stuff and nonsense

a bit of this and that and sometimes the other if I feel like it

[multismusa-deactivated20170218]

What she says: I’m fine.

What she means: I understand the Chronicles of Narnia was at its heart a fairytale with theological analogies for children. But why did Lewis never address how they had to adapted to life on Earth again. Why does no one talk about how the Pevensies had to grow up with a kingdom of responsibilities on their shoulders, only to return to Earth and be children. Take Lucy, she was youngest and perhaps she adapted more quickly-but she had the memories and mind of a grown woman in an adolescent body. Edmund literally found himself in Narnia, he went from a selfish boy to mature and experienced man. He found a purpose and identity through his experiences to come back as just Edmund, Peter’s younger brother. Did people wonder why the sullen, sour boy came back, carrying himself like a wisened king? Did his mother wonder why he and Peter suddenly got along so well, why they spent so much time together now? And Susan, the girl of logistics and reason came back with a difference in her. She learned how to be a diplomat and ambassador, Susan the Gentle had to live to endure not-so-gentle circumstances. She had the respect she wanted, only to be just another teen girl. And Peter, he entered the manhood and maturity he so wanted. He earned the responsibility and stripes he yearned for. He learned to command armies and conduct the menial tasks demanded of a king to rule a nation. But he came back, appearing to be just anther glory-hungry boy. Not to mention the PTSD they must have struggled with. Especially Edmund. How often did he wake up in a sweat, screaming a sibling or comrade’s name? His parents believe it’s the war, but it’s an entirely different one he has nightmares about. How often did he have trouble with flashbacks and mood swings? And how many times did he and Peter sit over a newspaper or near the radio listening to reports on the troops. How often did they pour over lost battles and debate better strategies. Did their parents ever wonder why they seemed to understand flight war so well? How long was it before they stopped discussing these things in front of people? Why does no one talk about this??? 

[cocoartistwrites]

Why am i fucking crying

[limblogs]

Why does no one talk about how the Pevensies had to grow up with a kingdom of responsibilities on their shoulders, only to return to Earth and be children

It’s not addressed because it’s understood. It was the shared experience of the generation. You are describing coming home from World War One, battle wearied and aged beyond belief, but walking around in the body of a youth. C S Lewis went to the front line of the Somme on his nineteenth birthday and went back to complete uni in 1918 after demob.

[saxifraga-x-urbium]

Not seen it with this very very pertinent addition before

[darksideofthecurtain]

Never blame a technician. This guy got murdered. He gets chipmunked and everything.

[q2qcomics-deactivated20200929]

Wow. I’m so appalled by this. I’m fuming right now.

That he was on the air with video and audio working means that whatever technician he was dragging on air succeeded in fixing whatever was wrong.

It’s an awful reality that technicians in the enetertainment industry will all work with an asshole like this at some point who doesn’t understand or respect what we do. Good on everyone else for immediately getting on him for it and not letting him get away with it.

And it should be up to that guy to apologize to his coworkers. It’s a nice gesture for everyone else to offer to get the crew gifts, but it absolutely is not the responsibility of anyone else on that panel to make amends or reparations.

[lbibliophile]

Just like Slughorn, Albus Dumbledore collects people. Only, instead of focusing on those with influence, he looks to the outcasts.

The expelled half-giant. The young werewolf. The repentant Death Eater.

He protects them and gives them a second chance. All he asks in return is their loyalty.

And, if on occasion he requests that they undertake a certain task, invoking their debt of gratitude - well, that is no more than he is owed.

He once thought to add a certain disowned Black to his collection, but quickly realised his mistake.

Sirius is not an outcast, but a rebel. He knowingly chose his path, and chooses what price he is willing to pay for it. He refuses to be used.

So Albus Dumbledore abandons him.

[wizardtowizard-blog]

Who gave you the RIGHT?

[bonnini]

Dumbledore knows Sirius’s loyalty lies with Harry instead of him, and he has no use for someone who is not willing to follow his orders without question. 

[marauders4evr]

Ooooohoo if there’s ever a post that fits my aesthetic…

[not-a-bit-good]

okay but then where does Harry himself fit into this collection? Is he an outcast because he is “the Boy Who Lived”?

[marauders4evr]

Nooonono, my friend, that’s what makes this post so beautiful. Because it fits the meta I’ve been trying to get people to accept for years. 

Harry was an outcast due to a childhood filled with abuse and neglect. 

Vernon made him an outcast by dismissing his claims of magic, berating him, locking him in a CLOSET and putting bars on his window, and let’s face it, even though her editor made her cut it out, Jo intended for there to be physical abuse. 

Petunia made him an outcast by enabling and contributing to this abuse, as well as making Harry do dozens of chores while doting on Dudley. 

