Never After: a few thoughts

[kelkyag]

Sunday I saw Never After. It's cute and bouncy. Much of the music is fun; the orchestra was excellent. It pushed at my definition of 'fairy tale' -- I think it isn't quite one, to me, but instead belongs over in whatever one calls the space Gilbert and Sullivan operettas are in

Comments

Thoughts, various

[desireearmfeldt]

It's not a fairy tale, it's a fairy tale spoof. (In my opinion

Re: Thoughts, various

[mathhobbit]

Being the sort of lesbian who likes to wear pretty dresses and, well, not embroider but knit, I appreciated Somnia. Perhaps my favorite thing about her was that she didn't bat an eye at her "Prince Charming" being female -- she was completely ready to run with it until she learned Les wasn't coping well.

I was, of course, imagining Somnia running the kingdom while her sweetie was off adventuring.

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[kelkyag]

she didn't bat an eye at her "Prince Charming" being female

She's a Princess -- she has poise, and lots of it.

imagining Somnia running the kingdom while her sweetie was off adventuring

If the story had given even a little nod to her competence at anything but embroidery ... I would have loved to see her step up as a mediator for the siege, for example, and thus wind up with some responsibilities.

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[mathhobbit]

Yes. A lot was left to your personal princess stereotype. You know the kind of books I read...

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[dpolicar]

Same actress was cast as Juror #8 in 12 Angry Jurors

Yeah. And I had to wrestle for a while about what casting a black woman in that role would do to the production before making that casting choice. And I've had several people say to me since then that they felt it didn't work... or, at least, that my directing failed to account properly for either Juror #8's gender or race. (shrug)

I dunno. As you say, racial casting is a tricky issue. Especially in a community that values a level of race-blindness that it doesn't actually possess.

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[firstfrost]

Having seen her before, my thought was more along the lines of "ahah, yes, she's T@F's go-to person for Imperious".

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[earthling177]

"But Margaret, Xenobia is a fictional character!" :-P

[kelkyag]

This, yes. (Somnia stood out to me for height and pink-streaked hair.)

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[twe]

Ya, the fact that they cast near the only black woman as the bad fairy did give me a moment surprise (much like the casting of the lone black actor as Judas in Jesus Christ, Superstar). It was lessened by having seen her as Juror #8, it made me wonder if perhaps she's just one of their better actresses who either can't sing well, or was just very busy and wanted a small (in terms of rehearsals) part.

On an unrelated note, "hispanic" as a race always completely baffles me, as it seems to include people who ancestors come from Europe, Africa, and the Americas plus various combinations thereof.

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[countertorque]

Hispanic is not actually a race, right?

[kelkyag]

It's a box one can check off on forms that ask for one's race / ethnicity / whatever we're calling it this week.

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[kirisutogomen]

It's an ethnicity, and as both "race" and "ethnicity" are such badly defined concepts, any attempt to draw a distinction between them is a waste of time.

As it happens, for US government purposes, ethnicity and race are two different things, with a bunch of different racial categories and only two ethnic categories: "Hispanic/Latino" and "Not Hispanic/Latino".

[kelkyag]

It's not a fairy tale, it's a fairy tale spoof.

I think it's possible but difficult for a story to be both. I have quirky fairy tale aesthetics.

mistaken about Les reacting to falling in love with Somnia

Perhaps. Before she was fairy-zotted to be a lesbian, she was fairy-zotted to love only one person ever, and to have better things to do than sit around the house waiting for her true love find her. I think she still would have been hostile toward anyone making romantic overtures toward her, and pole-axed on finding the her one true love.

bothered by the conflation of lesbian with butch/"plucky"/liberated/feminist

Yeah, stacking those all up as if they were a package deal did not please me, either. (Petronella was a favorite on my childhood reading list, too, and definitely a running comparison with this.)

Nobody but Les has been rejecting femme princesses as yucky -- all the princes want one!

I didn't believe in her, or her and Les having anything to say to each otherAfter the wedding is always outside the scope of fairy

[desireearmfeldt]

What I meant by "gender/class roles are challenged" is that the text is all about saying "didn't you ever ask Mathilde?" and "why should the royals have all the power?" and so on and so on -- but the storyline doesn't, in the end, live up to the spoken principles as well as it wants to. (I agree, the revolution plot and its resolution end up being neither pragmatic nor especially revolutionary -- partly because the need for turning fairy tales on their heads and getting political is grinding up against the need to stay within the fairy-tale-ish structure: short and shallow, with a happy ending

[kelkyag]

short and shallow, with a happy ending

Shallow and political commentary don't always play well together, alas. Most of the modern fairy tales (or fairy tale based stories) that I've read have a lot more depth of character than classic fairy tales for much that reason. That said, why hand the kingdom back to Les at the end? What has she done to demonstrate suitability for the job? Or if she is elected by public acclaim as the hero, how about a nod to next year/generation, given that she won't be having kids and will probably get restless pinned to the castle governing. "I'll do it this year while you guys study up on government."

Could the dynamic of Robinson hitting on Les have worked if he were the second or third in command of the band, instead of the leader?

That was a good song. :)