Times are hard for dreamers

It was a bit last minute, but I went down to London on Monday to see Amelie The Musical which is currently having a limited run and I managed to get a half price ticket in the New Year sales.

Amelie has always been one of my favourite movies. I went through a period of being really into French cinema, and although I don't watch much nowadays Amelie has always stayed very close to my heart. I know it's a very popular film anyway, but I've just always really related to Amelie with her "quiet on the outside, loud on the inside" personality, her endless daydreaming and optimism, her social awkwardness from spending too much time in her own head, and people around her thinking her infantile and naive. Like Amelie I've never been in a relationship because I run away at the first hint of interest, assuming no one can be bothered to take the time to get to know me and my strange little ways, scared that if I let others into my inner world I'd have to give it up entirely in order to be accepted. When I was in school I was bullied for just about everything about me, my home life was unstable for a myriad of reasons, and there are levels of dysfunction that just destroy a person’s ability to network with anyone, anywhere, ever. I am nobody's little weasel. What else is a girl to do but retreat into the depths of her imagination?

I hadn't actually looked into the musical adaptation before going, so went in blind which I generally prefer to do as then there's fewer expectations. Wicked is my most favourite musical of all time, but I remember the very first time I saw it I was so disappointed because I'd been listening to the soundtrack for so long and had pictured scenes in my head completely differently to how they actually were, and it took me years before I gave it another chance and fell in love with it. So I prefer to know as little as possible before going in if I can help it.

The biggest thing that I liked about it was how French it felt. I'd heard that a lot of the French-ness was lost when it was on Broadway, which I assume is just down to culture clash, but the French are our direct neighbours so we tend to know each other pretty well! All of the actors even spoke and sang with heavy French accents, which I appreciated for how firmly rooted it kept the show in Paris, but I admit it made bits difficult to understand too. I've travelled to France many times and never had any difficulty understanding actual French people, so I think it was just the fact it was almost entirely sung through in accented English. I'm glad I already knew the film as I think a lot of it would have gone over my head otherwise.

Overall I really liked it though! I'm hoping they release a London cast album as it's definitely something I'd want to hear over and over and pick up on things I missed. It kept the quirky nature of the film nicely, but without over doing it (the fig scene!!). I loved the set design, it had a little window at the top of the stage that opened to reveal Amelie's apartment and she grabbed on to a lampshade and floated up to it, and during the cafe scenes you could actually smell the smoke from the cigarettes. The humour was excellent and so well timed, and I loved how the cast are playing instruments throughout which was incredibly clever. To be able to sing and dance whilst playing a cello or violin? I'm in awe. I'd wondered before it began where the orchestra where and never expected it.

Before the show I mostly spent time in Camden. I go down to London a lot, but I haven't visited Camden in about a year and it seemed as good a place as any to have a mooch round. It's lost a lot of it's personality over the years as it's become more and more commercialised and most of my favourite shops are long gone, but it's still fun to play tourist for the day. I had a delicious waffle filled with chocolate, strawberries, marshmallows, and cream that made me feel a bit sick, and managed to get lost around the Stables.

Why else live if not for love?

When listening to the Moulin Rouge OBC the other day I was inspired to share my feelings about the musical as it's something that I have a lot of thoughts about. I went to see it back in August when I travelled to New York for the first time in my life which I wrote about here and why it was such a huge deal for me on a personal level. I saw it twice while I was there because I'm such a huge fan of Aaron Tveit and I don't get many opportunities to see him live so I wanted get all that I could! I also think that because I saw it twice in such quick succession I'm able to look at it a little more critically because I got over that 'wow' phase of when you're not sure what's coming next, to where you know what to expect so can take in the details.

I wish I could say that I loved Moulin Rouge, but even after all this time I honestly still have no idea how I feel about it. It's a difficult musical for me to be critical about because it means so much to me personally, and regardless of my issues with it I will always love it and proudly wear my merch because it's so wrapped up in so many amazing experiences for me. If it wasn't for this musical I wouldn't of travelled to New York and it would of remained a 'someday' dream, I would never have met my favourite actor and given him a piece of my artwork, I would never have been on the journey it took me to get there in the first place. Which is why it pains me so much to say that there were a lot of elements I didn't actually like, and overall I just found a lot of it's storytelling really weak.