Dudley made him an outcast by bullying him and threatening any students at school who wanted to be his friends. 

And the rest of the wizarding world made him an outcast when they bullied him for being an outsider.

Harry James Potter became an outcast the moment he was placed with The Dursleys.

And who put him there in the first place?

[harrypotterfandomunite]

The life and lies of Albus Dumbledore

[geekyjessica]

I DONT LIKE IT BUT I LIKE IT

[perpetuallight]

I lost my mind at 0:44…and again at 1:08 😲

[pez-uzi-deactivated20160424]

Places where reality is a bit altered:

[solareveille]

playgrounds at night

rest stops on highways

deep in the mountains

[ghostfiish]

early in the morning wherever it’s just snowed

trails by the highway just out of earshot of traffic

schools during breaks

those little beaches right next to ferry docks

bowling alleys

[genesisdoes-moved]

unfamiliar mcdonalds on long roadtrips

your friends living room once everybody but you is asleep

laundromats at midnight

• any target • churches in texas • abandoned 7/11’s • your bedroom at 5 am • hospitals at midnight • warehouses that smell like dust • lighthouses with lights that don’t work anymore • empty parking lots • ponds and lakes in suburban neighborhoods • rooftops in the early morning • inside a dark cabinet

[ringingofraevolution]

galeries in art museums that are empty except for you 

the lighting section of home depot

stairwells

[doomgeneration1995]

•hospital waiting rooms •airports from midnight to 7am • bathrooms in small concert venues

[midtownsparker]

I just got the weirdest feeling I swear

[the-crepes-of-wrath]

OK LISTEN THERE ARE REASONS FOR THIS!!!

A lot of these places are called liminal spaces - which means they are throughways from one space to the next. Places like rest stops, stairwells, trains, parking lots, waiting rooms, airports feel weird when you’re in them because their existence is not about themselves, but the things before and after them. They have no definitive place outside of their relationship to the spaces you are coming from and going to. Reality feels altered here because we’re not really supposed to be in them for a long time for think about them as their own entities, and when we do they seem odd and out of place.

The other spaces feel weird because our brains are hard-wired for context - we like things to belong to a certain place and time and when we experience those things outside of the context our brains have developed for them, our brains are like NOPE SHIT THIS ISN’T RIGHT GET OUT ABORT ABORT. Schools not in session, empty museums, being awake when other people are asleep - all these things and spaces feel weird because our brain is like “I already have a context for this space and this is not it so it must be dangerous.” Our rational understanding can sometimes override that immediate “danger” impulse but we’re still left with a feeling of wariness and unease. 

Listen I am very passionate about liminal spaces they are fascinating stuff or perhaps I am merely a nerd. 

[sp1ne-sh0t]

I, for one, appreciate your passion for liminal spaces and thank you for explaining it to the rest of us.

[maddiesharafian]

Be careful with your honey, my friends! <3

[terrywho-cartoons]

Not just actors are theater kids ♥️ A shout out to the rest of the team!

[iguanamouth]

[unicornempire]

I. Love this. 

Love it.

Oh my god

yes.

[defilerwyrm]

This is it, I found it, the funniest post on this entire godsforsaken website

[chambergambit]

I will never get over how brilliant this comic is. The artist could have just drawn a single image in response, but instead we have this masterpiece. The world doesn’t deserve @iguanamouth.

[brennenbeckwith]

Shit I love Technical Theater

The sound of everyone’s feet on a stage during a black out

when 5 techies go on stage, move a piece and it looks like no one did it

the sound of a smooth fly system

the feel of a screw driver with a newly charged battery 

at the end of an act or a show and the curtains close and ten techies converge on the stage at once to do their job

being able to see in the dark 

the satisfaction of building a piece and seeing it on stage knowing how hard you worked on it

fixing shit the actors break 

the sound of ripping gaf tape

saying jokes into the mic during sound check because ‘Testing 123′ is boring

going to a restaurant at the last show

watching actors cry about never seeing each other again and knowing that you will always be back

getting a cue just right

always wearing black

when a scene change goes faster and smoother than planned 

saving something before anyone notices it’s wrong

watching actors freak out when something goes wrong and being the only person calm enough to fix it 

putting 100% of yourself on stage and no one knows you were there

learning that the best validation can only come from yourself

learning to be creative, quick minded, resourceful, quiet

learning to be humble 

knowing that sometimes you don’t have to be loud to be productive

knowing that you don’t have to be seen to do something incredible 

[lesbianblush-deactivated2018053]

[novellearts]

oh my goddd. I thought it was great from the beginning but it only gets better

[poorquentyn]

It puzzles me when people cite LOTR as the standard of “simple” or “predictable” or “black and white” fantasy. Because in my copy, the hero fails. Frodo chooses the Ring, and it’s only Gollum’s own desperation for it that inadvertently saves the day. The fate of the world, this whole blood-soaked war, all the millennia-old machinations of elves and gods, comes down to two addicts squabbling over their Precious, and that is precisely and powerfully Tolkien’s point. 

