A hit, a palpable hit!
Apr. 23rd, 2006 10:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bironicBest. Weekend. Ever.
Well, a very, very good weekend, anyway, and one which seems that much more wonderful when compared to the stress of life lately.
Why, you ask? Let us see.
I. In which she awakes one morning to find herself famous.
Okay, far from famous, but Friday night and Saturday morning I got some of the sweetest, most insightful and encouraging feedback for "Dissonance," plus recs in two communities (!!) -- so much more than I was hoping for. It completely eclipsed the final-days' frustration of writing that story as well as all the RL stuff that's been going on. Heartfelt thank-you's all around.
As far as the ficathon goes, less than half of the entrants have posted their stories even though the deadline was Thursday. (I don't know where the rest are; it's like they're in school with exams to take or something.) I wanted to wait until everyone had posted before sharing recs, but who knows when that might be, so here are my favorites at the moment, in the order in which they appear on the list:
- "After Hours" by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
thewlisian_afer: A nurse stumbles across House and Cuddy arguing in the clinic one night. Good dialogue, good characterization, and an original character who isn't intrusive or annoying.
- "the slowly ascending curve of dating" byzauberer_sirin: Never thought I'd like Foreman/Cameron, but once again, good writing conquers all. Very nice, spare piece full of quiet, quotable lines and great Foreman characterization.
- "Love Struck Romeo" byijemanja: A sweet story in which an increasingly intoxicated Cuddy consoles a very drunk Wilson at a bar while they wait for House to come take him home. Don't judge it by the summary.
Found some outstanding stories while skipping along f-lists and community posts. As I dip into this wonderful world of House fanfic I'll be adding more recs to My Memories.
Also, everyone who is remotely interested in House/Wilson—whether you watch the show or not—should check outpun's H/W essay, "Sometimes You Get What You Need," over at ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
ship_manifesto. Very thorough, well-organized, persuasive and funny explanation of why slashers slash 'em. I think the only thing it doesn't mention is the blatant eye sex smoldering glances eerie facility those two have with nonverbal communication.
II. In which RSL and his forearms perform Shakespeare eight feet away.
Todaymichelle_nine and I braved the downpour, met at the Met (ha ha) for the Hatshepsut exhibit—unimpressive, frankly—and then took a stupid number of subways to get across town to Symphony Space for the first-annual Shakespeare Marathon in honor of the Bard's 442nd birthday. It was scheduled to start at 3:30, free of charge, no tickets, with a host of minor celebrities set to perform, so we planned to arrive fairly early and wait, rain or shine. As it happened, we got there at about 1:00 and there were less than a dozen people in line. This, friends, is just one difference between Harry Potter fangirling and Shakespeare fangirling.
Since we clearly had the time, we ate a leisurely lunch at a diner across the street and then got in the slightly longer line at Symphony Space. The rain had, thankfully, stopped. We were maybe 40 people from the front and wondered whether that meant we would get seats; when Michelle called the theater last week, they told her we had little chance of seeing well since Society members had precedence. I hoped we would be able to seeRobert Sean Leonard everyone without squinting from where we sat; she hoped we would be sitting, period.
Imagine our surprise, then, when at 3:15—the line now stretching down the avenue—they let us in and we found that not only was the theater mostly empty with just two rows in the middle reserved, but also that people were filling in the middle and sides while leaving some spots open in the front. After confirming that we could indeed go as far forward as we pleased, we sauntered down, stumbled over the people in the aisle seats, and sat in SECOND ROW CENTER.
The program was divided into four hours, each with a host, a commentator, a group of NYC public schoolchildren, and several small casts of actors doing various scenes. RSL was set for the end of the first hour. It began (on time) with the obligatory introduction from the Society's co-founders and a letter from the Mayor, then a beautiful song whose name along with the singer's name I unfortunately didn't catch, before hostess Marian Seldes arrived to welcome us all, crack a joke about how the rain it raineth every day, wish Will a happy birthday, and introduce commentator... *checks program* Majorie Garber. The author of Shakespeare After All, Garber spoke about unorthodox female roles as seen with Troilus and Cressida, Antony and Cleopatra, and Romeo and Juliet, interspersing her talk with three sets of actors reading scenes from those plays (R&J II ii, T&C III ii and A&C I iii, if you're curious) to illustrate her points. The actors, in nice clothes not costumes, read at microphones from binders. Some had more memorized than others. Juliet (Marsha Stephanie Blake) and Cleopatra (Elizabeth Marvel) were fantastic, but the bit from Troilus and Cressida fell flat; David Townsend as Troilus kept fumbling his lines, and John Rothman was an awkward Pandarus. Or maybe it was because I've never read that play.