It's obviously impossible not to compare it to the movie as it’s supposed to be a direct adaptation, and I don't know how much that spoils it as obviously it gives you a certain level of anticipation before you even go in. I guess if you’re not a fan of the movie you might enjoy it more, but I am a fan if the movie, it’s been one of my all time favourites for about 10 years so I was pretty pumped. I completely understand the need for changes between movie and stage so I wasn't looking for a carbon copy, if anything I was excited to see these characters have new life breathed into them and see them be reinterpreted, but for me the musical missed the mark in so many areas.

The worst parts are undoubtedly the book and the score, more than anything it just don't feel finalised enough for me and could of benefited from further rewrites. Visually this musical is second to none, the set design in particular is just incredible and I will throw hands if it doesn't win a Tony, second for the choreography too. The costumes were a bit hit or miss, some were spectacular, particularly Satine's and Zidler's, but Christian's and the Duke's were just...odd. Especially Christian's, why with all of the neckerchiefs?? I get that it's not supposed to be a realistic depiction of 1899, even the movie isn't historically accurate, but some of the costume choices just left me scratching my head as they seemed weird and out of place in 2019, never mind 1899. I also didn't get why Christian is suddenly from Lima, Ohio. I understand making him an American character for American audiences, and I'd much rather that then sit through an actor murder an English accent, but why make it so specific? It didn't enhance the plot and there was no explanation as to why he'd moved from Ohio all the way to France, it just seemed like an excuse to make some weird Ohio jokes.

The performances by absolutely everyone on stage were phenomenal. The ensemble were incredible, Danny Burstein had the whole audience in the palm of his hand as Zidler, I loved Ricky Rojas as the Argentinian Santiago, and how his and Toulouse's roles were fleshed out (I'm a HUGE fan of the real Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and I loved how they incorporated his paintings into the scenery). I wasn't overly familiar with Karen Olivo before but she was fantastic, especially her voice, and she really gave the character her all. And as I've already said Aaron is one of my favourite actors and his performance was just as amazing as I'd hoped. I stress all of this because what I'm going to say next has nothing to do with the cast, they did an incredible job within the limitations of the script they had to work with. But man, I really think this is one of the worst written musicals I've ever seen?? 

Throughout promotion they keep mentioning just how many pop songs they'd fit in to the musical, and I feel like they're more impressed with that than they are literally anything else and most of the additions felt completely unnecessary and hurt the script. In the movie the pop songs are charming and are musically altered to fit the scene, eg Roxanne by The Police is turned into a tango, Madonna's Like A Virgin is turned into a foppish farce, etc. I would of expected Broadway creators to have a better grasp of this kind of creativity within music, but they instead interpret the songs literally as straight up pop songs making it feel more like an episode of Glee. It feels like every time someone said "this moment reminds me of this song" they added it in, and you spend half of the musical internally playing "Name That Tune" which completely takes you away from the story. Also a lot of the songs seemed like they were chosen for laughs, which meant that the tone of the show was just all over the place and the audience just didn't know how to react and ended up laughing at poignant moments. I'm also not sure how wise it is to fill the soundtrack with pop music from the past 10 years? A big strength the movie had was that because it mostly reworked classic hits it felt ageless, but so much recent pop music is going to age this one fast and it'll be interesting to see if it's still even relevant in 5-10 years. I also wish they'd used Come What May more, I felt like Your Song had replaced it as Satine and Christian's love song, but I realise that's just personal preference.

