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71-588: In the English-speaking world, he is best known for writing the novel The Phantom of the Opera ( French : Le Fantôme de l'Opéra , 1909), which has been made into several film and stage productions of the same name, notably the 1925 film starring Lon Chaney and Andrew Lloyd Webber 's 1986 musical . His 1907 novel The Mystery of the Yellow Room is one of the most celebrated locked room mysteries . Leroux

142-527: A Gothic romance . In his article, Fitzpatrick compares the Phantom to other monsters featured in Gothic novels such as Frankenstein's monster , Dr. Jekyll, Dorian Gray, and Count Dracula . The Phantom has a torture chamber where he kidnaps and kills people, and the walls of the chapel in the graveyard are lined with human bones. Drumright notes that The Phantom of the Opera checks off every trope necessary to have

213-458: A wax museum that is in financial trouble. One night, he gives a private tour to a friend, Dr. Rasmussen, and an art critic, Mr. Galatalin, showing them statues of Joan of Arc , Voltaire , and his favorite, Marie Antoinette . Impressed, Galatalin offers to submit Igor's work to the Royal Academy after he returns from a trip to Egypt. He and Rasmussen then leave. Igor's partner, Joe Worth, who

284-621: A French workprint in the PHI collection. Uncovered by a Los Angeles collector in the early 2000s, the workprint has indifferent, pallid-plus-green color, French subtitles, and an English audio track, though some reels lack sound. In 2019, The Film Foundation sponsored a digital 4K restoration of the film by the UCLA Film & Television Archive , with funding from the George Lucas Family Foundation. The Warner print, with its superior color,

355-475: A Gothic novel according to the Encyclopedia of Literature's description which says, "Such novels were expected to be dark and tempestuous and full of ghosts, madness, outrage, superstition, and revenge." Although the Phantom is really just a deformed man, he has ghost-like qualities in that no one can ever find him or his lair and he is seen as a monster. People are frightened by him because of his deformities and

426-425: A Sunday morning slot, cut by 15 minutes for commercials, before becoming a staple on the station's Saturday night Chiller Theater . In 1988, the film's new owner, Turner Entertainment , made another new negative. The result was more faithful to the film's original color, but had intermittent damage, visible splices, and missing footage. The Jack Warner nitrate print of the film resides at UCLA , which also holds

497-496: A detective mystery entitled The Mystery of the Yellow Room in 1907, and four years later he published Le Fantôme de l'Opéra . The novel was first published in newspapers before finally being published as a book. The setting of The Phantom of the Opera is the actual Paris opera house, the Palais Garnier . Leroux had heard the rumours about the time the opera house was finished, and these rumours became closely linked with

568-403: A large crate. She returns to Winton and interrupts a conversation with two detectives who have been following him to say she has found Joan Gale's body. The detectives see Darcy leaving and call for help to both give chase and investigate Florence's claim. They catch Darcy, but the crate turns out to contain alcohol, as Worth is a bootlegger . At the police station, a missing judge's pocket watch

639-576: A lawyer in Caen (graduating in 1889), He inherited millions of francs and lived wildly until he nearly reached bankruptcy. In 1890, he began working as a court reporter and theater critic for L'Écho de Paris . His most important journalism came when he began working as an international correspondent for the Paris newspaper Le Matin in 1893. He was present at, and covered, the 1905 Russian Revolution . He left journalism in 1907, after returning from covering

710-439: A line of Glenda Farrell's dialogue that was sourced from Life Begins (1932). Following Rennahan's directives in his oral histories as to how he lit for two-color and what palette he aimed to achieve in the film, the new restoration revealed subtle degrees of color that were latent in the nitrate print, but had been obscured by cross-contamination of the color dyes. The restored print of the film received its television premiere on