Then the students of PS 118 came out to do the first scene of A Midsummer Night's Dream, which was hilarious. First of all, the kids were adorable. Imagine a bunch of inner-city sixth-graders in homemade costumes: fairies with blue wings and white tights or socks, Theseus with a yellow cape, Titania with a wreath of flowers in her hair, Helena (I think) with bleached bangs braided and tied back. Now imagine them spouting rapid-fire Elizabethan English at each other with Hispanic, Bronx and Indian accents, in itself presenting a new interpretation of the play, and Demetrius and Lysander getting into a fistfight/wrestling match over their fiancées that Theseus had to break up. (There was also the nervous/excited ?Demetrius rushing in a monotone [if earnestly] through "The course of true love never did run smooth.") Now add a girl walking across stage between scenes with a sign that says "Meanwhile… In the forest." And then transform Titania's fairies into a posse of girls backing up their clique leader, snapping and crossing their arms and doing talk-to-the-hand whenever the queen, one hand on her hip, tells off Oberon. There are no words. The audience was in stitches.
We also had opera singers. David Townsend and Marsha Stephanie Blake reappeared to do the pilgrims' hands/lips scene from Romeo and Juliet, and then a pair of opera singers did Gounod's version of the same, to live piano accompaniment. It was really lovely. Like being back at school again and having easy access to these special comparative and/or expository performances.
And then, at last, it was RSL's turn. We were treated to Shakespeare Society artist-in-residence Joe Plummer (reminiscent of Alan Cumming, only prettier) as Poins, RSL as Prince Hal, Philip Bosco as Falstaff, and David Townsend and Marsha Stephanie Blake as Peto and the hostess, respectively, doing Henry IV Part I II iv: At the tavern, Falstaff spins his tale of escaping dozens of thieves (not knowing it was Hal and buddies); Hal calls him on his lie; and Falstaff and Hal roleplay as King and Heir Apparent. If you don't know the play, you can read the scene here, starting with Poins' "Welcome, Jack: where hast thou been?" straight through to "I do. I will." (Only without Bardolph and Gadshill, and with various other small amendments.) It's alternately hilarious and poignant, just the way we like it.
As you might gather from the length of that excerpt, they read for a marvelously long time, long enough even for me to drink my fill of Robert Sean Leonard standing eight feet away looking so very hot and reading Shakespeare. *ahem* He didn't look as dorky as he did at that Academy of Television Arts & Sciences panel they webcast from California last Monday, and he further didn't have the handicap of having to answer questions on the fly or for that matter say anything that wasn't scripted; in other words, perfect. He had his glasses today, his hair dry and ruffled-looking like it was at the end of "Sex Kills," wore a gray-green silky-looking shirt with the top buttoned (but a little triangle of neck visible) and sleeves rolled to the elbows—oh,elynross, did I think of you—a silver watch, belted brown pants and dark brown dress shoes. We were so close I could see the stubble along the bottom of his jaw when he turned toward Falstaff and tilted his head up slightly. H-o-t. I'm sure there will be pictures for all you unfortunates who couldn't be there.