And then the hero goes home, and finds home a smoking desolation, his neighbors turned on one another, that secondary villain no one finished off having destroyed Frodo’s last oasis not even out of evil so much as spite, and then that villain dies pointlessly, and then his killer dies pointlessly. The hero is left not with a cathartic homecoming, the story come full circle in another party; he is left to pick up the pieces of what was and what shall never be again. 

And it’s not enough. The hero cannot heal, and so departs for the fabled western shores in what remains a blunt and bracing metaphor for death (especially given his aged companions). When Sam tells his family, “Well, I’m back” at the very end, it is an earned triumph, but the very fact that someone making it back qualifies as a triumph tells you what kind of story this is: one that is too honest to allow its characters to claim a clean victory over entropy, let alone evil. 

“I can’t recall the taste of food, nor the sound of water, nor the touch of grass. I’m naked in the dark. There’s nothing–no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I can see him with my waking eyes.”

So where’s this silly shallow hippie fever-dream I’ve heard so much about? It sounds like a much lesser story than the one that actually exists.

[sophiamcdougall]

+1 You know how Frodo leaves Sam with the legacy of the quest - the job of bearing witness to what happened - and the duty to finish and protect his writings? Tolkien lost all but one of his friends in WW1. He was founder member of a literary club at school - the TCBS. There was a larger group and a core of four. They all stayed friends, they kept writing and sharing their work with each other. And they were almost all killed. One of them, Geoffrey Smith, wrote this to Tolkien in 1916. My chief consolation is that if I am scuppered tonight – I am off on duty in a few minutes – there will still be left a member of the great T.C.B.S. to voice what I dreamed and what we all agreed upon.  […] May God bless you my dear John Ronald and may you say things I have tried to say long after I am not there to say them if such be my lot. And that was his last letter. There’s something eerie about the way he seems to have pegged Tolkien as an eventual survivor.  Sam’s survival (and his emergence as the true hero of the book) are beautiful because they’re suffused with loss, because they’re not the grand conquering heroic narrative that on some level was “supposed” to happen.

[vulgarweed]

Tolkien possibly only survived because he got trench fever - a particularly nasty disease carried by lice - and got sent home because he was desperately ill. Considering how the rest of his unit fared, it probably saved his life. Unpleasant and unglamorous, but if not for that, we wouldn’t have LOTR. I’m sure survivor’s guilt was a factor - as was a sickening sense of dread when “The War to End All Wars” didn’t, and his son went off to WWII.

TLOTR has some of the type of valorization of war that you find in the Old Norse and Anglo-Saxon literature that JRRT loved and studied and taught because he loved that style and it’s deeply fitting for cultures like the Rohirrim, but it’s also full of the slog of war, the waste and tragedy, and the irrevocable damage that even victorious survivors carry for the rest of their lives. Frodo’s symbolic “death” is also resonant for survivors of what was called “shell-shock” then and PTSD now.

I mean, it’s not Game of Thrones. It’s not gritty in the same way. But the protagonist of LOTR was minor gentry from a backwater nobody’d heard of, and the REAL hero who saved the world by saving him was his gardener. All the great kings and queens and lords and ladies in the story are background characters compared to the story of the little people. Literally little people, but symbolically too.

[gayharoldfinch]

“I mean, it’s not Game of Thrones. It’s not gritty in the same way”

well thank fuck for that

[housetohalf]

Stage Manager Brain Like...

Reads:

Ok, this is a 1960s studio rented by 2 architects. Googles “1960s coffee maker” Rad they exist and it’s not a stovetop thing Adds “Coffee maker” to props list Adds “Coffee Filters” to props list Adds “Decaf Coffee” to props list Adds “Coffee cups, Qty: 2″ to props list

Wait.

Do we have running water onstage for the carafe? We will also need to run power for the whole thing. Makes note to bring up both questions in first production meeting. Keeps reading Coffee mentioned as being ready 4 pages later Ok that’s not how a coffee maker works Oh ok and they decide against the coffee because she needs to leave. So maybe we just have him mime it and there’s premade coffee? Ok I’ll have to set that at intermission So I can make it on the industrial coffee maker downstairs in the green room at the top of intermission as soon I get down from the balcony/calling desk Lightly writes “MAKE COFFEE” in calling script before “check in w/ house management” on the last page of Act 1

.

.

.

It’s never just a cup of coffee.

