Hal Prince on 'PHANTOM', Bdwy and the Need for 'Creative Producing' to Hartford Courant

Legendary producer/director Harold Prince speaks to the Hartford Courant about the current state of Broadway, the need for creative producing and the lasting power of his massive hit, The Phantom of the Opera.

The beginning of Hal Prince's 'Phantom' journey began when Andrew Lloyd Webber told him that he was working on a new show based on the famous Lon Chaney silent film (itself based on a 1910 French novel) about a deformed and mad composer hiding in the catacombs of the Paris Opera House. Prince told the Courant writer that he was "immediately sold".

"What I loved about the idea of the show was the romance," he tells the HC. Lloyd Webber was a willing and creative collaborator during the long period from conception to the first audience. It was worth the time, effort and travel between London and New York, Prince says, as "the first preview is virtually the same show that is running today."

To read the entire interview with Hal Prince in the Hartford Courant click here.

Hal Prince directed the premiere productions of Cabaret, the original Sweeney Todd, A Little Night Music, The Phantom of the Opera, She Loves Me, Company, Follies, Candide, Pacific Overtures, Evita, Parade and LoveMusik. Mr. Prince's producing credits include The Pajama Game, Damn Yankees, West Side Story, Fiddler on the Roof, Fiorello! and A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. Among the plays he has directed are Hollywood Arms, The Visit, The Great God Brown, End of the World, Play Memory and his own play, Grandchild of Kings. Recently he prepared a new version of Phantom, which is running in Las Vegas at the Venetian Hotel. He is currently working on a glamorous new musical, Paradise Found with Richard Nelson, Ellen Fitzhugh, Jonathan Tunick and Susan Stroman, and music by Johann Strauss II. His opera productions have been seen at Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Dallas Opera, Vienna Staatsoper and the Theater Colon in Buenos Aires. He served as a trustee for the New York Public Library and on the National Council of the Arts of the NEA. Recently, he became an officer with the Order of Arts and Letters from the French Government for "contributing significantly to furthering the arts in France and throughout the world." He is the recipient of a National Medal of Arts for the year 2000 from President Clinton for a career spanning more than 40 years, in which "he changed the nature of the American musical." The recipient of 21 Tony Awards, he was a 1994 Kennedy Center Honoree.