781-513: A monstrous figure has been stealing bodies from the morgue . Reporter Florence Dempsey, on the verge of being fired by her impatient editor, Jim, for not bringing in any worthwhile news, gets a tip that George Winton, the son of a powerful industrialist, is being held in connection with the death of his model ex-girlfriend, Joan Gale. Florence goes to watch the autopsy, but the body cannot be found, and then visits Winton in jail, believing his protestations of innocence. Meanwhile, Igor prepares to open

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852-525: A movie in 1925. Leroux did not live to see all the success from his novel and its subsequent critical re-evaluation; he died in April 1927. There have been many literary and other dramatic works based on Leroux's novel, ranging from stage musicals to films to children's books. Some well-known stage and screen adaptations of the novel are the 1925 film and the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical . Leroux's novel

923-424: A new wax museum. Due to injuries sustained in the fire, he uses a wheelchair and must rely on assistants to create his new sculptures. One of those assistants, Ralph, is engaged to Florence's roommate, Charlotte Duncan, but Florence does not approve of the match because Ralph is a starving artist . While visiting the museum, Florence notices an uncanny resemblance between the wax figure of Joan of Arc and Joan Gale. At

994-547: A series of free screenings to celebrate the 20th anniversary of sound films. He said the print subsequently began to decay and was destroyed. The "lab reference" 35 mm nitrate copy of the first reel of the film was still held by Technicolor-Hollywood in the 1960s, when it was screened by film historian Rudy Behlmer , but that reel is not currently in the Technicolor Collection of the Academy Film Archive and

1065-489: A volcanic eruption and being immediately sent on another assignment without vacation time, and began writing fiction. In 1919, he and Arthur Bernède formed their own film company, Société des Cinéromans , publishing novels and turning them into films. He first wrote a mystery novel titled Le mystère de la chambre jaune (1907; English title: The Mystery of the Yellow Room ), starring the amateur detective Joseph Rouletabille . Leroux's contribution to French detective fiction

1136-513: Is considered a parallel to those of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in the United Kingdom and Edgar Allan Poe in the United States. Leroux published his most famous work, The Phantom of the Opera , as a serial in 1909 and 1910, and as a book in 1910 (with an English translation appearing in 1911). Balaoo followed in 1911, which was made into a film several times (in 1913, 1927 and 1942). Leroux

1207-456: Is entitled, Le masque de cire (translated as The Wax Mask ). The Phantom of the Opera (novel) The Phantom of the Opera ( French : Le Fantôme de l'Opéra ) is a novel by French author Gaston Leroux . It was first published as a serial in Le Gaulois from 23 September 1909 to 8 January 1910, and was released in volume form in late March 1910 by Pierre Lafitte . The novel

1278-460: Is found on Darcy. By the morning, he is experiencing symptoms of drug withdrawal and close to cracking. Meanwhile, Charlotte goes to see Ralph at the museum, but he is not there yet. Igor lures her to his underground laboratory and reveals he can walk. Ralph arrives for work and lets in Florence, who compares a picture of the missing judge with Igor's statue of Voltaire at the same time Darcy is telling

1349-499: Is frustrated Igor will not create macabre exhibits like those that draw crowds to their competitors, proposes they burn their museum down to collect a £10,000 insurance policy. Though Igor refuses to consider this, Worth starts a fire, and the men fight while the wax masterworks melt. When Igor passes out, Worth leaves him to die in the conflagration, but he awakens. Twelve years later, both Igor and Worth are in New York City , where

1420-399: Is given). Neither "Alexander Peters" nor "Fantasy Book" appear to exist, and the text of the story is, in fact, a word-for-word copy of the story Figures de cire by Andre de Lorde which was published as Waxworks in the 1933 anthology Terrors: A Collection of Uneasy Tales, edited (anonymously) by Charles Birkin . The confusion has sometimes caused Leroux to be erroneously credited with

1491-562: Is partly inspired by historical events at the Paris Opera during the nineteenth century, and by an apocryphal tale concerning the use of a former ballet pupil's skeleton in Carl Maria von Weber 's 1841 production of Der Freischütz . It has been successfully adapted into various stage and film adaptations, most notable of which are the 1925 film depiction featuring Lon Chaney , and Andrew Lloyd Webber 's 1986 musical . Leroux initially

