Playbill is reporting that the role of Christine Daaé has been cast for Andrew Lloyd Webber’s upcoming sequel to The Phantom of the Opera:
“The talk of the town is that Sierra Boggess, the golden-voiced actress who created the role of The Little Mermaid on Broadway, will be an older but perhaps no less romantically conflicted Christine in the sequel to Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera. Baz Bamigboye of The Daily Mail Online reported that Phantom: Love Never Dies will star Boggess and Ramin Karimloo (who plays the masked tenor in the London production of The Phantom of the Opera). In Love Never Dies, the disfigured Phantom who released his beloved soprano and her love, Raoul, at the end of The Phantom of the Opera, and then disappeared in a flash has been relocated from the Paris Opera to Brooklyn’s Coney Island. Christine apparently has a son, and is unhappily married to a now dissipated Raoul. The new story was created by Lloyd Webber, lyricist Slater, director O’Brien “and a twist of it was given to us by Ben Elton,” the composer previously said.”
Webber is hoping the show will bow at the end of 2009 in 3 separate locations. Boggess originated the role of Christine in Phantom: The Las Vegas Spectacular (which I saw 2 years ago–it was great to hear the music but the show was way too rushed to be enjoyable) and made her Broadway debut as Ariel in The Little Mermaid.