In August, “Phantom” producers announced they had cast the first-ever Black actor to play Christine since the show opened on Broadway in 1988. Within a few weeks of the show going dark, COVID-19 had claimed the life of a beloved dresser, Jennifer Arnold, who had been with the show for more than three decades.Īfter protests filled United States streets last year in outrage at the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white police officer, newly unemployed Broadway workers pushed the industry to make overdue changes to increase racial diversity in theater companies. Reuters watched as the “Phantom” company prepared for its return. Their return this fall is viewed as a test of the city’s efforts to restore some new sense of normalcy. Now, after an unprecedented shutdown, the theaters are among the last workplaces to reopen. Word of the abrupt shuttering came during a “Phantom” matinee at the Majestic Theatre on March 12, 2020, as some cast and crew themselves were falling sick.
The crowded Broadway theaters, vital to the city’s tourism industry, were the first places closed by the New York government as the coronavirus began to ravage the state.
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