{"id":2511471,"date":"2026-07-21T20:03:36","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T20:03:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2511471"},"modified":"2026-07-21T20:03:36","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T20:03:36","slug":"meet-gillian-the-untold-story-of-phantom-of-the-operas-2000-pound-chandelier","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/meet-gillian-the-untold-story-of-phantom-of-the-operas-2000-pound-chandelier\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet ‘Gillian’: The untold story of ‘Phantom of the Opera’s’ 2,000-pound chandelier"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\u2018Phantom of the Opera\u2019<\/p>\n

Where:<\/b> Hollywood Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd., L.A.
When:<\/b> 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays-Thursdays; 8 p.m. Fridays; 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays; 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sundays. (Check schedule for exceptions.) Ends Aug. 9.
Tickets:<\/b> Start at $47 (subject to change)
Contact:<\/b> BroadwayInHollywood.com<\/a> or Ticketmaster.com<\/a>
Running time:<\/b> 2 hours, 30 minutes (including one intermission)<\/p>\n

The production also runs Aug. 12-Aug. 30, Segerstrom Center for the Arts, 300 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. scfta.org<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n

It\u2019s over 8 feet tall, nearly 11 feet wide and travels by 53-foot semitrailer. It\u2019s covered in more than 20,000 beads and weighs almost 1 ton \u2014 or about 2,000 pounds. And eight times a week, it\u2019s dropped atop the heads of people who pay for the privilege \u2014 just a few feet short of actually hitting anyone. <\/p>\n

Meet \u201cGillian,\u201d the stunning chandelier traveling with \u201cThe Phantom of the Opera\u201d on its current North American Tour. Playing at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre through Aug. 9 before heading to Segerstrom Center for the Arts, the show is a \u201creplica\u201d of the original 1980s West End and Broadway extravaganzas , maintaining director Hal Prince\u2019s staging, Gillian Lynne\u2019s choreography and Maria Bj\u00f6rnson\u2019s iconic production design while incorporating modern technology.<\/p>\n

As a result, the production \u2014 and the chandelier at its center \u2014 are laden with history. But the creative team is careful not to let the show become a \u201cmuseum piece.\u201d When the chandelier falls, Production Stage Manager Jovon E. Shuck wants audiences to feel a fresh thrill of terror.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope you poop a little bit,\u201d he joked. \u201cWe want the audience in the back of the house to be glad that they\u2019re not sitting under it, and the folks sitting under it to be thrilled that they [did].\u201d<\/p>\n

Far from a stagnant set piece, the \u201cPhantom\u201d chandelier is considered a character in its own right. The show opens by foreshadowing a past disaster involving the lighting fixture at the Paris Op\u00e9ra House, which comes to fruition at the end of Act 1 when the titular Phantom sends it crashing in a climactic fit of rage.<\/p>\n

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A section of the 2,000-pound chandelier set piece for \u201cPhantom of the Opera\u201d hangs in the Hollywood Pantages Theatre.<\/p>\n

(Ariana Drehsler \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n

So beloved is the chandelier that each model is named after one of the show\u2019s pioneering creatives. The original Broadway production featured a chandelier named \u201cRuthie 2,\u201d a successor to an early London chandelier reportedly named \u201cRuthie\u201d after Hal Prince\u2019s longtime assistant Ruth Mitchell (alternate stories suggest the first chandelier was just called \u201cthe Chandi\u201d).<\/p>\n

Both the chandelier in the current London production and the one built for the 25th anniversary concert at the Royal Albert Hall are named \u201cMaria\u201d after Bj\u00f6rnson, the show\u2019s original designer, and the chandelier on the current World Tour is named \u201cHal,\u201d in honor of Prince. On the North American Tour, we have \u201cGillian,\u201d namesake of Lynne.<\/p>\n

In addition to the new name, Gillian is distinguished by a revamped design and capabilities.<\/p>\n

Forty years ago, Bj\u00f6rnson initially modeled her chandelier design after the one in the Palais Garnier (Paris Opera House), but ended up \u201csquishing\u201d it into a more oblong, elliptical shape to accommodate the staging. In the original productions, the chandelier started onstage and traveled diagonally to a point above the audience, before traveling down again to \u201ccrash\u201d onto the stage and collapse. Critically, the oval shape allowed it to occupy less stage depth.<\/p>\n

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\"Maria <\/picture>\n
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Maria Bj\u00f6rnson\u2019s original 1986 \u201cPhantom\u201d model and chandelier design.<\/p>\n

(Maria Bj\u00f6rnson Archives)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n

\u201cOver the years, as the oval became the iconic look of the phantom chandelier, replica productions both in America and then internationally in Vienna, and onwards from there across Europe and Asia and Australia all just held on to the original design,\u201d said Seth Sklar-Heyn, \u201cPhantom\u2019s\u201d director and executive producer.<\/p>\n

Later tours reconfigured the chandelier\u2019s choreography, hanging it on one fixed point to lower and lift up and down without the sideways travel \u2014 a much easier installation for touring.<\/p>\n