Because of the over-saturation of pop songs, the book is extremely lacking and the dialogue was often cheesy. Like, SO cheesy it was embarrassing to watch at times. Whilst the movie knows when it's being cheesy and plays up to it to add to the heightened reality, the stage adaptation took itself too seriously in these moments so it just fell flat, and it was such a messy job that the parts that are supposed to be emotional just aren't. Christian yelling "because she doesn't love you!" to the Duke didn’t make me gasp or feel any concern for his welfare. Quite honestly I didn't even care when Satine dies in Christian's arms because Christian isn't given any time to mourn, he just gets up and stats monologuing about bohemian ideals so I feel pretty sure he's already over it. In the movie you feel Ewan’s pain, the tragedy of how they're still on stage and the audience think her death is part of the show and clap unsuspectingly as Christian screams out in pain. Whereas here it's too fast paced to allow anything to set in, and they quickly transition into a dance and sing Outkast's Hey Ya! to lighten the mood.

I also didn't like how some of the characters had been rewritten and struggled to get invested in them. Satine is written as a strong, independent woman, but she ends up being so strong that I don't buy her story arc at all and Christian seems more like a nuisance to her than a potential love interest. In fact I don't buy their relationship at all as we don't really get to see it? The writers were so focused on adding appropriate pop songs that they fail to focus on the love and intimacy between them so their romance is never explored. Satine gets more intimate with the Duke than she ever does Christian, and one of the biggest plot points they missed from the movie overall was that Satine WON'T! SLEEP! WITH! THE! DUKE! and that's why the Duke get's so jealous and why Christian has a breakdown and it's the linchpin of the whole plot. She won't sleep with the Duke because she loves Christian, but in this version she jumps into bed with the Duke straight away and we never see her having any of these moments with Christian, who seems more concerned with philosophising over the subject of love in general, so the love triangle just doesn't work.

I also felt that Christian needed more sensuality and darkness to him, the only time we really get to see anything like that with his character is during Roxanne which is absolutely mesmerising and heartbreaking but I wanted to see more of that as the story builds. Ewan McGregor's Christian is naive but still sensual and passionate, whereas this Christian is much more of a boy scout and I missed the darkness and madness that disturbs his euphoric happiness of being with Satine. I don't blame Aaron for this as I know he doesn’t shy away from complex characters with some darkness to them, it's clearly very much a script and direction issue, but I wish they'd given him more substance instead of being too afraid of potentially making him in any way dislikable.

Zidler is also completely changed and becomes a much more sympathetic character and very protective of his girls, which completely erases the exploitative nature of the Moulin Rouge and repaints it as a safe haven for misfits so there's no real sense of risk to any of the story. In the movie the atmosphere is cut throat, Zidler literally sells Satine in an attempt to save his own ass and feeds her with the idea that she's not deserving of love and any attachments would place her at enormous personal risk. Without that background the stakes are lowered and so Christian and Satine's love is neither as triumphant nor as tragic as they never really had a lot to overcome in the first place other than Satine's indifference to Christian (seriously, when she tells him he means nothing to her I fully believed her!). Even when the Duke is making threats against Christian there's no weight behind any of it as he doesn't really hold any of the cards so it's not menacing, at the end his story line isn't even resolved, he just suddenly isn't there anymore. Christian is more of a danger to himself than the Duke is. Compared to the movie where Zidler grows and gradually becomes protective of Satine and shoots the Duke to defend her, it's a bit of a different mood!

I know from all of this it probably sounds like I hated it, but I didn't! Despite all of these misgivings I can't help but love it anyway in all of it's gaudy, ostentatious glory. I just wish it were better written by people who cared about the original movie, rather than people who wanted style over substance with tacky ideas over what a jukebox musical should be like. Theatre should be about the story first, everything else second, and they had a great story to work with and they didn't. But whilst it's not the most expertly crafted and doesn't even have a lot of heart considering it's a story about love, it is fun and there's a lot to be said for that. You won't cry, but you're guaranteed a good time, and I know that's enough for a lot of people so I'd still recommend it. Especially because of how hard the cast are working every single night, I felt exhausted just watching them! The opening of Act 2 with Bad Romance was probably worth the cost of admission alone (although it was completely pointless within the context of the story, which is what so much of it keeps boiling down to!)

