hey :) do you mind sharing some more about the skam austin panel today?
yeah for sure!! iāll put what i remember under the keep reading tab for ppl who wanna hear about it :) i only went to the panel, not the rewatch (bc money lmao) so there are probably some other things they talked about that i missed, but iām sure there are other ppl on here that can fill you in on any gaps that i miss!
it was valeria (jo), julie (megan), and lakeisha* (shay), and pedro (p jo) on the panel (he was the moderator, the other three did most of the talking), though they did mention other castmates throughout :,)Ā
*lakeisha was the name they went by on the panel, and in the info before the panel it said they use they/them pronouns, so thatās how iāll be referring to them throughout thisĀ
all of them started out by talking about what theyāre doing currently, julie said sheās dropping out of school because her therapist told herĀ āyou as a person matters more than you as a studentā which i thought was a great sentiment as wellĀ
lakeisha said theyāve been making a lot of clothes and music (also throughout the whole thing they kept showing us their shoes and they left to pee like halfway through something they were answering one time hfjskaj)
they then talked about their audition processes (val had the most chaotic series of audtions omg i would love to see her audition tapes)
val originally read for either jo or megan, and she had literally just moved there like right before casting and almost didnāt go to her audition
she said that she decided to be the loudest person in the room so that they couldnāt ignore her, and that carried her through most of the rounds of auditioning
she said that at the end she saidĀ āif you donāt choose me, which you should choose me, but if you donāt, please choose another latinx actress because you have no idea how much it means to see someone who looks like you on screenā
julie auditioned because she was hoping julie (andem) would bring lisa and tarjei and she basically wanted a free meet and greet djkfshkĀ
she found out about skam og on tumblr !! sheās one of us šĀ
she thinks julie andem is the coolest person in the worldĀ
they told her that she was pretty much everything they envisioned megan to be, so they cast her fairly early on and then had her partner with the marlon prospectsĀ
giovanni, who eventually played tyler, auditioned for marlon and they kissed during their audition even though they werenāt supposed to
julie went to high school with till who ended up playing marlon and people would always ask her what it was like to get to make out with him and she was just like .... we just working bruh
lakeisha found the ad to audition on instagram and decided why not because it said it was a paid jobĀ
they looked up a bunch of improv games the night before because they had no experience and had no idea what they were doing
in the audition julie asked what the tattoos on their hand meant (and also the one thing lakeisha was excited about being out of contract was that they could get as many tattoos as they wanted without asking for permission)
they all had a lot of love for julie andem and loved working with her
val said that sheād always try to make julie laugh and she said that julie is the reason og and austin are so good, because itās her story and her visionĀ
they roasted the shit out of fb too (as they should)
basically fb ghosted them and never renewed the show but also never cancelled it so technically they donāt even know if anyone else could get the rights to reboot the show somewhere else (lakeisha saidĀ āskam austin onlyfansā lmao)
i donāt remember which one of them said it but they said fb is like an inconsistent dad lollll
they also think that fb sort of finessed julie/her team because they were under the impression that it would be like og where they had their own website for the show and everything, but then it ended up just being a facebook page
they also filmed promo for season 1 that never ended up being used but they donāt know whyĀ
lakeisha felt super disrespected by the fact that not only did they not get their season, but also the fact that they just dropped the show like it was nothing and none of them even found out that they probably werenāt getting more seasons until they saw that their instagram accounts were gone
everyone was upset about the igs getting deleted too because they put so much work into the content on there for it all to just disappearĀ
val saidĀ āno one tells a story like the one that was about to be toldā and everyone agreed
val said that if the show would have continued, jo would have been undocumented and they would have shown her trying to navigate college (not only were we robbed of a jo season, we were robbed of college seasons š¤)
jo x jo were definitely going to be a thing
val said that when they wrapped s2 she was like finally!!! because now they could get into the stories that they really wanted to tell and really knew would make a difference (everyone vehemently agreed)
they were proud of the fact that theyāre the most diverse cast and that they donāt just treat the characters of color like sidekicks like the other remakes do
julie talked about how skam france was the only remake to have jonas not accept isak right away when he was coming out and how it was suspicious that he happened to be the only non white jonas and that was the choice they made
val said that druck is the only remake sheās watched but she likes it
they also talked about how, even though itās great that the cast was so diverse, practically everyone behind the scenes was white
val said that she didnāt really think about it much at the time because she found it hard to speak up since she was very young and inexperienced but looking back she wishes joās body wasnāt so fetishized as a latina (she didnāt clarify whether she was talking on a production level or within the fandom, but she talked about costuming so i assumed she meant more on a production level)
