remindmeofthe | (no subject)

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This is KILLING ME, people. KILLING ME. SO MUCH TEMPTATION. Less than a day to go (I hope) before I can see the Doctor Who finale, and I'm glad for more reasons than one. Trying to avoid even the slightest hint of a possibility of a vague spoiler requires skipping over everything I would normally read. There are THREE DW wank reports up at Fandom Wank. THREE OF THEM. And I don't dare touch them.

I know it'll all be worth it. But damn.

In other, equally geeky news, I've been listening for the last couple of days to the soundtrack of a play called The Fix. I'd only ever heard of this play because the original cast had John Barrowman, but that's not why I bought it. I bought it because it is a political satire musical, which is just one of those combinations you don't expect and the second I read the blurb at Amazon, I had to have it. And I am really, really sad that I hadn't heard of it years ago, because it is awesome and it is something that should have been in my life long before now. What happens is: the front runner Presidential candidate dies in the midst of screwing his mistress, so his wife and brother decide that her drug-addict son will go into politics and eventually become President instead. Naturally, it all turns into a huge mess, and the songs are great, and the performances are wonderful, and why did I only hear of this play because one of the actors in it happened to end up on a couple of shows I like? How many other awesome musicals am I missing out on?

(Mind you, in terms of my Doctor Who fandom, I'm not sure this didn't turn out for the best. Because my first DW eps were the Empty Child two-parter, and the second I figured out who was playing Jack I would have been all, "OMG it's Cal!" and probably have viewed the entire thing rather differently. Casting can be funny that way.)

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~I've babbled about the Fix, right? I wrote fic about it. I appear to be one of the very few people in the world who actually saw that when it was on the stage, and it quite literally CHANGED MY LIFE.

I can't remember. If you've mentioned it while I've had you friended, I probably just skimmed it.

But! omg link?

Everything I've posted about it is, I think, here: http://apiphile.livejournal.com/tag/the+fix

Although it's been mentioned in memes under "life-changing". I was 15 when I saw it, met John Barrowman and Philip Quast, had my brain broken, completely reshaped my views on a lot of things. Unbelievable. SO FUCKING HOT/DARK/TWISTED. I cannot tell you.

That is brilliant. It's intensely frustrating to just listen to the soundtrack and read the summary in the liner notes, because I can tell I am missing so much good stuff. And I'm not JUST referring to the gay quasi-incest, either.

Tina was executed while dressed as Marylin Munroe. The Two Boys At Harvard dance was fucking HILARIOUS. Bobby Cracker Barrell would appear onstage. Did you see there are some very, very grainy videos of it up on YouTube? I linked to them.

I did see that! I am most pleased. Visuals are good, even grainy ones.

It got such bad reviews in the papers and it angered me immensely because it was a FUCKING AMAZING musical. You know what the reviews were?

"Too dark".

TOO DARK?

FAIL. What the hell? People are such damn pansies. IT IS JUST DARK ENOUGH.

NO KIDDING. Oh, it was beautiful. Beautiful. So dark, so brilliant, so nasty. So drug-addled, incestuous, filthy and grim.

You know how much I love these things.

Seriously, what's not to love? It is made of awesome. And I know this even though I've only listened to it all the way through once, because I keep getting stuck on "Simple Words" and listening to it like five times and then having to flip back to the beginning. But I'll manage to keep going eventually.

Hahha. The one I have trouble getting past - the two - are The Upper Hand (one of the hottest songs in stage musical history) and Control because it is so fucking CYNICAL. Although America's Son is also amazing because, really, how often do you get to sing about taxes like that?

And Two Boys At Harvard is the basis of the background of that fic I wrote. I LOVE THAT. LOVE. That musical.

Plus, "America's Son" contains that exchange about big words that just cracks me up. For that matter, Grahame's "Oh, sweet Jesus" during "Simple Words" gets me every time, too. I kind of love Grahame. Bringing the snark is key.

Also, it's lucky I can type this because I watched the "Upper Hand" clip and I swear, even grainy and blobby, it's still worthy of near spontaneous combustion. *fans self*

Grahame's snark is beautiful. The bit where Violet goads him over him fancying Cal is wondrous. Grahame is easily the star of the piece, and he and Cal are perfect(ly bad) for each other.

SERIOUSLY. Now think how I felt, 15, sex-crazed, repressed bisexual who already had an incest fixation ... seeing THAT on stage for the first time. I believe I nearly chewed my hand off in an attempt to hold in the shrieks.

Yeah, that sounds like a SERIOUS AWAKENING MOMENT if ever there was one.

Still makes me crazy in the brain now. It was so deliciously fucking filthy and screwed up.

Oh, yes. I'd bet my farm, if I had one, that some of the negative reviews came from people who were in indignant denial over how hot that scene was.

I'd bet my balls, if I had any, that you're absolutely right. People don't want to accept that John Barrowman clutching Philip Quast's hand to his crotch is fuck-hot.

So instead they whinge on about how it's too dark, because it's easier to condemn a show than admit that maybe it stomped square on one of your secret repressed kinks.

The foolish, foolish fools. Surely if you admit you like a certain aspect, there will be MORE of it on the stage as people try to curry favour?

I am incapable of keeping my kinks secret, they kind of EXPLODE when I'm not looking. And I pick those fuckers up like dogs pick up ticks. *whine*

You know what else I dig about this play? (I just now, seriously, remembered that I have a CD player I can play it on, which goes to show how much I use the thing.) IT IS HAMLET ON CRACK. That makes me SO HAPPY. It's clearly a very loose adaptation, and to a Hamlet fangirl, that just makes the whole thing even funnier.

And more awesome, because Hamlet/Claudius, hello.

This makes me wish so much that I knew more of Hamlet, and had a copy of R&G Are Dead to read. One of my favourite artists is a Hamlet obsessive. ;) My play is rather more Titus Andronicus, which I have been adapting (or ruining) to something quite hideous on LJ. ;)

I'm glad you've found something in it for you, though!

Then you should read it! And, you know, see a production, specifically Branagh's, but in my experience it's easier to follow if you've read it first.

The similarities are really pretty general, though, mostly using tropes from storytelling in general rather than specific Hamlet stuff. The only bits that put me specifically in mind of Hamlet are Cal's lines about the king being dead (this sounds like a deliberate reference to me, with the part of about the joker indicating the difference between Cal's being manipulated and Hamlet's doing the manipulating) and the scene with Cal seeing Reed. Which, the idea of Hamlet tripping on acid gives me joy like I can't even say. <3

I have, I have, but it was many years ago. When I was 13 I memorised the "To Be Or Not To Be" Soliloquy to keep myself amused at the first day back at school.

Which, the idea of Hamlet tripping on acid gives me joy like I can't even say.

... you need to write that.

No way. I've ficced Hamlet. It's HARD.

Awww, just a little? I read Hamlet/Laetres slash in iambic pentameter, once.

You're just going to have to settle for some five year old Hamlet/Claudius (http://community.livejournal.com/contrelamontre/125800.html).

. . . I can't believe it's been five years.

You are a much stronger person than I. I would be out spoiling myself like crazy right about now.

I can't stand it. I'm too addicted to the shock of a really good twist.

It's funny, because I used to be a major spoiler whore. I was always looking for them.

I just can't help myself. I spoiled myself for S2 and S3 of Supernatural long before I got my hands on the DVDs. Labeling something "SPOILERS DON'T CLICK" is all the more reason for me to click :P

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