I also appreciate that my negative feelings are mostly borne out of my love for the movie and I might not have been so harsh on it if I wasn't already so emotionally tied to these characters. However I do know that audience reaction and reviews have been very polarising, and I’m quite active in musical theatre spaces online and I think it says a lot that outside of Aaron and Karen fans, people aren’t generally talking about Moulin Rouge much compared to other shows that have opened recently. And although I'm really dragging it, it's only because I care about it so much! Despite what you might think from reading this I did enjoy it and I would happily go see it again. Although I saw other shows on Broadway on my trip, Moulin Rouge was definitely the most memorable and has come to epitomise the whole journey for me which is why it's so special (on top of it allowing me the opportunity to meet Aaron which I WILL NOT SHUT UP ABOUT!!)

Overall it had me leaving the Al Hirshfeld feeling a mix of excitement and disappointment. Excitement because some of the music was fun and Aaron Tveit live!!! But so much disappointment because I didn’t feel anything at the end when everything is falling apart, and ultimately there’s no love in a story about love.

(All photos are my own, please do not repost.)

For the times they are a-changin'

I was reading through some Tumblr discourse about how much peoples interactions with social media has changed over the last 10 years, which really got me thinking about it all, and not just in the way of monitisation which I think is the most obvious thing. I can't decide if the way it's changed is a good or a bad thing, it's just different, but I do often find myself wishing more for the internet of old, back when it felt more casual and there was a degree of anonymity and we had more control over our identities, but in a less filtered way.

I kind of touched on this in my first blog entry, but it feels like nowadays your actual life is your 'brand' (which is a term that always feels icky to me, we're human beings not brands and it's scary how disconnected people get towards seeing "content creators" as actual people), whereas before the internet used to be more of an escape from the daily performance we go through in our real lives and I think this is where I've always struggled. There used to be a clearer divide between our online and offline selves which allowed us to explore personality facets that we normally kept under wraps. I remember back in the day I'd of died if my school friends found my online accounts because having your internet personality and interests known outside of the internet was embarrassing as hell! It was a different side of myself that I didn't feel I could share with them, a more authentic, dorky side where I could let my freak flag fly. It was all about weirdness, niche communities, fandom, reclamation and creative experimentation, and finding like-minded people and being part of an underground movement. We could all create stuff, regardless of natural talent, camera equipment, editing software, or social media reach, and blogs were messy with florescent backgrounds, flashing graphics, badly spaced formatting, and it was everything that I loved about it. People shared random photos they took without caring about picture quality and good lighting because people were just having fun documenting things that were important to them in that moment. And I miss that!

As social media has become more and more monetized people's motivations have changed, and now we're constantly performing for the consumption of others and online culture has become very much rooted in our physical presence so there’s no longer the divide between our 'offline' and 'online' selves. Even people's online handles are often their real name, which is WILD to me when you think of that internet paper trail following you around, and the fact that I've personally just always appreciated having the two worlds separate. I don't want my employer or people I don't really like finding my online space because it's MINE, and it would make me feel like I had to filter myself down if I felt like I was being judged or it, because I've been bullied enough in my life to know that people won't always come into our personal spaces with kind intentions. Our internet activities can so easily affect our offline lives now, and where are you supposed to escape to when you want to express something other than your combined online/offline self?

I’ve always had this desperate Anxiety that I’m not living my life to it’s fullest and I try to live up to others expectations of how I should be. I end up feeling like I either have to go all out to prove myself or reel myself in completely, only to then grow resentful of the box I've put myself in. I want to be less afraid of what I share, to be vulnerable and honest and unapologetic without feeling the expectations of strangers who don't even know me but think they do. I want to blog like we used to, with bright eyes and AA battery powered digital cameras, when pictures of skylines still seemed unique and you could just capture a moment and it was enough for the novelty of your photo being posted somewhere on the internet without any extra clout. We were impressed with any sort of like minded little corner we found ourselves in, small groups banded together sending clunky letters of admiration back and forth without any toxicity of lurking or judgement, or the fear of anyone coming into our spaces with mean intentions.