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1562-676: Is presumed to have decomposed decades ago. According to the Wisconsin Historical Society 's website, a 16mm copy of the film is located at the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research . In 1970, the Warner Bros. studio reference print of the film was found by former studio head Jack Warner in his personal collection. The American Film Institute made a new negative, which director of photography Ray Rennahan told historian Richard Koszarski looked so dismal he walked out of

1633-401: Is styled as a mystery novel , as its frame is narrated by a detective acquiring his information through various investigations. The mystery under investigation is the identity and motive of 'the Phantom' who lurks through the opera house, seemingly appearing out of nowhere as if by magic in inaccessible places. But, it seems that the mystery novel frame story is a façade for the genre being more

1704-463: The MeTV show Svengoolie on March 13, 2021, and theatrical Digital Cinema Packages of the restoration are available for archival and theatrical screening. A color version of the film, manipulated to look blue/pink, was released as an extra in standard definition on the Warner Bros. DVD and Blu-ray of the 1953 remake of the film, House of Wax . On May 12, 2020, Warner Archive Collection released

1775-824: The "based on" wording and instead used "inspired by" in the show's Playbill, much to O'Connell's dismay. This musical adaptation, which won some of the most prestigious theatre awards in the UK and the US, first premiered in London in 1986 and on Broadway in 1988. Phantom has since become the longest-running musical on Broadway (it ran for 35 years before closing in 2023) and is still running in London (the second longest-running West End musical behind Les Misérables ). The show has also received multiple international productions and translations, yet has never been performed professionally in France. Mystery of

1846-477: The 1880s, in Paris , the Palais Garnier Opera House is believed to be haunted by an entity known as the 'Phantom of the Opera', or simply the 'Opera Ghost', after stagehand Joseph Buquet is found hanged, the noose around his neck missing. At a gala performance for the retirement of the opera house's managers, a young, little-known Swedish soprano, Christine Daaé , is called upon to sing in place of

1917-473: The Opera . The underground "lake" that he wrote about, in reality an enormous cistern, does exist beneath the opera house, and it is still used for training firefighters to swim in the dark. The serialized version contains an entire chapter ( "L'enveloppe magique" ) that does not appear in the novel version—though much of its content was added in other chapters—and was not reprinted in English until 2014. In

1988-800: The Persian, using the water which would have been used to douse the explosives. Still, Christine begs, promising him not to kill herself after becoming his bride. Erik releases Raoul and 'the Persian' from his torture chamber. When Erik is alone with Christine, he lifts his mask to kiss her on her forehead and is eventually given a kiss back. Erik reveals he has never kissed anyone, including his own mother, who would run away if he ever tried to kiss her. Moved, he and Christine cry together. She also holds his hand and says, "Poor, unhappy Erik", which reduces him to "a dog ready to die for her". He allows 'the Persian' and Raoul to escape, though not before making Christine promise that she will visit him on his death day and return

2059-526: The Warner library was sold as a package to Associated Artists Productions for television syndication in the late 1950s, Mystery of the Wax Museum , though it remained on the sales list, was never broadcast, because the negative vaults did not have a preprint to service it. William K. Everson reported that Warner's London exchange kept a 35 mm color print on hand, and he saw the film there in 1947 as part of

2130-519: The Wax Museum Mystery of the Wax Museum is a 1933 American pre-Code mystery - horror film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Lionel Atwill , Fay Wray , Glenda Farrell , and Frank McHugh . It was produced and released by Warner Bros. and filmed in two-color Technicolor ; Doctor X and Mystery of the Wax Museum were the last two dramatic fiction films made using this process. In London in 1921, sculptor Ivan Igor operates

