1.
2nd draft
Sorelli, prima ballerina of the Paris Opera, is admiring herself in her dressing-room mirror when half a dozen screaming ballet girls rush in.
JAMMES
We saw the Ghost!
LOUISE
I thought us toast.
MEG
We were, almost.
JAMMES
If we hadn't fled fast,
our lives would have been past.
PAULETTE
He wasn't even handsome.
Not the kind I fantasized
would hold me for ransom
or make me compromised.
JAMMES
Only air fills your head
when we could have been dead.
SORELLI
It's all but scary
when you boast
you saw your imaginary
Opera Ghost.
... Did the Ghost you really see?
JAMMES
As plainly as you now see me!
LOUISE
We were backstage, and then, I swear,
a figure formed out of thin air.
But though he was cutthroaty,
he wasn't white or floaty.
He looked a gent in fancy dress,
a gent bent on torment,
but a gent nonetheless.
SORELLI
There are many of those,
wearing fine clothes,
many of whom
you can't presume
are dead.
JANELLE
His dressing was not why we fled.
We're stressing because of his head.
JAMMES
It looked like death.
LOUISE
He had no nose to draw in breath.
JANELLE
The skin was thin,
I saw each vein.
JAMMES
He grinned a grin
that wasn't sane.
PAULETTE
His eyes were flames.
SORELLI
What crazy claims.
LOUISE
The honest Joseph Buquet, master of the flies,
has seen the Ghost with his own eyes
and it looked most as he did say—
a head made up of but decay,
rotting away with every day.
JAMMES
He said the Ghost has a lasso
that he will use to strangle you.
LOUISE
I've heard a noise behind the door.
MEG
The thrill we find in this uproar
the Ghost abhors.
He's come to kill the ballet corps!
The girls shrink away from the door; Sorelli bravely approaches it, wielding a hairbrush.
JANELLE
Sorelli, if you have a wit,
I pray to you, don't open it.
Sorelli opens the door.
SORRELI
Hello, is there anyone there?
Reveal yourself, Ghost, if you dare.
MEG
What are you, thick?
Do close it, quick!
Sorelli closes the door.
SORRELI
Oh, it's silly to be chilly.
Your stories are not true.
We're too old to
believe in them really.
Enter Lucille, another ballet girl.
LUCILLE
I've ghastly news.
LOUISE
They're banning booze?
LUCILLE
The honest Joseph Buquet, master of the flies,
has suddenly met his demise.
In the cellars he died,
hung by a lasso.
They say it's suicide,
but I don't think it's true!
MEG
The Ghost has killed Buquet!
No, mother said I'd pay
for any gossip of the Ghost,
and never to my knowledge boast.
JAMMES
You have knowledge of the eerie,
Meg Giry?
LOUISE
Oh, tell us! Our theory
has gotten so dreary.
MEG
with growing enthusiasm from the girls' reactions
Since it makes you cheery,
maybe mother wouldn't spaz
if I just told you the Ghost has
a reign of fear o'er the managers here.
Only fools would flout his rules,
cause he's willing to do killing.
Secrets I'm not spilling
when I say he finds it thrilling.
And so, each show,
a share of what the opera's grossed
is handed over to the Ghost.
But money is not all he wants;
he has a private box he haunts!
Yes, he suggested they grant him Box Five
if the managers had any wish to survive.
And on the occasion
he had an invasion,
the intruders heard a voice
melodic and euphonic.
But it had no body,
and its words were quite demonic:
He spoke he'd choke the bloke
who dared remain in his domain
because you'd have to be insane
to sit in the box of the Ghost.
Being right in the head, they fled.
but to this day no one will tread
inside Box Five
if they've got drive
to stay alive.
But what am I saying?
Why, I should be praying
the Ghost won't kill me as Buquet,
since all his secrets I've given away.
JAMMES
Yes, Buquet knew too much of the phantom
and so the Ghost had to plant 'im
in his grave!
SORELLI
But we mustn't speak a word
of what's occurred
to anyone.
JAMMES
Well, that's no fun.
SORELLI
Tonight the managers retire,
and I desire
to not ruin their last night
with our foolish fright.
After the gala performance
in which we all dance
to celebrate the end of their careers,
they deserve us to shed
at least a few tears
when we say farewell,
and not out of fears
at tales of the Ghost which we shall not tell.
That is the Parisian way:
pretend we don't keep death at bay.