In 2020, a new United Kingdom tour led designers to revisit and adapt Bj\u00f6rnson\u2019s original spherical design with added bells and whistles. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, that production was short-lived, but the design was re-appropriated when the musical reopened in London in 2021. The current West End production includes the massive, ornate spherical chandelier and the stage-to-ceiling travel \u2014 \u201ca happy medium between the two worlds,\u201d said Sklar-Heyn.<\/p>\n

Though Gillian \u2014 the biggest working \u201cPhantom\u201d chandelier in the world \u2014 only travels vertically and doesn\u2019t start onstage, the production team makes sure it\u2019s still a spectacle.<\/p>\n

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\"1991 <\/picture>\n
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1991 chandelier schematic for the 1993 North American \u201cMusic Box\u201d tour of \u201cPhantom of the Opera.\u201d <\/p>\n

(Maria Bj\u00f6rnson Archives)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n

\u201cWe are spherical. We have the harps. We have the swags of beads. We have the globes. We have the fluted glass lanterns. We\u2019ve got all these little elements that recall Maria\u2019s original design, because we have the space to create an element that doesn\u2019t have to go to the stage,\u201d said Sklar-Heyn.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can do certain things in the air in L.A., on tour, with swinging and pyrotechnics, and there\u2019s certain elements we can\u2019t do in London because it moves from the stage,\u201d he continued. \u201cSo you try to make the best of whichever version you\u2019re working with.\u201d<\/p>\n

Different productions have required different chandeliers. According to Lighting Designer Andrew Bridge, for the 2000s-era Las Vegas iteration of the show, \u201ceverything had to be bigger and more spectacular.\u201d That chandelier started in four separate pieces, flying through the auditorium to come together and form the complete fixture at the overture\u2019s climax.<\/p>\n

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\"The <\/picture>\n
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\u201cPhantom of the Opera\u201d plays at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre through Aug. 9. <\/p>\n

(Ariana Drehsler \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n

For the 25th anniversary performance at London\u2019s Royal Albert Hall, the production team planned to borrow one of the chandeliers that Swarovski had made for the 2004 \u201cPhantom\u201d film.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor some reason, we couldn\u2019t get it,\u201d recalled Set Design Adapter Matt Kinley. Instead, Kinley and his team had to call upon lighting designer and prop maker Howard Eaton, whose company Howard Eaton Lighting Ltd. has constructed virtually every \u201cPhantom\u201d chandelier, and ask him to make a \u201cgiant\u201d one from scratch in just two weeks.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a real maverick,\u201d Kinley said. \u201cThere\u2019s no one really like him in [the U.K.], and he\u2019s able to take on these insane projects and take an artistic brief and turn it into something hugely technical. They\u2019re kind of works of art in themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

In his role, Kinley draws from Bj\u00f6rnson\u2019s archive of sketches, photos and models to maintain a \u201cDNA link\u201d between her original concept and every piece of the design.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was a hard task master, you know, she was tough, but she was brilliant and \u2018Phantom\u2019 is her masterpiece,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

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\"Production <\/picture>\n
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\u201cPhantom\u201d Production Stage Manager Jovon Shuck sits in the Hollywood Pantages Theatre. The North American tour of the musical kicked off last November. <\/p>\n

(Ariana Drehsler \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n

Bringing Gillian on tour is another feat. It takes up one-third of a 53-foot tractor trailer\u2014one of 17 trailers \u201cPhantom\u201d travels with, and the team anticipates about 38 hours to load into a venue. Six months before every tour stop, someone from Shuck\u2019s team visits to survey the theater building and meet with structural engineers to ensure the structural steel mount can support its weight and dynamic force.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want that moment at the end of act one to be terrifying and completely safe,\u201d Shuck said.<\/p>\n

When the \u201cphans\u201d \u2014 that\u2019s \u201cPhantom\u201d fans \u2014 come to the theater, whether they\u2019ve seen every production or are just seeing it for the first time, Shuck, Sklar-Heyn and the whole team want their experience to be as close to the original Broadway spectacular as possible.<\/p>\n

If that involves a massive chandelier falling above their heads in a pyrotechnic explosion, even better.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.latimes.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2018Phantom of the Opera\u2019 Where: Hollywood Pantages Theatre, 6233 Hollywood Blvd., L.A.When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays-Thursdays; 8 p.m. Fridays; 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays; 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sundays. (Check schedule for exceptions.) Ends Aug. 9.Tickets: Start at $47 (subject to change)Contact: BroadwayInHollywood.com or Ticketmaster.comRunning time: 2 hours, 30 minutes (including one intermission) The production also […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2511472,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2511471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Meet-Gillian-The-untold-story-of-Phantom-of-the-Operas.com2F802F672F42c414dc4cb4abafb8be7065.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2511471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2511471"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2511471\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2511473,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2511471\/revisions\/2511473"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2511472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2511471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2511471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2511471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}