2201-427: The Wax Museum was the last of Warner's feature films under a 1931 contract with Technicolor, whose two-color system at the time combined separation photography printed with red and green dyes to create a color image with a reduced spectrum. As the novelty of color films began to wear off, Warner had noted a growing apathy, and even hostility, among critics and the public toward their Technicolor films since 1929, given

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2272-401: The Wax Museum was the last studio feature filmed in two-color Technicolor. Because the heat generated by the extremely bright lights required for the process could melt wax, many of the statues in the film were portrayed by actors, though some have said this was always the plan and was intended to add a life-like verisimilitude to the wax exhibits. Technicolor founder Herbert Kalmus declared

2343-572: The Yellow Room and The Perfume of the Lady in Black . Although previous commentators have asserted that The Phantom of the Opera did not attain as much success as these previous novels, being particularly unpopular in France where it was first published, recent research into the novel's early reception and sales has indicated the contrary. One book review from the New York Times expressed disappointment in

2414-403: The acts of violence he commits. The novel features a love triangle between the Phantom, Christine, and Raoul. Raoul is seen as Christine's childhood love whom she is familiar with and has affection for. He is rich and therefore offers her security as well as a wholesome, Christian marriage. The Phantom, on the other hand, is not familiar. He is dark, ugly and dangerous, and therefore represents

2485-414: The appeal of the film. When Technicolor's three-strip process became available, Warner was the first to use it for live-action shorts, beginning with Service With a Smile (1934). Upon its release, Time magazine felt the film was a good mystery film, but was disappointed it lacked a scene at the end that explained everything and wrapped it all up. Mordaunt Hall of The New York Times praised

2556-479: The audience, killing a spectator. The Phantom, having abducted Christine from her dressing room, reveals himself as a deformed man called Erik . Erik intends to hold her prisoner in his lair with him for a few days. Still, she causes him to change his plans when she unmasks him and, to the horror of both, beholds his skull-like face. Fearing that she will leave him, he decides to hold her permanently. However, when Christine requests release after two weeks, he agrees on

2627-417: The comic performances of Glenda Farrell and Frank McHugh, but found the overall film "too ghastly for comfort", writing: "It is all very well in its way to have a mad scientist performing operations in well-told stories, but when a melodrama depends upon the glimpses of covered bodies in a morgue and the stealing of some of them by an insane modeler in wax, it is going too far." The reviewer for Variety said

2698-459: The condition that she wear his ring and be faithful to him. On the roof of the Opera House, Christine tells Raoul about her abduction and makes Raoul promise to take her away to where Erik can never find her, even if she resists. Raoul says he will act on his promise the next day. Unbeknownst to Christine and Raoul, Erik is watching them and overheard their whole conversation. The following night,

2769-722: The detectives that Igor made his new statues by murdering people and covering them in wax, while all he did for Igor was locate Worth. Charlotte strikes Igor's face and breaks through a wax mask to his scarred true visage underneath, revealing he is the monstrous bodysnatcher. He uncovers Worth's corpse, saying his search for the man responsible for his appearance is finally over. Charlotte's screams attract Ralph and Florence, but Igor knocks Ralph unconscious and Florence runs away. Igor prepares to douse Charlotte with wax. Florence and Winton return, followed by police, who attack an athletic Igor. One officer shoots Igor, who falls into his vat of molten wax. Ralph comes to and saves Charlotte just before

2840-427: The direction of the movie. His take on the novel, making it a dark romantic movie with comedy, was not popular with audiences. Finally, the film was reworked one last time by Maurice Pivar and Lois Weber . They removed most of Sedgwick's contributions and returned to the original focus. This time, the movie was a success with audiences. The most famous adaptation of the novel was Andrew Lloyd Webber's 1986 musical of

2911-505: The enraged and jealous Erik abducts Christine during a production of Faust and tries to force her to marry him. Raoul is led by a mysterious Opera House regular, 'the Persian', into Erik's secret lair in the bowels of the building. Still, they end up trapped in a mirrored room by Erik, who threatens that unless Christine agrees to marry him, he will kill them and everyone in the Opera House by using explosives. Under duress, Christine agrees to marry Erik. Erik initially tries to drown Raoul and

