Madame Giry's Tale

(The whole thing is spoken)

(GIRY is hurrying across. RAOUL appears and calls after her)

RAOUL

Madame Giry, wait. . .

GIRY

Please, Monsieur - I know no more than
anyone else.

RAOUL

That's not true.

GIRY (uneasily)

Please, Monsieur, don't ask, there have been too many accidents . . .

RAOUL (ironical)

Accidents?! (She moves off again. He stops her) (desperately) Please, Madame Giry, for all our sakes . . .

GIRY (She has glanced nervously about her and suddenly deciding to trust him, cuts in)

Very well. It was years ago. There was a traveling
fair in the city. The gypsies. I was very young, studying to be a ballerina. One of many living in the dormitories of the opera house.
(There is a flashback of when Madame Giry is still very young and at the traveling fair)

(The traveling circus)

(Young Madame Giry's school is taking a fieldtrip to a traveling circus)

Scary woman: See the wonder from the East!

Cruel man. Come. Come. Come inside. Come and see The Devil's Child.

(They all see Young Erik with a sack over his head, chained in a cage of straw. He is making a stuffed monkey playing the cymbals like the one on the musical box)

(All the children except for Young Madame Giry laugh at Young Erik)

Cruel man. (Beats Erik with a stick) You damn demon! (Beats) Villain! (Beats) Ne'er do-well! (Beats) Libertine! (Beats) Dangerous! (Beats) Hideous! (Beats) Monstrous! (Beats) BEAST! (Beats very hard)
(Young Erik groans in pain on the straw. Young Madame Giry looks sadly at Young Erik)
Cruel Man. Behold, Mesdames and messieurs, the Devil's Child! (He takes the sack off Young Erik's head, pulls the hair)

(All the kids except Young Madame Giry laugh at him)

(Erik slowly puts the sack back on. When all the children break free, the cruel man begins to count his money coins)

(Young Erik suddenly breaks free, grabs a rope and the chains he was chained too and strangles the cruel man)

(Erik grabs his stuff monkey and takes Young Madame Giry's hand and they run out of the traveling circus)

Man: Murder!

Policeman: Which way?!
Man: That way! That way!
Policeman: He's getting away!

(Young Madame Giry and Young Erik run all the way to a window of the Opera House)

(Young Madame Giry puts Erik in the window)

(The Opera House)
GIRY: (Narrating the story) I hid him from the world, and its cruelties.
(Young Madame Giry enters from another part of the room, Young Erik runs to her and she hides him)

Young Giry. If you stay in here, you are safe.

Young Erik. Thank you so much, young lady.

(It goes back to the real times)

GIRY: He has known nothing else of life since then except this opera house. I called him Erik. It was his playground and now his artistic domain, he's a genius. He's an architect and designer, he'scomposer and amagician. A genius, Monsieur!

ROUL: But clearly, Madame Giry, genius has turned to madness.