He was poised and seemed comfortable. He was the only one who didn't fiddle with his stand or book, for instance, except for flipping pages, and a few times pushing up his glasses or tugging at his pants (I don't wanna know); kept his hands loose at his sides, or in his pockets, or in a few memorable moments behind his head as he laughed through the insult wars with Falstaff. Oh man, neither of them could keep straight faces for that. RSL's eventually went red and he had that dopey grin and buried his hands in his hair. Here, for those of you who don't know the play and are too lazy to click that link ;), read this and imagine what it was like:
So, yes. The scene started with a soliloquy from Hal that I can't seem to locate, though I recognized it, warning us that he is about to play antagonist; must've been transplanted from later in the play. RSL was excellent, as was Philip Bosco. No egos there, just good, clear, funny reading. I can't say how RSL compared to Matthew Macfayden, whommusicisbelievng and I saw at the National Theatre last year with Michael Gambon as Falstaff (and David "Filch" Bradley as Henry IV), since everyone was reading from the scriptbooks at microphones instead of watching and interacting with each other. The name-calling and increasingly preposterous lies were audience favorites. Standout lines for RSL include:
- His faux-concerned "What's the matter?" as Falstaff prevaricates about losing the thousand pounds;
- "He'll have more anon" to Poins when Falstaff embellishes his story by adding more and more attackers, a line which sadly got laughed over and I think lost to most people;
- "How long is't ago, Jack, since thou sawest thine own knee?" which also didn't get the reaction it should have;
- Deepening his voice when caricaturing his father—"Now, Harry, whence came you? … The complaints I hear of thee are grievous";
- His switch from teasing to attacking while describing Falstaff from "his father's" perspective; and
- His final, solemn, "I do. I will."
Sigh.
The first "hour" ended up lasting 100 minutes, and, having got a representative sampling of the entire program and having seenwhom what we came for, we left when the second hour's host announced that there wouldn't be any intermissions, that we were free to go at any time and that there were people outside who would be glad to have our seats. Sure enough, we saw at least a hundred people on line on the sidewalk when we stepped out. I hope they got in to enjoy the rest of what was surely a more-than-four-hour performance.
Have one more point to make about Hal/Wilson and Falstaff/House parallels noticed by virtue of RSL having played both parts, but it's late now. Tomorrow perhaps.
ETA: I've posted it over here.
ETA 2: Some lovely soul on the TWOP forum posted the soliloquy I couldn't place. Shades of Puck, indeed! "I'll so offend, to make offense a skill."
ETA 3: Photos available, finally! Shoddy quality but better than nothing.
From shakespearesociety.org.
Well, a very, very good weekend, anyway, and one which seems that much more wonderful when compared to the stress of life lately.
Why, you ask? Let us see.
I. In which she awakes one morning to find herself famous.
Okay, far from famous, but Friday night and Saturday morning I got some of the sweetest, most insightful and encouraging feedback for "Dissonance," plus recs in two communities (!!) -- so much more than I was hoping for. It completely eclipsed the final-days' frustration of writing that story as well as all the RL stuff that's been going on. Heartfelt thank-you's all around.
As far as the ficathon goes, less than half of the entrants have posted their stories even though the deadline was Thursday. (I don't know where the rest are; it's like they're in school with exams to take or something.) I wanted to wait until everyone had posted before sharing recs, but who knows when that might be, so here are my favorites at the moment, in the order in which they appear on the list:
- "After Hours" by
thewlisian_afer: A nurse stumbles across House and Cuddy arguing in the clinic one night. Good dialogue, good characterization, and an original character who isn't intrusive or annoying.- "the slowly ascending curve of dating" by
zauberer_sirin: Never thought I'd like Foreman/Cameron, but once again, good writing conquers all. Very nice, spare piece full of quiet, quotable lines and great Foreman characterization.- "Love Struck Romeo" by
ijemanja: A sweet story in which an increasingly intoxicated Cuddy consoles a very drunk Wilson at a bar while they wait for House to come take him home. Don't judge it by the summary.Found some outstanding stories while skipping along f-lists and community posts. As I dip into this wonderful world of House fanfic I'll be adding more recs to My Memories.
Also, everyone who is remotely interested in House/Wilson—whether you watch the show or not—should check out
pun's H/W essay, "Sometimes You Get What You Need," over at ship_manifesto. Very thorough, well-organized, persuasive and funny explanation of why slashers slash 'em. I think the only thing it doesn't mention is the II. In which RSL and his forearms perform Shakespeare eight feet away.