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2982-476: The film "the ultimate that is possible with two components." Contemporary exhibitor reviews in The Film Daily document that the film's color was greatly admired by both theater owners and their audiences, who called it "beautiful" and "the best color I have ever seen", and some reviewers have said the eerie atmosphere created by the two-color process, along with Rennahan's lighting and Grot's set designs, adds to

3053-467: The film in 1080p HD as a stand-alone Blu-ray, utilizing a Rec. 709 submaster of the UCLA restoration. With corrected color, restored sound, and digital correction of wear-and-tear to the image, this release garnered universal rave-reviews, with many commenters noting that it was as if they were seeing the film for the first time. Extras included two audio commentaries, one by Michael Curtiz biographer Alan Rode, and

3124-461: The forbidden love. However, Christine is drawn to him because she sees him as her Angel of Music, and she pities his existence of loneliness and darkness. By the time Leroux published The Phantom of the Opera , he had already gained credibility as a crime mystery author in both French- and English-speaking countries. He had written six novels prior, two of which had garnered substantial popularity within their first year of publication: The Mystery of

3195-486: The graveyard scene that comes later where the Phantom plays the fiddle for Christine and attacks Raoul when he tries to intervene. Drumright points out that music is evident throughout the novel in that it is the basis for Christine and Erik's relationship. Christine sees Erik as her Angel of Music that her father promised would come to her one day. The Phantom sees Christine as his musical protégé, and he uses his passion for music to teach her everything he knows. The novel

3266-561: The lead role. The Gaston Leroux Bedside Companion , an anthology published in 1980 and edited by Peter Haining , as well as the Haining-edited The Real Opera Ghost and Other Tales By Gaston Leroux (Sutton, 1994), include a story attributed to Leroux entitled The Waxwork Museum . A foreword alleges that the translation by Alexander Peters first appeared in Fantasy Book in 1969 (but no original French publication date

3337-469: The managers. Leroux uses the operatic setting in The Phantom of the Opera to use music as a device for foreshadowing. Ribière makes note that Leroux was once a theatre critic and his brother was a musician, so he was knowledgeable about music and how to use it as a framing device. She uses the example of how Leroux introduces Danse macabre which means "dance of death" in the gala scene which foreshadows

3408-420: The novel: Act One of the opera Hellé had just finished when a fire in the roof of the opera house melted through a wire holding a counterweight for the chandelier, causing a crash that injured several and killed one. Using this accident paired with rumours of a ghost in that same opera house, Leroux wrote Le Fantôme de l'Opéra and published it in 1910, which was later published in English as The Phantom of

3479-526: The opera's leading soprano, Carlotta, who is ill. Christine's performance is a success. Among the audience is the Vicomte Raoul de Chagny, who recognizes her as his childhood playmate and recalls his love for her. He attempts to visit her backstage, where he hears a man complimenting her from inside her dressing room. He investigates the room once Christine leaves, only to find it empty. At Perros-Guirec , Christine meets with Raoul, who confronts her about

3550-503: The original color, and the film was released as part of UA's "Prime Time Showcase" television package in August 1972, which was first broadcast on the BBC in London before playing sixteen domestic TV markets. In Washington D.C., Mystery of the Wax Museum played on WTOP 's Saturday night classic film series "Cinema Club 9" in late 1972. In New York City, it had its first airing in 1973 on WPIX-TV in

3621-520: The process. Back at the Palais Garnier, the new managers receive a letter from the Phantom demanding that they allow Christine to perform the lead role of Marguerite in Faust and that box 5 be left empty for his use, lest they perform in a house with a curse on it. The managers assume his demands are a prank and ignore them. Soon after, Carlotta ends up croaking like a toad, and a chandelier drops into

