Cast and crew of "The Phantom of the Opera" squared off against the
 Pioneer  Theatre Company on Monday in a co-ed softball game at a Salt Lake City
 diamond. PTC Artistic Director Charles Morey played shortstop for the
 local  team, while the visiting "Phantom" squad (at Capitol Theatre through
July  31) was led by Brad Little, the Phantom himself. Sure, he can sing, but
 was the Phantom a phenom on the ballfield?

 "He was good," says PTC Production Manager David Deike, who led the
Pioneer team. "He pitched for a while, and he got a couple of hits."

 The "Phantom" team won, 8-7. The teams scheduled a rematch for Monday,
 and Deike predicts a different outcome. "Pioneer by 5," he says. You
 heard  it here first.

      There's a changing of the guard this week in the dark, musty lower depths of the Paris Opera House. Ted Keegan, who's been playing the title role in the national touring production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "The Phantom of the Opera," now at the Capitol Theatre, is leaving Salt Lake City to return to the Broadway cast. He'll be replaced, starting with the Wednesday night performance, by Brad Little, who's been touring with the company for the past two and one-half years.

      Little, who was playing the role of Raoul in the Broadway production at the time he was promoted to Phantom in the touring company, was nearing the end of a three-month vacation and busy packing for a benefit concert in Cincinnati, Ohio, when he was interviewed by phone from his apartment in New York City.

      (Two years ago, playing the Phantom in Cincinnati, he befriended an ailing cheetah named Maya at the city's zoo. He has since become involved in efforts to preserve the African cheetah, which was the reason for the benefit concert.)

      Little notes that he can identify and sympathize with the feared Phantom's intense, internal anguish. The singer/performer has dyslexia, a medical glitch that he struggled with while growing up in Redlands, Calif.

      "I like to visit with school children when I'm on the road, doing seminars with teachers and helping dyslexic children cope with self-esteem," he said. "It's amazing the number of friends I've made — from elementary to high school kids. I really try to help them just as much as I possibly can, just getting through life.

      "One of the stories I tell the kids is about how I coped in class; like when the teacher would go up and down the rows and each pupil would take turns reading one paragraph out of a storybook. I would count the paragraphs and then I'd count the number of kids that would get to me, and then I'd memorize that one paragraph. I learned a lot of memorizing skills that way.

      "But, of course, the teacher would always stop and tell the girl sitting in front of me 'Go ahead and read the next paragraph' — and then I'd have to memorize the next paragraph even quicker! By then, I'd have no idea of what the story was even about, but I sure had my paragraph memorized," he said.

      The skills he picked up learning how to memorize have suited him well in his theater career.
      "Now, the most nightmarish time for me is the very first day of rehearsal, because they usually do what is called a 'table reading.' Everybody sits around a big table and we read through the entire show.

      "As far as auditions go, though, I always tell them I'm dyslexic and ask if it's OK if I take some time to study the lines. That's generally just a page or two," he said. "Once my lines are memorized, I'm just fine. It's simply an eye-to-brain miscommunication. My brain is perfectly normal and my eyes are perfectly normal, it's just whatever transfers the picture to the brain seems to be distorted a bit."

      Both Keegan and Little have performed the roles of Phantom in both of the major musical versions of the legendary story — Andrew Lloyd Webber's global hit and Maury Yeston and Arthur Kopit's "Phantom," which has been performed locally by Rodgers Memorial Theatre and Salt Lake Community College's Grand Theatre. The latter has been popular with regional and dinner theaters across the country.

      "The only similarity (in the two shows) is that you're dealing with one man's struggle with love and passion, knowing that he is being shunned because of his physical disability, but the music is not even close to the same and the whole process of the Phantom earning Christine Daae's love is different.

      "But the Phantom's inner struggle is the same, especially at the end. That's when I feel the inner pain I went through as a child and it tears me apart. I may sound absolutely nuts, but I'm up there on stage feeling sorry for the Phantom, thinking 'I know what this is like. I know the pain you're going through.' It doesn't happen every night, but there are times when it just lands that way. It's devastating, absolutely devastating. I'll come off the stage in tears and nobody will come up to me and I end up being very isolated, just like the character in the show."

      Little is just completing three months of vacation. He requested the time off "so I could get to know my wife again." While he was on the road with "Phantom of the Opera," his wife, Barbara McCulloh, was performing in "The King and I" and she's currently playing Mrs. Darling in the Broadway company of "Peter Pan."

      While the Phantom turns Christine into his "angel of music," Little says his wife is his "angel of books." She helps him learn his roles.

      Little's trip to Salt Lake City is not his first. When he was a student at Redlands High School (he wouldn't divulge how many years ago), his school choir came to Utah as part of a concert swing through Colorado and Arizona.

      At one time, Little considered attending Brigham Young University.
      "My girlfriend at the time was going there," he said. He was aware that BYU had an excellent theater department, but he ended up going elsewhere.

      Little said he probably began his stage career "well beyond my memory."
      His father was professor of theater at the University of Redlands and put him on stage when he was an infant.

