One-on-One with Michael

The interviewer is Jill Rappaport, apparently a "One-on-One" interview from 1992.

JR: Did you ever think to yourself as a child that you could be doing the things you are today?

MC: No, I was very shy as a child. I used to have nightmares. I remember having a lot of nightmares when I was a child 'cause I was frightened to go to school. I, sort of...was bullied at school so that I didn't like...and I had unhappy experiences there. So, in a way, if you're put down a great deal in that way I suppose inside you have a fight that you want to prove that you can do something and you're worth something.

JR: Why were you bullied at school?

MC: I was fairly frail as a child and so that's a perfect perfect subject for a bully-someone who...they can just blow over. I sort of put up with it and didn't talk about it much and in that way I guess things were lonely a bit. I never lacked in love at home-ever. Uh...we didn't have much money but everything was...again, I didn't want for anything. I didn't have to wear sort of, tattered clothes or anything like that.

JR: You had a wonderfully supportive and loving mother.

MC: Yes. I had a lot of support...um...from my mother and my family. My mother died when I was 21 and so then I kind of shared my life with my grandmother. She had a lot of character, a lot of fight and always thought that I should sing. And, it was so obscure, it was as though she knew something I didn't. And that was really virtually the last thing she ever said to me. It was that "you've got to sing."

JR: The Phantom was truly extraordinary.

MC: Yes.

JR: And you just knew this was for you?

MC: Yes. That sounds sort of rather precocious in a way but I felt it was going to be me and I felt the character approach me and I/we came together as one. It really did feel like that, I suppose. I loved him. I loved him and still do love the character.

JR: Tell me what happened the minute you heard the beginning of the music.

MC: I suppose it happens even as I talk about him that I suddenly...my face changes. I seen it in interviews and I suddenly become this...there's a strength, there's an inner strength this man has and the music told me what to do. It made me sit up straight. It made me become a more elegant man because I was no longer Michael. I was...the Phantom and it's an occasion. It is THIS occasion. This is the night. This is the performance.

JR: But, have you ever suffered stage fright?

MC: Every night! Every night I'm scared stiff before I go out there because you gotta remember every line. It's quite mind blowing. The responsibility is great and the excitement every night is great.

JR: You talk about this emotional moment during your performance when you have to kiss the leading lady.

MC: It is the sort of highlight of...he has never been touched. He's never been held. His mother...one feels he had rejection from his own mother as a child. His...a mask was his first piece of clothing that he ever wore, was his mother covering his face up. So from his earliest memory in life was it...And for the first time someone touches him and kisses him and everything...all the passion that has built up throughout what we create in the evening through the music and through the movement, through the story line. As she kisses him I treated it as though it was an orgasm and the whole body just shook. Mainly this right arm against his body was this suffering-it came out as this joyous feeling. She fulfilled him in every way just by this 1 kiss.

JR: And you wonder why you become a sex symbol?

MC: (laughs) Well...yes because I mean, I am not standing up there trying to be a...um... a kind of sensual being. There was more to it than that. I mean...you did feel for the man as well-you cried for him and felt his pain, his anguish and his suffering at the end. So, I think that was just a side issue.

JR: Do you see yourself as a sexy guy?

MC: No, no. I hope I have a sensuality and I hope that I am sexual. That's part of my life. I've been in love and I hope I'll be in love again.

JR: Well, you were married once and it really ended quite abruptly and it was painful for you wasn't it?

MC: Yes, I think divorce is never a sort of joyful experience for anyone. It tends to make you very...you think very carefully before doing it again. So that way I'm very cautious.

JR: What happened? Was it because you were so busy working and trying to get your career off the ground?

MC: No, I don't think there's a sort of answer to anything like that...as to how a relationship goes wrong. It wasn't very obvious...that I started hitting her or she started hitting me or I was working too hard. I mean, it's a combination of a few things...um...It can be a slow realization that you haven't been doing the right thing by each other that lets a relationship falter.

JR: Do you have any regrets about that? About your relationship with your ex-wife?

MC: Um. I can't really say that I would say I'd like my life all over again. I think I've been given this life to live as best I can and I'm doing the best I can. Look at all the wonderful things that have happened in the last 3 1/2 years with Phantom. It's something that not even in my wildest dreams could I have imagined that would happen. I am very, very lucky. Very fortunate. Very fortunate.

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