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3692-438: The ring he gave her. He also makes 'the Persian' promise that afterward, he will go to the newspaper and report his death, as he will die soon "of love." Later, Christine returns to Erik's lair, and per his request returns the ring and buries him 'somewhere he will never be found'. Afterward, a local newspaper runs the note: "Erik is dead". Christine and Raoul then elope together, never to return. The epilogue reveals that Erik

3763-513: The same name . With his second-hand copy of the novel and his artistic goals set on creating a major romantic piece, Lloyd Webber and his team wrote a musical that honored the original text while crafting a story that resonated deeply with audiences at the time. During the show's development, however, there were disagreements over whether it was "inspired by" or "based on" Gaston Leroux's novel. Bill O'Connell, an assistant to film producers in New York at

3834-463: The same time, Igor spots Charlotte and, saying she looks just like his Marie Antoinette , asks if she will pose for him sometime. Florence gets Winton, who was released from jail, to help her trail Professor Darcy, who Igor said made the Joan of Arc. Darcy leads them to a derelict building owned by Worth, for whom he also works. Florence sneaks into the basement and watches the monster from the morgue pushing

3905-414: The screening room when it was shown to him. Nevertheless, it was screened at Graumans Chinese Theatre in early summer of 1970, and then at Alice Tully Hall on September 26 at 4:00 pm as part of "Medium Rare 1927-1933", a retrospective of films not seen since their first release, at the 8th New York Film Festival . United Artists made a low-contrast negative for TV prints, which lacked virtually all of

3976-549: The stories from the 1933 film Mystery of the Wax Museum , the 1953 film House of Wax (both of which were based on a story by Charles S. Belden ) or, particularly, the 1997 Italian film Wax Mask (for example, in Troy Howarth's Splintered Visions: Lucio Fulci and His Films ). No such story by Leroux exists, though some confusion may have been the result of chapter IX in Leroux's novel La double vie de Théophraste Longuet, which

4047-457: The story was "loose and unconvincing", but liked the gruesome makeup and said the film should do well at neighborhood cinemas. At the box office, the film did better in Europe than it did in the United States, but still made a profit of $ 800,000. According to Warner Bros., it earned $ 325,000 domestically and $ 781,000 internationally, making it Warner's fifth-highest-grossing film of 1933. The film

4118-608: The studio optioned the story from Belden for $ 1,000 before getting the attorney's report. Rogers dropped his option on the play when the co-author of a Broadway play with a similar plot threatened him with a lawsuit. A follow-up to Warner's earlier horror film Doctor X (1932), Mystery involved many of the same cast and crew, including actors Lionel Atwill , Fay Wray , Arthur Edmund Carewe , and Thomas Jackson ; director Michael Curtiz ; art director Anton Grot ; and cameraman Ray Rennahan . The film also re-used Doctor X ' s opening theme music by Bernhard Kaun . Mystery of

4189-419: The time, contended for the show to appear as "based on" rather than "inspired by", as he viewed the latter as a minimization of Gaston Leroux's original involvement with the story. Lawyers for producer Cameron Mackintosh and Webber's Really Useful Theatre Company responded, saying that it was never their intention "to fail to give appropriate prominence to the contribution of M. Leroux". They didn't, however, use

4260-527: The unreal hues and humdrum quality control, and this made the considerable additional expense seem less worthwhile. Warner had tried, without success, to get Technicolor to permit them to swap out their last feature-length commitment for a series of shorts, but after the studio violated the contract by filming Doctor X with an additional black-and-white unit—thereby permitting them to process B&W prints at their own lab and avoid paying Technicolor thousands of dollars—Technicolor refused. Consequently, Mystery of

4331-401: The voice he heard in her room. Christine says she has been tutored by the "Angel of Music", whom her father used to tell her and Raoul about. When Raoul suggests that she might be the victim of a prank, she storms off. Christine visits her father's grave one night, where a mysterious figure appears and plays the violin for her. Raoul attempts to confront the figure but is struck and knocked out in