they all wished there was more representation off screen as well as on
shay x megan was brought up and julie said that shay was going to have her own love interest (am!even !!!!) come season three, and that it wouldnāt have been meganĀ
she also said that megan was mostly just confused and likeĀ āhaha i kiss girls when iām drunkā but then she also said that megan and shay never had feelings for each other at the same time so šĀ
she was upset that they made megan and marlon get back together at the end of season 2 because she wasnāt a fan of them together, but she said it also makes sense because a lot of teen girls go back to their toxic exes even when they know itās not good for them
lakeisha said that they hated shayās acrylic nails because it didnāt make sense to them for her to have them (especially since shay was a musician)
they also said that theyāve been pretty confident and open with their sexuality since they were around 12, and that one time in middle school they dated a boy because he had an xbox and then they were like oh no is this toxic am i using him because he actually has feelings for me?? hdskafjaĀ
they also said that the cfgc music happened because they heard that the boys from og also had a song and at first i was like wtf are they talking about but now i think they meant the penetrator song ššĀ
julie has a cfgc shirt :,) and they all stole a bunch of clothes and stuff from set, val said she took a bunch of outfits that jo never wore which makes her sad to think about nowĀ
valās favorite scene to film was the car scene in s1 before the party (she said it was one of the best moments of her life) and julie said she liked that one as well (val said thereās a shot of her looking into the camera and flipping it off but they didnāt include it in the show, i feel robbed)
people asked how it felt for lakeisha to be the first lesbian isak and they said that they didnāt feel like they were, because they didnāt really get the chance :(( but they also said that the idea itself was very intimidating and there was a lot of pressure around it
they also said that they and gio were very very close both on screen and off, they said it wasnāt even like they were an extension of one person, thatās how close they got
there were a lot of improvised scenes, particularly with val, and she also said that incorporating spanish into joās dialogue was mostly improvisedĀ
julie, val, and pedro also all talked about how theyāre all mexican, and how each of their life experiences vary so much from one another, on the show and off and julie said meganās upbringing was a lot like hersĀ
they all also said that they liked the music the show used and a lot of them have emotional attachments to a lot of the songsĀ
val said she wishes they used more frank ocean and i agreeĀ
they also said theyāre not sure if there are bloopers or anything, but theyād love to see them if there areĀ
iām trying to think of anything i missed ahhh i feel like they talked about so much but i think iāve got the key points soooo
thatās all !!! hope this was interesting to ppl who still care about austin like i do :,))
ok but the hunger games literally did mention it All likeā¦ the use of propaganda by the elite as an attempt to divide the minority groups they oppress by making them perceive each other as rivals and prevent them from recognizing and uniting against their real enemy? check. criticism of the way we consume media with no consideration for other peopleās privacy like weāre entitled to every detail of their lives and a lack of empathy for their pain because it makes good entertainment? yeah. realistic depictions and explorations of the effects of trauma, particularly that caused by conflict? hunger games has you covered. acknowledgement of the existence of and links between racism and classism, and that conventional standards of beauty are influenced by the societal elite, which people are encouraged to harm themselves in order to conform to (the fact that the weathier people in district 12 are white, blonde and blue-eyed while the coal miner families are mostly people of color; that the two poorest districts, 11 and 12, have majority poc populations; that most people, katniss herself included, consider prim to be prettier than katniss partly because she looks like her white, blonde, blue-eyed mother, who was from the wealthier part of the district; that the first thing that happens to the tributes when theyāre taken to the capitol is they theyāre āpreppedā to conform to capitol beauty standards before they even meet their stylists in ways that literally violate their bodies permanently, and that many of the capitol residents have extreme body modifying surgery that can take a severe toll on their health and wellbeing in the long term)? none of this is accidental, and is both brought up and criticised multiple times throughout the trilogy. the sexualization of minors for adult consumption, especially young celebrities? the fact that politicians in positions of power and authority gain those positions through corruption and by considering anyone harmed in their acension collateral damage? the significance of propaganda and social influence in modern warfare? the misery caused by poverty, which is caused and intentionally maintained by the wealthy elite? the brutal and violating experience of living in a surveillance police state, especially as a member of a minority group and/or poor person? the inherently immoral and corruptive nature of warfare and the military and the unimaginable atrocities and suffering it leads to for ordinary civilians? every YA dystopia novelist tried so hard to be mrs collins but most didnāt even understand half of what went into her books that made them so compelling.
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