Undercover at the First Preview of Broadway's 'Masquerade'

Masquerade is the new musical experience from the creative universe of Andrew Lloyd Weber, adapted from The Phantom of the Opera and directed by Diane Paulus. The theater world has eagerly awaited the mysterious production, styled as an immersive experience, after an actor dressed like the infamous Phantom emerged from a carriage at the Tony Awards earlier this year.

It was this exact flair for secrecy and the dramatic that drew me to a sprawling building tucked away on W 57th Street late Thursday night for the first preview. I’d managed to score myself a ticket and a set of instructions for the night: dress extravagantly, wear a mask and prepare for literally anything. The monumental summer storm that descended on New York City felt pre-arranged by Andrew Lloyd Webber himself, as fans and attendees huddled in their couture while quizzical pedestrians wandered by, curious to see what sort of mysterious fashion event was going down at some nondescript and unmarked building.

When I’d heard news of that aforementioned dress code, I worried that it might feel hokey, or that I’d woefully overprepared to stand around in a crowd of black cocktail dresses. My shock at how incorrect this assumption was remains a highlight of the night, adding to the experience as I clocked runway pieces and Manolo Blahniks and elaborate masks on my various co-conspirators at the opera.

Because it matters, I myself wore a plunging, backless silk gown with a halter neck and most of my breasts exposed. My hair was high, and I had my favorite, strappy little Betsy Johnson kitten heels on. They felt the most sensible, seeing as I’d be traipsing around an immersive theater experience all night. And traipse I did, once my pre-assigned group was allowed to enter, once our phone cameras had been taped over – “Like at Basement,” one patron remarked – and our belongings confiscated at coat check.

The aforementioned maze of corridors that separated the entrance from the theatrical experience were drenched in blood red lighting, which followed me into the bathrooms, giving the entire experience the feeling of wandering around the backrooms. I made a mental note of the joke I made while washing my hands next to a woman in what looked like archival Vivienne Westwood: Andrew Lloyd Webber set his The Phantom of the Opera revival in Silent Hill.

Not quite, I soon learned, once stewards led our group into a room where we were offered champagne and invited to hear Madame Giry speak about going ons at the opera house and teach guests the choreography to “Masquerade,” which I found quite charming. She also warned us to pay no mind to rumors of the mysterious “Phantom” as dancers beckoned us into the masquerade proper. Inside, they danced and spun and cavorted with guests. One such performer in an elaborate Italian carnival costume offered me a hand, spinning me in circles while others did their best to keep up with the choreography we were taught. It was a sensational opening act, interrupted at the end by the arrival of the Phantom, who emerged from the crowd near where I stood to herald his plans for the evening.

It’s important to note here that while there’s no knowledge needed to enjoy the evening, my intermediate understanding of the show certainly came in handy over the following series of events. Not because they are necessarily confusing, but because the show itself feels more akin to a dreamlike fantasia than a musical proper. The action happens all around patrons, and with the principals swapping in and out of roles for each group – something I sussed out from talking to other patrons at the after party – no two experiences are the same. It’s as if they’ve exploded the musical and reconstructed a dizzying recreation of it from the fragments.

While precedents like Sleep No More stand as the primary comparison most patrons will enter with, it genuinely feels like an entirely new experience for the Broadway season.

Therein lies the motivating factor around my eagerness to attend, seeing as The Phantom of the Opera is the musical that defined the contemporary Broadway era for decades. It stands as one of the most successful musicals ever, and holds the record for the longest running show to date. This record, notably, is rivaled only by another Andrew Lloyd Webber joint, Cats. When the show closed in 2023, amid struggles to capture its pre-pandemic audience, skeptics were curious to see what form it might return in. Because, as correctly assumed, it would return. The Phantom of the Opera is Broadway. So how does the most successful living creative in theater reinvent Broadway?

Masquerade, it seems.

But is it a near-total reinvention? Not quite, and it’s all the better for it. As productions grow more technically complex, it was comforting to experience something so practically grounded in the longstanding theater arts. Longtime attendees will pick up on familiar effects that have formed the girding to Broadway shows since before the dawn of LEDs: sets built to help actors disappear in an instant, hidden wires to move objects on their own, animatronics, traditional circus tricks and even a remote controlled gondola ride between the Phantom and Christine. That last set piece is one of the more memorable, as they deliver their iconic duet deep in the bowels of his lair.

Without spoiling too much, other memorable moments included a chandelier rig that genuinely made my heart stop in fear and a stomach-turning carnival of horrors that served, in my estimation, as the hidden intermission. To the performer I watched drive nails through and into their nose: brava, as I had a nightmare about you last night as I drifted off to sleep, back into the deceptive hallways of Masquerade.

As the cadence of the show picked up speed near the finale, I noted how unlike the expected “immersive” experience it was. It was totally dissimilar to that now infamous scene from Girls spoofing Sleep No More, with patrons wandering the halls to piece together some estimation of a story. Instead, it was a highly choreographed musical on rails, like a Disney World attraction corseted up in a vintage couture gown. How very like Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Being an entirely new show on the night of its first preview, it's only sensible one small portion of the experience went awry. Considering the buckets of rain being dumped on Manhattan, the rooftop cemetery had to be closed and brought indoors, to a room they clearly built out for that exact scenario. As Christine and Raoul’s hidden engagement unraveled, I could faintly hear the sounds of the carnival intermission bleed through the walls. Oddly, it did not detract from the scene, adding back to it what was lost with the roof proper closed to us: actual street noise, bleeding in from the edges of the dreamworld we’d been summoned to.

From there, the pace continued to intensify. We were led through dressing rooms, looping at last back around the grand ballroom of the opera house we first found ourselves in. We gasped, we fled, we watched in horror as Christine was forced to make her choice between Raoul and the Phantom. As lights came up and ushers led us into the afterparty, I made particular note of the audible crying and wet faces.

Not me, though. I was grinning from ear to ear.

Image via Joan Summers