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4402-464: The wax begins to pour onto her. After turning in her story, Florence goes to gloat to Jim, who asks her to marry him. She looks out the window at the waiting Winton and accepts the proposal. The film is based on an unpublished short story , "The Wax Works", by Charles S. Belden , who had also written a play called The Wax Museum , which was optioned by Charles Rogers, an independent producer. This had been discovered by Warner's copyright attorney, but

4473-483: The way the phantom was portrayed, saying that the feeling of suspense and horror is lost once it is found out that the phantom is just a man. The majority of the notability that the novel acquired early on was due to its publication in a series of installments in French, American, and English newspapers. This serialized version of the story became important when it was read and sought out by Universal Pictures to be adapted into

4544-551: Was born deformed, and the son of a construction business owner. He ran away from his native Normandy to work in fairs and caravans, schooling himself in the circus arts across Europe and Asia, and eventually building trick palaces in Persia and Turkey. Returning to France, he started his own construction business. After being subcontracted to work on the Palais Garnier's foundations, Erik discreetly built his secret lair, complete with hidden passages and other tricks that allowed him to spy on

4615-657: Was born in Paris in 1868, the illegitimate child of Marie Bidaut and Dominique Leroux, who married a month after his birth. He claimed an illustrious pedigree, including descent from William II of England (in French, Guillaume le Roux), son of William the Conqueror , and social connections such as having been the official playmate of Prince Philippe, Count of Paris at the College d'Eu in Normandy. After schooling in Normandy and studying as

4686-401: Was going to be a lawyer, but after spending his inheritance gambling he became a reporter for L'Écho de Paris . At the paper, he wrote about and critiqued dramas, as well as being a courtroom reporter. With his job, he was able to travel frequently, but he returned to Paris where he became a writer. Because of his fascination with both Edgar Allan Poe and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle , he wrote

4757-614: Was made a Chevalier de la Legion d'honneur in 1909. He died at age 58 in Nice, France, in 1927. Leroux married twice, first to Marie Lefranc from whom he separated in 1902. Following his separation, he then lived with Jeanne Cayatte from Lorraine , with whom he had a son, Gaston, nicknamed Milinkij, and daughter Madeleine; they married in 1917 after Lefranc's death. In 1918, he founded a film production company, Société des Cinéromans with René Navarre and debuted two films Tue-la-Mort and Il etait deux petits enfants , in which his daughter played

4828-403: Was made into two silent films. The first film version, a German adaptation called Das Gespenst im Opernhaus , is now a lost film . It was made in 1916 and was directed by Ernest Matray. The next adaptation, a 1925 Universal Studios silent film, stars Lon Chaney as the Phantom. Due to tensions on the set, there was a switch in directors and Edward Sedgwick finished the film while changing

4899-610: Was never reissued domestically, though it was reissued in Franco's Spain in 1940, and over time it came to be considered a lost film . In 1936, Technicolor-Hollywood stopped servicing two-color printing and is said to have issued a "last call" to their customers for prints as the final imbibition rigs were converted for their three-strip process, though records show scattered print runs of some two-color subjects after that date, and correspondence indicates that in 1940 Goldwyn Productions wanted to make two-color prints for Spain, and Technicolor

4970-462: Was still able to service them. The response of most studios was to junk the two-color negatives of their now obsolete films, which were stored at Technicolor, but a precious few of these negatives survived, including those of the Eddie Cantor musical Whoopee! , which Goldwyn moved to their vaults. Warner Bros. kept the negatives for their two-color cartoons, but not their live-action projects. After

5041-407: Was used as the primary resource, but it exhibited pickups at reel ends culled from different prints, and the French workprint, which was less pleasing overall, yielded shots and ends of reels that were tattered, broken, or missing in the main print, along with some lost lines of audio, as it was made from different matrixes. Other missing bits of audio were taken from other Warner Bros. films, including

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