The Clouds Begin to Thunder

"Hello gentlemen, I'm touching her breast."

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 21:36:43 GMT

The moment I signed on today TWO people were IMing me telling me I needed to watch this.

Susan Blackwell is from [title of show], one of my most favorite musicals of all time, and she is HILARIOUS AND AWESOME. She got asked to be like, Broadway.com's reporter at this event, and it became like... one of their most-viewed videos of all time. There was a lot of licking, sniffing, and groping of Broadway superstars involved.

So they decided to give her her own show.

"In the premiere episode of her new talk show, Susan Blackwell enjoys breakfast in bed with Sutton Foster, a Central Park carriage ride with Jonathan Groff and a late dinner at Hooter's with Laura Benanti."

Jonathan Groff, as I've said a billion times before, is the one and only original Melchior Gabor of my canon, so This Is Relevant To My Interests even more than usual.

RANDOM

Sat, 12 Dec 2009 19:37:43 GMT

Did you know that Spring Awakening once had a sundae named after it? It looks like this.

No, we don't know how it relates to SA. We are open to theories. I think it had something to do with.. SA being daring... and the sundae being daring...

I think it looks like a spider.

Matt tried it, along with many other cast members at the time.

We also caught him wearing glasses, which has never been seen before or since, while eating it.

I don't remember -- no, I remember what made me think of that sundae.

Krissy says:
*Norwegian cast of SA was just on TV.
*Singing BoL.
Arqueete *naf says:
*is it awful
Krissy says:
*No.... just... weird.
*It wasn't gorgeous, but it didn't suck... XD
*I tihnk Melchior was wearing eyeliner.
Arqueete *naf says:
*...XDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD
Krissy says:
*And Moritz wears glassees.
Arqueete *naf says:
*stereotyping
*I always felt like Melchior should wear glasses. It'd be classy.

There have been quite a few Melchiors who wear glasses off-stage.

Jake Epstein wears glasses at stagedoor a lot.

Jon Groff wears glasses occasionally too.

Edit: msmoocow contributes that former tour Melchior understudy Perry Sherman also wears glasses.

Matt Doyle was once spotted wearing glasses while eating this sundae that looked like some sort of insect -- SNAKE EATS TAIL.

Melchior and Sex (so "Spring Awakening"? -- SHUT UP.)

Wed, 02 Dec 2009 06:15:45 GMT

Today the Spring Awakening tour Twitter brought up an article in the Denver Post pondering the controversy surrounding Spring Awakening and how as a society we are so numb to seeing sex scenes in movies and on TV, but as soon as you try and do the same thing live on stage people think you're crazy. (When my mom told my aunt about the show she couldn't believe it was even legal to do that. It's not real, guys.)

ANYWAY but I wasn't going to talk about that. I was going to talk about this quote:

Wendla is attracted to a boy named Melchior, who has read many books about sex but lacks any actual human experience to understand its psychological complexity.

Brava, Denver Post.

Epstein describes [the hayloft scene] as "kind of beautiful and loving, and yet it's also kind of rough and raw and filled with anger. There's so much to it. It's totally compelling and human."

Brava Jake Epstein (I LOVE YOU I'M SO GLAD YOU WERE MY MELCHIOR -- THREE TIMES).

There was this review I read... it might've been like, a visitor comment on a professional review of... the London production, maybe? It was this couple who said that they saw the show and they hated it. They said that by the end of the show they hated Melchior and they thought he was a rapist. They didn't know how in the world the show can make this message of sexual freedom when Melchior and Wendla's sexual misadventures lead to Wendla getting pregnant and then dying -- doesn't that defeat the entire thing?

I think what I found funny about it is that they DID get at least some of the major themes of the story -- they just thought that it was awful because they thought their opinions were the opposite of what the show was going for and that what they were seeing were plot holes.

In the musical there was a conscious effort to make Melchior more likeable.

"Whenever the play is done, Moritz walks away with it because he's the most sympathetic character, but he dies half way through so that's kind of a problem if you're going to do the whole story, right? You can't have your lead sort of just... kill himself and then show up at the very very last scene. So my instinct was then to make Melchior our hero, and if you're going to have a hero's journey then we have to respect him and care about him. ... And what if [Melchior and Wendla] actually had real affection for each other? Really loved each other? Then we get a -- it's not Romeo and Juliet by any means, but then there's something between them that we're rooting for. So that when he is bereft of both his best friend and this young woman with whom he imagines spending a life, that he's really -- that's the first time that he thinks that he'd like to -- why bother to go on living? As opposed to the cynical kid that we meet in the [original play] who couldn't care less early on."

