It is unlikely that Gaston Leroux's novel The Phantom of the Opera would be read today if it were not for the ways that other artists have adapted it to visual media. When Leroux's story first appeared as a newspaper serial in 1909, it was popular enough to be carried in papers in France, Great Britain, and the United States, but the subsequent release as a novel was only modestly successful. It was considered just another thrill story by a competent writer who churned out entertainment stories for a living. The book fell out of print quickly. In 1925, however, while looking for a film vehicle to match the success that he had just had with Lon Chaney in The Hunchback of Notre Dame, film producer Carl Laemmle purchased the rights to The Phantom of the Opera. The film took great liberties with Leroux's story, but it was...