      One of his father's former students, Jerry A. Wolf, is now wardrobe supervisor for the "Phantom of the Opera" touring company.
      "He knows me as the son of Paul and Joann Little," he said.

      • DEBUT CD: Little recently released a new CD, "Brad Little Unmasked," showcasing a medley of Broadway and off Broadway hits. For information regarding the recording, call 1-888-320-9123 or check out his Web site at www.bradlittle.com.

    The production of "The Phantom of the Opera" now exploding in the Capitol Theatre welcomes a new Opera Ghost for July. The tour's regular Phantom, Brad Little, returns after a few months off.
    Although not visibly tanned (what ghost should be?), Little gave a decidedly "rested and ready" performance Tuesday night. Any lay-off jitters were long gone.
    Little plays his role large -- he is a Phantom of rich voice and swooping gesture, the sort of spirit who could send shivers through every beam of Paris' grand Opera House. Plus, he looks great in a tux, even when topping it with the famous half-mask.
    That hidden handsomeness explains why Little played the heroic lover Raoul in the Broadway production of "Phantom." His height and broad shoulders make him a fair match with this show's Raoul, Richard Todd Adams.
    However, on Tuesday Raoul was played by understudy Ray Gabbard. It was no problem. Gabbard isn't as tall as Adams, but his Vicomte de Chagny is every bit as brave and lovesick. His clear-voiced singing paired nicely with that of Megan Starr-Levitt as Christine -- in another, less tortured romance, they would be called "a cute couple."
    Starr-Levitt performs in place of Rebecca Pitcher at matinees and other select shows, but she gives a full-price, prime-time quality performance. Her Christine is fresh and believable as a young woman who would accept instruction from a spooky unseen tutor, just because her dead father told her to.
    When she first comes forward onstage to sing "Think of Me," Starr-Levitt is appropriately tentative through the song, certainly not a shoo-in to unseat the strutting diva Carlotta (the wonderful Diane Jennings). Christine's voice fills out later, when she is less naive and more in love.
    Seeing the show more than once affords a chance to appreciate its subtle charms -- yes, "Phantom" can be subtle. The expensive effects are fun, and on a warm summer night the audience in front feels both the chill of the dry-ice fog and the heat of the flames. But, for pure entertainment, the chandelier plays fourth fiddle to the stars and the rest of the cast.
    Besides Jennings' opera singer, the tour boasts consistent performances by supporting players David Cryer, Ian Jon Bourg, Jennine Jones, Steven Stein-Grainger and Diana Gonzalez.
    And the kids really like the elephant.
 

THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, national touring production; Capitol Theatre, 50 W. 200 South. Continues Tuesdays-Fridays at 8 p.m., Saturdays at 2 & 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2 & 7 p.m. through July 31. All seats reserved. Tickets range from $26.50 to $72.50. For reservations, contact any ArtTix outlet. For group rates, call the Theater League of Utah at 355-2200. Running time: two and one-half hours (one intermission).

      There's a new Phantom lurking around the Capitol Theatre.
      Brad Little, who's played the title role in the national touring company of "The Phantom of the Opera" for the past 2 1/2 years, has just completed a three-month vacation and is rejoining the ensemble midway through its two-month Salt Lake City engagement.
      Little, who has a strong, wide-ranging voice and a commanding stage presence, brings an emotional depth to the role. He noted recently that his early struggle with dyslexia has helped him identify with the Phantom's being teased and tormented as a youth. Little's empathy for the character he's playing gives this production an added, very moving, dimension.
      (Ted Keegan, who was the Phantom during the first four weeks of the Utah run, has returned to the Broadway company, where he covers the role for selected performances.)
      Little was joined on Tuesday night by two performers who aren't normally "regulars" in this production — Megan Starr-Levitt as Paris Opera House ingenue Christine Daae (who is listed in the playbill as playing the role "at certain performances") and Ray Gabbard, a native of the Boise area, who is one of two understudies for the role of dashing, romantic Raoul.
      Gabbard, who has previously performed such roles as Matt in "The Fantasticks" and Huck Finn in "Big River," brings youthful exuberance to the role of Raoul, who rescues Christine from the clutches of her "angel of music" deep in the opera house's murky labyrinths. He also has a fine, well trained voice.
      Starr-Levitt, who's played Christine in both the Broadway and long-running San Francisco companies of "Phantom," is also perfectly cast as the mysterious Opera Ghost's pupil. Her youthful looks and exceptional, operatically trained voice, are just right for this role.
      Seeing Little this week (and Keegan last month) in the role of the Phantom makes one wonder how the anxious and highly vocal fans of Michael Crawford — the mega-hit musical's most popular star — can really be serious about attempting to promote Crawford for the role in the much-delayed movie version of the show.
      Sorry, but Crawford is just way too far over the hill to tackle the part, even on screen (where, perhaps, Warner Bros. could haul out the same soft-focus lenses they used for Lucille Ball in "Mame" several years ago). Unless WB is planning a geriatric version, they'd better stick to a younger, up-and-coming generation of talent.
      There's certainly plenty of exceptional talent on display in this national touring company.