Foyer of the Ballet

The Foyer of the Ballet is the social and ceremonial heart of the Paris Opera House in Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera, a place where the private anxieties of the corps de ballet and the public rituals of the opera's management intersect. It is the stage for the ghost's most audacious public appearances, the setting for the farewell gala's aftermath, and a space whose very architecture—its mirrors, its paintings, and its sloping floor—reflects the theatrical world that Erik haunts.

A Place of Reunion and Ritual

The Foyer of the Ballet is a place of reunion to which subscribers to three performances a week are admitted between the acts, a usage established in 1870. It is a space where the ladies of the ballet receive their admirers, and where they can practice their steps, for the floor has been given the same slope as that of the stage, so that the labor expended may be thoroughly profitable to the performance. Velvet-cushioned bars are secured at convenient points for this purpose. The room is lit by a chandelier with one hundred and seven burners, and its back wall is covered by three immense looking-glasses. The paintings include twenty oval medallions, in which are portrayed the twenty danseuses of most celebrity since the opera has existed in France, and four panels by M. Boulanger, typifying 'The War Dance', 'The Rustic Dance', 'The Dance of Love' and 'The Bacchic Dance.'

The Farewell Gala and the Ghost's Appearance

On the evening of the farewell gala performance given by MM. Debienne and Poligny, the Foyer of the Ballet is the setting for the ceremony marking their retirement. Sorelli waits for the arrival of the retiring managers with a glass of champagne in her hand and a little prepared speech at the tip of her tongue. Behind her, the members of the Corps de Ballet, young and old, discuss the events of the day in whispers or exchange discreet signals with their friends, a noisy crowd of whom surround the supper-tables arranged along the slanting floor. Most of the dancers wear their skirts of gossamer gauze, and all have thought it the right thing to put on a special face for the occasion. It is here that little Jammes, whose fifteen summers seem already to have forgotten the ghost and the death of Joseph Buquet, suddenly yells "The Opera ghost!" in a tone of unspeakable terror, pointing among the crowd of dandies to a face so pallid, so lugubrious and so ugly, with two such deep black cavities under the straddling eyebrows, that the death's head in question immediately scores a huge success. The ghost slips through the crowd and vanishes, while the others vainly hunt for him, and little Giry stands screaming like a peacock. Sorelli is furious, for she has not been able to finish her speech; the managers kiss her, thank her and run away as fast as the ghost himself.

The Count's Domain and the Ballet's Refuge

The Foyer of the Ballet is also a place where the Comte de Chagny is bound to show himself, as a true Parisian of his rank. It is here that Philippe Georges Marie Comte de Chagny, a bachelor with plenty of leisure, comes to spend an hour or two after dinner in the company of Sorelli, a dancer who has the finest eyes that ever were seen. It is in this foyer that the count is said to be "on terms" with Sorelli, and it is here that he often waits for her until it is her time to "go on," sometimes handed the little gaiters in which she runs down from her dressing-room to preserve the spotlessness of her satin dancing-shoes and her flesh-colored tights. After the ghost's appearance at the farewell gala, the ballet-girls, crowding around Sorelli like timid sheep around their shepherdess, make for the foyer through the ill-lit passages and staircases, trotting as fast as their little pink legs can carry them, seeking refuge in this familiar space.

The Foyer's Narrative Significance

The Foyer of the Ballet serves as a liminal space between the public auditorium and the private backstage world, a threshold where the supernatural intrudes upon the social. It is here that the ghost, who is usually heard but not seen, makes one of his few public appearances, and it is here that the superstitious fears of the ballet-girls are given voice. The room's mirrors, which reflect the dancers and their admirers, also seem to hold the potential for the kind of illusion that Erik masters, as when Christine Daae vanishes through a mirror in her dressing-room. The foyer's sloping floor, designed to mimic the stage, makes it a place where the boundary between performance and reality is always blurred, a fitting setting for the opera's central mystery.