Today
michelle_nine and I braved the downpour, met at the Met (ha ha) for the Hatshepsut exhibit—unimpressive, frankly—and then took a stupid number of subways to get across town to Symphony Space for the first-annual Shakespeare Marathon in honor of the Bard's 442nd birthday. It was scheduled to start at 3:30, free of charge, no tickets, with a host of minor celebrities set to perform, so we planned to arrive fairly early and wait, rain or shine. As it happened, we got there at about 1:00 and there were less than a dozen people in line. This, friends, is just one difference between Harry Potter fangirling and Shakespeare fangirling.Since we clearly had the time, we ate a leisurely lunch at a diner across the street and then got in the slightly longer line at Symphony Space. The rain had, thankfully, stopped. We were maybe 40 people from the front and wondered whether that meant we would get seats; when Michelle called the theater last week, they told her we had little chance of seeing well since Society members had precedence. I hoped we would be able to see
Imagine our surprise, then, when at 3:15—the line now stretching down the avenue—they let us in and we found that not only was the theater mostly empty with just two rows in the middle reserved, but also that people were filling in the middle and sides while leaving some spots open in the front. After confirming that we could indeed go as far forward as we pleased, we sauntered down, stumbled over the people in the aisle seats, and sat in SECOND ROW CENTER.
The program was divided into four hours, each with a host, a commentator, a group of NYC public schoolchildren, and several small casts of actors doing various scenes. RSL was set for the end of the first hour. It began (on time) with the obligatory introduction from the Society's co-founders and a letter from the Mayor, then a beautiful song whose name along with the singer's name I unfortunately didn't catch, before hostess Marian Seldes arrived to welcome us all, crack a joke about how the rain it raineth every day, wish Will a happy birthday, and introduce commentator... *checks program* Majorie Garber. The author of Shakespeare After All, Garber spoke about unorthodox female roles as seen with Troilus and Cressida, Antony and Cleopatra, and Romeo and Juliet, interspersing her talk with three sets of actors reading scenes from those plays (R&J II ii, T&C III ii and A&C I iii, if you're curious) to illustrate her points. The actors, in nice clothes not costumes, read at microphones from binders. Some had more memorized than others. Juliet (Marsha Stephanie Blake) and Cleopatra (Elizabeth Marvel) were fantastic, but the bit from Troilus and Cressida fell flat; David Townsend as Troilus kept fumbling his lines, and John Rothman was an awkward Pandarus. Or maybe it was because I've never read that play.
Then the students of PS 118 came out to do the first scene of A Midsummer Night's Dream, which was hilarious. First of all, the kids were adorable. Imagine a bunch of inner-city sixth-graders in homemade costumes: fairies with blue wings and white tights or socks, Theseus with a yellow cape, Titania with a wreath of flowers in her hair, Helena (I think) with bleached bangs braided and tied back. Now imagine them spouting rapid-fire Elizabethan English at each other with Hispanic, Bronx and Indian accents, in itself presenting a new interpretation of the play, and Demetrius and Lysander getting into a fistfight/wrestling match over their fiancées that Theseus had to break up. (There was also the nervous/excited ?Demetrius rushing in a monotone [if earnestly] through "The course of true love never did run smooth.") Now add a girl walking across stage between scenes with a sign that says "Meanwhile… In the forest." And then transform Titania's fairies into a posse of girls backing up their clique leader, snapping and crossing their arms and doing talk-to-the-hand whenever the queen, one hand on her hip, tells off Oberon. There are no words. The audience was in stitches.
We also had opera singers. David Townsend and Marsha Stephanie Blake reappeared to do the pilgrims' hands/lips scene from Romeo and Juliet, and then a pair of opera singers did Gounod's version of the same, to live piano accompaniment. It was really lovely. Like being back at school again and having easy access to these special comparative and/or expository performances.
And then, at last, it was RSL's turn. We were treated to Shakespeare Society artist-in-residence Joe Plummer (reminiscent of Alan Cumming, only prettier) as Poins, RSL as Prince Hal, Philip Bosco as Falstaff, and David Townsend and Marsha Stephanie Blake as Peto and the hostess, respectively, doing Henry IV Part I II iv: At the tavern, Falstaff spins his tale of escaping dozens of thieves (not knowing it was Hal and buddies); Hal calls him on his lie; and Falstaff and Hal roleplay as King and Heir Apparent. If you don't know the play, you can read the scene here, starting with Poins' "Welcome, Jack: where hast thou been?" straight through to "I do. I will." (Only without Bardolph and Gadshill, and with various other small amendments.) It's alternately hilarious and poignant, just the way we like it.
