London Film and Comic Con/Liz Sladen
Went to the lacklustre London Film and Comic Con Sunday avec Katy and her friends. I say lacklustre-I enjoyed it WAY better than I thought I would, as I generally hate cons?
1) I used to work at anime cons in uni (good money, but irregularly so-not worth the transportation hassle, and the company structures themselves are often infuriatingly poorly organized), and have holdover!eugh. At any moment on the crowded floor I expect to be handed an Obi of Office and forced to sell Deathnote to overweight old men in sailor fuku.
2) I hate meeting actors. They’re men and women wearing the bodies of characters I love, and yet thoroughly not them. I can admire them as people as well as for their characters in rare cases (oh Patrick Stewart, be still my heart), but generally I not only have no wish to meet them, I sneak through the Richmond Waitrose like ninja for paranoid terror that Richard E. Grant will be buying bread or something, and I’ll duck into frozen foods only to be confronted by old!Davison (how dare he no longer look like Five and Tristan, etc.). And then I’ll be startled into gibbering something about all the slash I’ve read/written about People Who Look A Lot Like Them and I’ll have to go home and delete the internet before committing sepukuu.
Am a lot more wary now that I know a friend of mine ran into Grant on a Richmond bus. What is he doing taking mass transit? But I don’t think said friend could have been deceived, as he is incredibly film-savvy. Worrisome!
But, even so, Elizabeth Sladen was there and gave a brief Q&A and I was very charmed.
Katy once commented that Q&A's always, always suck, and aren't as good as proper talks. I tried to defend the masses and their right to Ask Stuff, but in general I’ve come to agree with her.
No matter who's talking or about what, it's nearly always really poorly structured and bad questions. I want to say something better just to SAVE the poor woman from the bajillionth WHAT IS IT LIKE TO TOUCH DAVID TENNANT O_O, and yet do not want to make an ass of myself/do not necessarily have a better question.
Sladen was v. graceful and tried to sort of close off the DO YOU FEEL IN THE UNDISPUTABLE PRESENCE OF GOD WHEN ADRESSING TENNANT MORE OR LESS THAN WHEN CARESSING MATT SMITH?, but no one had better shit? Really people should THINK OF QUESTIONS THEY ARE DYING TO ASK HER beforehand, self included.
Liz Sladen is not the best Question Fielder in the world in terms of taking a dung heap and capitalizing on it. Some people with enough BOMBAST or tact make gold from straw, and that's better when the audience isn't giving you a lot-though it comes off as gittish if they are, I suppose? But she was v. sweet
She did, however, kind of fumble the day's best question-the girl came at it from a triffley awkward angle, but she had good thoughts re: Sladen's remark about being protective of Sarah Jane as a character, and wanting to know how that feminism translated to her work now as a strong OLDER female character/actress. Sladen sort of went 'well, I mean, I intended to do the work and play the character, not sepcifically TO PORTRAY WOMEN'S LIB!!' And I know it wasn't /what she meant/ (in other interviews she’s had more collected, thoughtful remarks on the subject than the Q&A format necessarily allows for), more that she wasn't necessarily playing an AGENDA initially, but she came off as a bit RAR I HATE FEMINISM. Also she side-stepped the opportunity to talk about the Older Actresses/Character thing, which could have been interesting.
Then backrow!girl gracefully moved onto a second question re: working with Billie Piper and complimented her on how hilarious that Doctor-mocking bit of School Reunion was. Interestingly in addition to being lovely and grateful for the compliment, Sladen talked about the director being VERY NERVOUS about it and whether it would play or read as super-catty. Which... sadly I could see?
So that girl could have asked more good questions (that were not the THIRD rendition of WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE MONSTER?! (though I LOVE that without thinking about it she just goes ‘Davros’)) if it hadn't seemed like Liz Sladen HATED HER AND HER FEMINISM OMG due to some awk phrasing.
I think seeing her worked for me because while I love Sarah Jane, she is not an ABSOLUTE FAVORITE of mine, capable of reducing me to a goopuddle. Also I haven’t ever written her-I don’t know, actually, whether it’d be difficult to now, having confronted the unhappy truth that she is a Person.
