In bel canto I trust

★Some old 1910's Phantom of the Opera illustrations!★

★Some 1925 Christine Daaé gifs!★

So I don’t have a full confirmation of this, but I think part of it is that I don’t think it’s a Leroux adaptation per se. I know Variety has referred to it as one, but I think that might be just assuming because it’s called The Phantom of the Opera that it’s adapted from Leroux, when the material put out so far seems to suggest it’s based on the urban legend at the Garnier itself irl about the ghost of a composer who had been both widowed and disfigured in the fire at the Salle le Peletier and lived his remaining years in mournful seclusion at the Garnier when it opened. The (literal) ghost’s lost love in that storyline was a ballerina. This is allegedly an earlier story that Leroux based his novel on, and it’s propagated enough that a children’s book at my job alludes to it:

Ohh, I’ve heard that urban legend too, but in a slightly different version.