As you might gather from the length of that excerpt, they read for a marvelously long time, long enough even for me to drink my fill of Robert Sean Leonard standing eight feet away looking so very hot and reading Shakespeare. *ahem* He didn't look as dorky as he did at that Academy of Television Arts & Sciences panel they webcast from California last Monday, and he further didn't have the handicap of having to answer questions on the fly or for that matter say anything that wasn't scripted; in other words, perfect. He had his glasses today, his hair dry and ruffled-looking like it was at the end of "Sex Kills," wore a gray-green silky-looking shirt with the top buttoned (but a little triangle of neck visible) and sleeves rolled to the elbows—oh,
elynross, did I think of you—a silver watch, belted brown pants and dark brown dress shoes. We were so close I could see the stubble along the bottom of his jaw when he turned toward Falstaff and tilted his head up slightly. H-o-t. I'm sure there will be pictures for all you unfortunates who couldn't be there. He was poised and seemed comfortable. He was the only one who didn't fiddle with his stand or book, for instance, except for flipping pages, and a few times pushing up his glasses or tugging at his pants (I don't wanna know); kept his hands loose at his sides, or in his pockets, or in a few memorable moments behind his head as he laughed through the insult wars with Falstaff. Oh man, neither of them could keep straight faces for that. RSL's eventually went red and he had that dopey grin and buried his hands in his hair. Here, for those of you who don't know the play and are too lazy to click that link ;), read this and imagine what it was like:
PRINCE HENRYYeah. Lots of laughing all around. He smiled a lot today. [/squee]
I'll be no longer guilty of this sin; this sanguine
coward, this bed-presser, this horseback-breaker,
this huge hill of flesh,--
FALSTAFF
'Sblood, you starveling, you elf-skin, you dried
neat's tongue, you bull's pizzle, you stock-fish! O
for breath to utter what is like thee! you
tailor's-yard, you sheath, you bowcase; you vile
standing-tuck,--
PRINCE HENRY
Well, breathe awhile, and then to it again…
So, yes. The scene started with a soliloquy from Hal that I can't seem to locate, though I recognized it, warning us that he is about to play antagonist; must've been transplanted from later in the play. RSL was excellent, as was Philip Bosco. No egos there, just good, clear, funny reading. I can't say how RSL compared to Matthew Macfayden, whom
musicisbelievng and I saw at the National Theatre last year with Michael Gambon as Falstaff (and David "Filch" Bradley as Henry IV), since everyone was reading from the scriptbooks at microphones instead of watching and interacting with each other. The name-calling and increasingly preposterous lies were audience favorites. Standout lines for RSL include:- His faux-concerned "What's the matter?" as Falstaff prevaricates about losing the thousand pounds;
- "He'll have more anon" to Poins when Falstaff embellishes his story by adding more and more attackers, a line which sadly got laughed over and I think lost to most people;
- "How long is't ago, Jack, since thou sawest thine own knee?" which also didn't get the reaction it should have;
- Deepening his voice when caricaturing his father—"Now, Harry, whence came you? … The complaints I hear of thee are grievous";
- His switch from teasing to attacking while describing Falstaff from "his father's" perspective; and
- His final, solemn, "I do. I will."
Sigh.
The first "hour" ended up lasting 100 minutes, and, having got a representative sampling of the entire program and having seen
Have one more point to make about Hal/Wilson and Falstaff/House parallels noticed by virtue of RSL having played both parts, but it's late now. Tomorrow perhaps.
ETA: I've posted it over here.
ETA 2: Some lovely soul on the TWOP forum posted the soliloquy I couldn't place. Shades of Puck, indeed! "I'll so offend, to make offense a skill."
ETA 3: Photos available, finally! Shoddy quality but better than nothing.
From shakespearesociety.org.
no subject
Date: Jul. 25th, 2006 12:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: Jul. 25th, 2006 02:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: Jul. 25th, 2006 04:37 am (UTC)Eh? Your morning? My morning? Or was that just an "I worked it out" comment, in which case I will nod in agreement. I am often on around GMT 1300 (9pm) as well but usually only for half an hour or so unless something interesting comes up :)
no subject
Date: Jul. 26th, 2006 03:07 am (UTC)