Though my GOD she has aged well and has great hair, make-up and airbrushing be damned!
1) I used to work at anime cons in uni (good money, but irregularly so-not worth the transportation hassle, and the company structures themselves are often infuriatingly poorly organized), and have holdover!eugh. At any moment on the crowded floor I expect to be handed an Obi of Office and forced to sell Deathnote to overweight old men in sailor fuku.
2) I hate meeting actors. They’re men and women wearing the bodies of characters I love, and yet thoroughly not them. I can admire them as people as well as for their characters in rare cases (oh Patrick Stewart, be still my heart), but generally I not only have no wish to meet them, I sneak through the Richmond Waitrose like ninja for paranoid terror that Richard E. Grant will be buying bread or something, and I’ll duck into frozen foods only to be confronted by old!Davison (how dare he no longer look like Five and Tristan, etc.). And then I’ll be startled into gibbering something about all the slash I’ve read/written about People Who Look A Lot Like Them and I’ll have to go home and delete the internet before committing sepukuu.
Am a lot more wary now that I know a friend of mine ran into Grant on a Richmond bus. What is he doing taking mass transit? But I don’t think said friend could have been deceived, as he is incredibly film-savvy. Worrisome!
But, even so, Elizabeth Sladen was there and gave a brief Q&A and I was very charmed.
Katy once commented that Q&A's always, always suck, and aren't as good as proper talks. I tried to defend the masses and their right to Ask Stuff, but in general I’ve come to agree with her.
No matter who's talking or about what, it's nearly always really poorly structured and bad questions. I want to say something better just to SAVE the poor woman from the bajillionth WHAT IS IT LIKE TO TOUCH DAVID TENNANT O_O, and yet do not want to make an ass of myself/do not necessarily have a better question.
Sladen was v. graceful and tried to sort of close off the DO YOU FEEL IN THE UNDISPUTABLE PRESENCE OF GOD WHEN ADRESSING TENNANT MORE OR LESS THAN WHEN CARESSING MATT SMITH?, but no one had better shit? Really people should THINK OF QUESTIONS THEY ARE DYING TO ASK HER beforehand, self included.
Liz Sladen is not the best Question Fielder in the world in terms of taking a dung heap and capitalizing on it. Some people with enough BOMBAST or tact make gold from straw, and that's better when the audience isn't giving you a lot-though it comes off as gittish if they are, I suppose? But she was v. sweet
She did, however, kind of fumble the day's best question-the girl came at it from a triffley awkward angle, but she had good thoughts re: Sladen's remark about being protective of Sarah Jane as a character, and wanting to know how that feminism translated to her work now as a strong OLDER female character/actress. Sladen sort of went 'well, I mean, I intended to do the work and play the character, not sepcifically TO PORTRAY WOMEN'S LIB!!' And I know it wasn't /what she meant/ (in other interviews she’s had more collected, thoughtful remarks on the subject than the Q&A format necessarily allows for), more that she wasn't necessarily playing an AGENDA initially, but she came off as a bit RAR I HATE FEMINISM. Also she side-stepped the opportunity to talk about the Older Actresses/Character thing, which could have been interesting.
Then backrow!girl gracefully moved onto a second question re: working with Billie Piper and complimented her on how hilarious that Doctor-mocking bit of School Reunion was. Interestingly in addition to being lovely and grateful for the compliment, Sladen talked about the director being VERY NERVOUS about it and whether it would play or read as super-catty. Which... sadly I could see?
So that girl could have asked more good questions (that were not the THIRD rendition of WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE MONSTER?! (though I LOVE that without thinking about it she just goes ‘Davros’)) if it hadn't seemed like Liz Sladen HATED HER AND HER FEMINISM OMG due to some awk phrasing.
I think seeing her worked for me because while I love Sarah Jane, she is not an ABSOLUTE FAVORITE of mine, capable of reducing me to a goopuddle. Also I haven’t ever written her-I don’t know, actually, whether it’d be difficult to now, having confronted the unhappy truth that she is a Person.
Though my GOD she has aged well and has great hair, make-up and airbrushing be damned!