[fuckyeahgreatplays]

This reminds me of the Hell in a Handbag game we used to play on SMNetwork.org (and I’ve subsequently brought up when I speak on stage management).

Person #1 posts a note from a fake rehearsal report about a new item that their director has decided to add. It can be a prop, costume, scenery change, script change, falling chandelier… your call. For example, “Tony will now recite the prologue holding a torch.” Person #2 replies with a list of 5 or more questions that arise from this addition, and then suggests a new thing that the director wants to add. Such as:

“What kind of torch is this? Does it need to be lit? Is it lit onstage or before he comes on? Who is our fire guard? Does our venue allow open flame? 

Note: Amy, who was supposed to eat a bagel in Scene Two, has recently been diagnosed with a gluten allergy.”

And so on and so forth.I’m a nerd who loves this game.

[risarodil]

Made this for Geek Gear Box ⚡️

[myszko]

@arabellesicardi 🍬 Man Repeller.

[arabellesicardi]

it me

[mydollyaviana]

Disney vs. 7 early fairytales 

[calanthesfeuillemort]

The 1812 version of Snow White is even worse when you consider that the girl was only seven years old in the tale (plus her unconscious body ended up being carted around by the prince until one of his servants accidentally woke her up).  Also, in The Little Mermaid, the mermaid’s unable to speak because she had her tongue cut out >__<

But I’d love to see faithful adaptations of the original tales.  Especially Bluebeard.  We need a Bluebeard adaptation.

[maliceandvice-deactivated201512]

Actually, the original-original pre-Grimm Brothers’ stories that were passed around Europe via oral tradition are nowhere near as violent as the Grimm’s made them. Cinderella’s stepsisters were never ugly and kept their eyes, Snow White’s mother was not even a villain (instead a group of bandits were), and instead of spending the whole story napping Sleeping Beauty outwitted a dangerous bandit leader, wouldn’t let him sleep with her, and saved herself. 

The original oral stories were radically changed by the Brothers Grimm to fit their personal and political beliefs. Most notably, they often added in female characters solely for the purpose of making them evil villains and took away most of the heroines’ agency and intelligence. Both brothers belonged to a small fanatical sect of Catholicism that vilified women because of the idea of Original Sin and Wilhelm in particular had a particularly deep hatred of women. The Grimms were actually pretty horrible people. Those cannibalistic queens and ugly stepsisters and the mass amount of violence against women didn’t exist until the Grimms wanted them to. Their ideas stuck so soundly though that we now assume they were in the original tales and that these terrible characters and ideas come out of some perceived barbaric Old World culture. But in truth they’re really the Grimms’ weird obsession with hating women showing through. The original oral folklore focused on the heroes’ and heroines’ good deeds and used them as ways to teach cultural norms and a society’s rules and encouraged girls to be quick-witted and street-savvy instead of passive princesses, and the Grimms promptly stripped that all away. 

[thestoutorialist]

“Grimms Bad Girls and Bold Boys” by Ruth Bottingheimer is an excellent book on this

[sharp-sparks]

Something to add to my reading list.

[youthinkucantellheavenfromhell]

Decided today that I was gonna focus on props in my final year and then saw Lin’s tweets 😄 Props is just the coolest

[caitthegreatest]

WHO SHOULD YOU FIGHT TECH EDITION

someone requested so   here we go

lighting designers: like yeah you could try to fight them but they’d probs just blind you and then kick your ass while you’re trying to reorient 4/10 would not advise

stage managers: buddy. pal. please. SMs are the reason your sorry ass gets anything done and we all know it. sure maybe you could win but then your life will fall apart and you’ll be sad 0/10 terrible idea

costume designers: i mean if they have their shears with them avoid but otherwise they tend to be pretty easy to fight. your call man 6/10 possibility of success

makeup designers: why would u want to fight makeup designers???? they just wanna make u look awesome and scary let them live. plus they’d probably murder you when you don’t see it coming 

fly crew: like you could try but they’d probably just bound away into the sky like fucking deer or something only attempt if you have wings 

sound designers: like i wanna say we could kick your asses but in all honesty what are we gonna do? throw a speaker at you? no those are heavy and cost more than your student loans we’d just yell until you gave up tbh

fight choreographers: like do i even need to explain why this is a terrible idea. they have fight in their name they’ll kick your ass into next tuesday and make it part of the warmup

set designer: ok i have a grudge against a lot of set designers but also have you seen their equipment. do not i repeat do NOT take them on on their own turf. corner them in a parking lot or something 

propsmaster: man they can turn anything into anything else who knows how many weapons they’ve got on them. on the other hand if you distract them with a challenge they will likely be pretty easy to subdue

dramaturg: history nerd to the max kick their bookloving ass if they deserve it they can’t fight back they’re not history BUFFS or anything amirite