosh. (Lloyd Webber also wrote a new song for the final show.)
"Cameron's done a fantastic job tonight," Lloyd Webber said. "I would like to start with ... I haven't really prepared anything. I hope you don't mind if I dedicate this performance to my son, Nick."
Lloyd Webber said that his son heard the show's music when he was a little boy and — speaking on stage with his second ex-wife, singer-actor Sarah Brightman — shared that Nicholas Lloyd Webber was familiar with the nascent days of the historic show.
"When Andrew was writing, he was right there. So his soul is with us," the soprano said. "Nick, we love you very much."
Nicholas Lloyd Webber, the composer's son with first wife Sarah Hugill, died last month at age 43 after being hospitalized with stomach cancer. The hospitalization forced the Grammy legend to miss previews for his newest Broadway musical, "Bad Cinderella," as well as the updated fairy tale's opening night at New York City's Imperial Theatre in March. Lloyd Webber said he was "totally bereft" after his son died days later.
The younger Lloyd Webber was also a composer and record producer. He worked with his father over the years to co-produce a "Cinderella" concept album and "Three Symphonic Suites," as well as to score a stage adaptation of "The Little Prince" and the musical "Fat Friends."
"The Phantom of the Opera" started its historic run of nearly 14,000 performances on Jan. 26, 1988. The musical based on Gaston Leroux's novel became the longest-running show on Broadway and was set to permanently close in February due to waning audiences following the COVID-19 pandemic. But as the final bow neared, ticket sales surged and the musical extended its final run for another eight weeks.
"All I can say tonight is thank you to absolutely everybody who made this extraordinary run possible," Lloyd Webber added onstage Sunday. "I mean, Cameron has really done it all before, but ... it's just amazing really, what has happened in the last few months. I don't think anybody, any of us, thought that the 'Phantom' would go up quite with the bang it has.
"So maybe [the show] may come back, you never know. But what I would like to say though is that if it was going to go out with a bang, it couldn't have gone out with a better performance. I thought it was one of the greatest performances of 'Phantom' I've ever heard."
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