Anyway, I've been writing this on and off for like 2 days, I'm currently typing this while watching the worst adaptation of Dracula I've ever seen while trying to recover from a horrid flu. A lot is happening! Hope this was of interest to you!

Another year over, a new one just begun

I've always been really excited by New Year. I know it’s just a day like any other and time is a human construct, but I love anything that signifies clear endings and the feeling of a fresh start. 2019 has been a weird one overall and I've had a bit of a love-hate relationship with it. I've had some truly life changing experiences, but I've been battling myself a lot and been in a bit of a weird funk for the latter half. But at the same time I've got a pretty good idea of what I need to do to help myself, so I guess that's a pretty good place to be. I also think this time last year I was in such an optimistic place that it kind of skewed my expectations and made me look back on 2018 with rose coloured glasses, so this year could never compare which is ridiculous. Especially as a lot of amazing things have happened this year. The biggest of which was always going to be the fact that I finally achieved my life long dream of going to New York and seeing not one, but three shows on Broadway. I was also able to meet my favourite actor Aaron Tveit and he was everything I could of ever hoped he'd be (they say 'never meet your idols' but thankfully all of my experiences have been great ones so far!).

I also visited Disneyland Paris for the first time in years and had the best time meeting all of the characters around the park. I attended London Comic Con and dipped my toes into the world of cosplay, styling my own wig from scratch with no prior experience. I really made the most of travelling around my home country and visited Whitby, Liverpool, Manchester, York, Eden Camp, as well as multiple trips to London. I was able to go to the theatre 11 times in total, and saw Wicked x4, The Phantom of the Opera, Come From Away and High Fidelity in London, and Moulin Rouge x2, Wicked and Frozen on Broadway. I beat my anxiety and stage doored for the first time with the leaving cast of Wicked, a total on the whim moment as I only booked the ticket the day before.

I went down to London with my mum for my birthday and we ate at the Hard Rock Cafe two days after it opened without even knowing. I actually stuck with language learning and developed a pretty good grasp of Danish which has always been a lifetime goal of mine to be able to speak another language, but I never thought I had a head for it until I was able to prove myself wrong. I added lots of amazing things to my personal collections, especially Mika and Frozen. I completed two sketchbooks, and finished Inktober for the first time in my life. I went to the cinema more times than I ever have before in my entire life, 17 times in total (8 of which were just seeing Joker over and over, but still!) I even went to the cinema in France and saw my favourite movie in French.

Last year I wrote that I wanted to "continue to throw myself into the things that I'm passionate about and stop feeling apologetic about it all and stay enthusiastic and true to myself and my heart", and although my usual insecurity ate into that a bit, it's something I'm striving for in 2020 too as I believe having passion for what you enjoy and what you do is what will get you far in all aspects of life. Whilst I do have my long term goals that'll take a few years to happen, I'm starting 2020 much less sure of where I'll go than when I started 2019, but maybe that's OK. I may have less of a plan but I have plenty of options to try too, and that's pretty exciting!

You only have to read the lines, they're scribbly black and everything shines

I've been drawing a lot of portraits lately as I find it fun and it's good to draw things for me, but it's something I always feel a little unsure of sharing as although I'm proud of them I don't want people thinking it's part of my 'brand' as an illustrator. It's a whole side of art business that I struggle with honestly, as it feels nowadays like you have to have your one aesthetic and stick to it but I'd get so bored! And honestly I think it's good to be versatile. But saying that, I don't think I'd want to do portraits as commissions as it'd no doubt lead to drawing people I don't care about which wouldn't be fun for me, so I keep them as just a hobby.

