We went to see the famous play by Andrew Lloyd Webber, The Phantom of the Opera, at the Paramount Theater this past Friday, opening weekend. The Phantom of the Opera is the longest running Broadway musical in history. I saw the play before at the Bass Hall in 1995 for my 13th birthday and I remember liking it a lot, so I was excited to see it again. We left an hour early so we would have plenty of time to get there and look around the old theater. We walked just over half a mile to the theater (which is really cool by the way, no parking hassles), and I bought a program. We had purchased the cheapest seats possible in the upper level since the ones on the main floor were $70 each.

Anyway, we walked in the theater and had our tickets scanned. As we were about to go up the stairs to our seats, an usher stopped us and asked to look at our tickets. He told us to wait there and he ran off with our tickets for some reason. I was a little irritated and didn't understand why this usher would stop us. He came back with another man and said that our tickets weren't valid. At that point I was angry because I didn't know why our tickets wouldn't be valid and I really wanted to see the play that we paid to go to. The other man introduced himself as an associate for Broadway for America and said that Wells Fargo had purchased some seats to give away. Then he handed us new tickets - two front row seats in the lower level, right up to the stage. I was shocked! He also gave us some goodie bags that had a Wells Fargo coffee mug with some Ghirardelli hot chocolate and raspberry chocolate coffee, a stuffed animal Wells Fargo horse, and some book about owning a home. I felt kinda bad for being irritated initially after I realized what was happening. Two front row seats to Phantom of the Opera! Wow!

So, we went inside and sat down in our seats right up at the stage. I just couldn't get over how crazy it was that we had gotten a free seat upgrade. The theater itself looked really cool inside and had lots of ornate old sculptures on the walls and chandeliers in the foyer. A few people came up to us and asked us how we got our seats. The start of the play was exciting because a chandelier prop in the play rises up from the stage to the ceiling, which was right in front of and above us. During the intermission, the usher that had stopped us initially came by to talk to us. He said that he's been picking people for a while now and he was looking for some "down to Earth" people to give the seats to. He also said that this was the only performance during the month-long tour of Phantom of the Opera in Seattle that they would be doing this seat upgrade for and only two seats were being given away. So, we were incredibly lucky. We just happened to pick Friday night to go to and we just happened to leave at a certain time and walk past the right usher.

The play itself was awesome, just how I remember it and I had a really great time. It was awesome being able to see all the actors' faces and expressions so close. I love the Phantom of the Opera and can't wait to see it again someday, perhaps on Broadway.