Meghan Picerno - Tumblr Posts

Geez, I hate their mentioning of the 'racially ambiguous' mirror bride. She's supposed to be like Christine? Like she's a replica of Christine that Erik made from his obsession. She should be somewhat resemble the real Christines no matter what their skin tone might be. Can't they just make another props and masks for the actresses to cover in or easier, cast more black actresses?

Aside from that, great article! Love them girls sm (Just not the changes of mirror bride)

“Picerno drew a scarf through her fingers as she danced and sang “Think of Me” in her bell-like soprano. Off in a corner of the studio, Emilie Kouatchou silently followed Picerno’s every move. Kouatchou, the daughter of Cameroonian immigrants, grew up in the Chicago suburbs. “Phantom” was the first Broadway production she ever saw, on a trip to New York with her high school. Christine captured her spirit. 

“I could sing that role in my sleep,” she recalls thinking. Still, she worried about stereotyping, that others might spot a mismatch between her voice, an operatic soprano, and her appearance, which was not the sort of “petite white girl” who seemed to always get cast as ingnue or heroine in TV.  “I didn’t feel like I had a place in musical theater because I didn"t see anyone who looked like me or sang like myself,” she said.

“Christine, are you alright?” a frightened ballet dancer turns to the heroine as the Phantom begins to reveal his terrifying presence in Act One.Before the epidemic and Kouatchou’s casting, the lyric had always been: “Your face, Christine, it’s white!”

The old, creepy Christine doll that stood in the Phantom’s lair, her features unmistakably white, also was out. On reopening night, a new doll, designed to be racially ambiguous, would be introduced.

Kouatchou had her first look at one of the new Christine wigs, which were created to match her hair texture, later that week. Kouatchou said, “It’s curlier and frizzier and I love it.”

( from here )