Paul Stanley Says Watching ‘Phantom of the Opera’ Was Like Watching The Beatles for the First Time
Paul Stanley has been performing with Kiss for nearly 50 years, but their music will never get old. Stanley and the rest of the band will never tire of singing songs like “Rock and Roll All Nite” and “I Was Made For Lovin’ You.” But rock ‘n’ roll isn’t all Stanley is interested in. He deeply loves Phantom of the Opera, but not because he can relate to covering his face.
Watching ‘Phantom of the Opera’ for the first time was like watching The Beatles
On his website, Stanley explained that after seeing the London company perform Phantom of the Opera in 1988, it changed his life. Watching it for the first time made him have similar thoughts to when he first saw The Beatles perform.
“I had this momentary revelation, an epiphany where I went, ‘Wow, I can do that,'” Stanley said. “And it was the same thing I did when I saw the Beatles. I was a fat little kid who couldn’t play an instrument but I looked at them and said, ‘I can do that.'” He had no background in musical theater to actually star in Phantom of the Opera, just like he had no experience performing an instrument in front of a live audience when he was young, after watching The Beatles.
Yet, more than 10 years later, Stanley’s agent called him asking if he’d consider auditioning for the part of the Phantom himself. Stanley agreed to take it on regardless of his background.
Paul Stanley feels a strong connection to ‘Phantom of the Opera’
Stanley has opened up about his connection to Phantom of the Opera. In 1999, Stanely joined the cast as the Phantom in a Toronto production of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. He swapped out his Starchild persona for another masked character from May until August and then from September to October. But Stanley had covered himself up like the Phantom years before he entered Kiss.
“Here’s somebody who has a disfigurement that they’re covering and they’re trying to reach out to a woman and, as much as they want to do it, they don’t know how. Well, that pretty much summed up my life, you know. Only I wasn’t living in a dungeon under an opera house,” Stanley said.
Stanley was born with Level 3 Microtia, a congenital deformity that left him deaf in one ear, “making it hard for him to communicate or do well in school.”
“I was an angry, dysfunctional kid with a real image problem and a hearing problem that put me under constant scrutiny,” Stanley explained. “Growing my hair was the start of covering it up.”
As an adult, Stanley got hearing aids implanted. Surgeons were also able to make Stanley an artificial ear from the cartilage in his rib cage.
Stanley loves musical theater almost as much as he loves rock
Besides recognizing his connection to the Phantom, Stanley just enjoys the musical for what it is. He has a vast musical appreciation, and Phantom of the Opera falls under the umbrella.
“I grew up with a greater appreciation of Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Loewe, Stephen Sondheim,” Stanley said. But Stanley puts Phantom of the Opera‘s Lloyd Webber above them all.
“Andrew Lloyd Webber is actually more than rock. He’s much closer to, I believe, Puccini and Verdi. Some music snobs would take issue with that, but that’s why we’re not on the same wavelength,” Stanley said.
Stanley considers starring as the Phantom a turning point in his career. It was eye-opening in multiple ways too. He’d never made the connection between himself and the Phantom until he joined the Toronto production. It was some of the most challenging work Stanley had ever done too. Either way, we’ll take Stanley wearing whatever mask he likes as long as he keeps performing.