I used to draw portraits quite a lot with pencils, but because I'm a perfectionist I hated them if they weren't super photo realistic and it really sucked the fun out of it. So last year I began drawing them with ballpoint pens, something that scared me silly at the beginning as it's so permanent so there's obviously no way of erasing if you make a mistake, but it's actually really liberating and I feel I've learnt a lot from being forced to work with my mistakes. Because these are just for fun, they're all in my sketchbook. The top is Joaquin Phoenix in Joker, as it's turned out to be my favourite movie of the year and I'm lowkey obsessed. Second is Mika which is my favourite of the three (look at those pinstripes!!), and lastly is Aaron Tveit which whilst I like, I had issues with my pen blobbing while I was drawing it (why do they do this though??)

And here's two other illustrations I've been working on. Above is from the Broadway adaptation of Moulin Rouge, and it's how they end Act 1 with Elephant Love Medley. I'm not keen on how the song has been reworked honestly, but visually it's amazing, and I had fun trying to translate specific people into my art style whilst still making it look like them, as usually I draw fictional characters so likeness isn't so important. And below is from the finale scene of Wicked, and uh, spoiler alert? But Fiyero gets turned into the Scarecrow and I've always felt like he gets vastly overlooked within fan circles when this is a huge thing he goes through and a major sacrifice. I've always felt particularly attached to Fiyero though after reading the novel, his character is a lot more developed in that so I guess if you haven't read it it's easy not to care about what happens to him as he doesn't have a lot of stage time.

Popular, I know about popular

I went down to London to see Wicked yesterday. It's my favourite musical, and I like to try and see it as often as I can but the last time was all the way back in August when I was in New York. I hadn't seen the current London cast at all as it changed back in July, and I really loved the previous cast so I was a little nervous but I really enjoyed it! Elphaba was especially amazing, possibly even my favourite?? Feels like a bold statement, but there were lots of little bits of her performance that she brought to Elphaba that really hit me emotionally that I've not seen other actresses do with the role. It was Nikki Bentley, I'll definitely be keeping an eye on other things she does too!

I didn't have any other plans for while I was in London other than a few specific stores I wanted to look in. I wanted to stock up on Leuchtturm sketchbooks as it's my go-to and they've changed the paper and binding method and I knew of a store with old stock, so I try and keep a collection going so I have back up. I also wanted to go to a HMV to see if they had anything Mika and if they had the Joker OST on vinyl (they didn't :( I've been waiting ages for it to be released and then I missed it!), and I wanted a new planner that I saw in Foyles when I was in London last time. It's based around goals and I love how this one has questions throughout it asking how you're on track, and each weekly spread has pre-printed habit trackers to fill in and stuff like that. I love organisation and keeping track and seeing my progress, so I think I'll really enjoy using this planner. I ended up walking 12 miles in all throughout the day, which is crazy!

Lose themselves in other times

I went to the antiques shop today as I haven't been in a while and I just love having a mosey round. It's a huge complex on an old RAF base with about 8 different antiques stores all in one area, and they have so many vintage things from all eras. Records, clothing, jewellery, hats, suitcases, home decor, old photos, and so on. I love flicking through all of the records and getting elbow deep through all of the clothes, it's fun to look around and fantasize about what my future forever home might look like.

I wanted this Pink Panther lamp so bad! I loved the Pink Panther cartoons when I was little.
There were way too many mannequins in this bit, it was creepy.

I always see a ton of neat things when I'm there, and naturally I couldn't resist bringing a few things home with me. I got this 70s wool throw (the yellow thing in the background) which I thought was really good value for £10 and thought it would suit my decor as my curtains are the same kind of golden yellow. I really love yellow, it makes me happy just looking at it. And I also got a new clown buddy!

Here he is with the party. I kind of unofficially collect these, I usually find them in thrift shops for £1-3 and I like rescuing them. Some I've fixed up their outfits or their paintwork to make them good as new, and I think they're cute! They're all the same maker as they have identical moulds, and I never knew who made them before as I've never seen them in their boxes so that's pretty cool that now I know! I don't usually like buying things in their original box as I then feel obligated to keep it as it's old. I know that's dumb, but it just seems a shame when it's survived so long, you know?