-- Michael Mayer (5/17/07 at the Made on a Mac presentation -- LOOK AT ME CITING MY SOURCES)

I think one of the side effects of that is even moreso than in the play, since there is this clear sense of Melchior being the guy we're supposed to be rooting for, we get used to the idea that we're supposed to also agree with him. It's sort of a trap because you start to think, yeah, Melchior, he's super smart, he knows what he's talking about -- yeah, no.

If Wendla and Moritz are teaching us that holding back information about sex and puberty from teenagers doesn't do them any good, Melchior is teaching us that information by itself isn't good enough either. Books can't raise our children for us. So no, random people who hated the show -- you don't even need to like Melchior, even if Michael Mayer would like you to. (I never used to like Melchior either.) (Sometimes I still don't.)

Melchior has a very... oversimplified view of sex, from an emotional and moral standpoint? Today we have problems with sex being everywhere and so people (teens (and bad fanfic writers...) especially) sometimes have overidealized ideas of sex, etc. Melchior has the problem that he has no real examples and no one to tell him how he should think or feel about it other than don't think about it at all which strikes him as wrong. So he tries to look at it from this very logical, natural standpoint, and he just can't understand what the big deal behind no sex before marriage is -- what difference does a piece of paper make? What's the big deal, period? He sort of naively assumes that it's all that straightforward. His first hint otherwise is the beating scene, which, you know, should be, and at first Melchior sees, as having a very logical and obvious solution: don't do it. And yet he does it. And he's very upset and confused about how in the moment it didn't seem that easy ("we were confused" is his words) -- he gets a whole song (The Mirror-Blue Night) about how messed up he feels after that.

And then, of course, the hayloft, where, actually... interesting note that in the beating scene, Wendla is upset and coming from an emotional place and she talks Melchior, who keeps saying no, into beating her -- that's how she looks to make sense of what she's feeling. In the hayloft, Melchior is upset and coming from an emotional place and he talks Wendla, who keeps saying no, into having sex with him -- and that's how he's trying to make sense of what he's feeling. Both are not good situations, though Melchior's has worse consequences, and beyond that, has some serious moral issues. A lot of people say he raped her and I don't think that's an incorrect assessment. But I don't think we should treat Melchior like a rapist. He's just as confused as anyone in this story, he just... Matt Doyle called him "intelligent to a fault". The fact that he knows so much really doesn't save him as much as it gives him the potential to get into particularly bad spots.

SO THERE.

Riddle

Tue, 01 Dec 2009 03:42:03 GMT

So I follow pretty much everyone in the touring cast of Spring Awakening on Twitter...

ChristyAltomare
Kayla ridle me this - what wears black and blue and is awaiting death all over
11 minutes ago from UberTwitter

ChristyAltomare
Wennndddlllaaaa
5 minutes ago from UberTwitter

kaylafoster
@christyaltomare...OMG I didn't even know! that's such a tricky riddle! what a trickster!
4 minutes ago from Echofon

They are special people.

Brazil

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 09:44:39 GMT

So back when I was talking about the weird promo images Spring Awakening Norway was producing, I said that a lot of productions had a serious sex sells thing going on with their ads (and I called out Brazil for it specifically) but that Norway was blowing my mind by having promo photos consisting of the entire cast in their underwear, piled on top of each other, and covered in dirt and dead flowers. Really. Really. Really.

I take it back a little.

...because Brazil has a weird let's-pile-everyone-on-top-of-each-other set of pictures too. Even if theirs is substantially more clothed (unlike some of their other promo photos...). And more sanitary. And does not make me think of Melchior/Moritz/Wendla threesomes.

I just thought, "I wonder if anyone's ever written that?" and then I remembered rule 34. Nevermind. (If you're thinking, BUT WENDLA AND MORITZ ARE DEAD, then you must not read fanfiction.)

But then curiosity got to me so I wanted to see if anyone HAS posted that publicly. I hit up FFN and, no, searches do not suggest that such a thing has been posted. While I was searching my eyes jumped to this at the end of a description: "Melchior/Moritz, Anna/Wendla, Melchior/Ilse, Moritz/Ilse" and my brain went WHO THE HELL WOULD WRITE SOMETHING LIKE THAT.

And then I saw: by Arqueete

OH OOPS. I GUESS I WOULD. (For the record it's a series of one-shots, not like, a single narrative.)

Also, out of the 9 fics that contain the words "Melchior" "Moritz" and "Wendla" in their descriptions on FFN, one third are fics written by musicisgone and I. I'm not entirely sure what this means, but considering there's apparently 237 Spring Awakening fanfics on FFN as we speak, it seems like it must say something... Rachelle and I didn't write 1/3 of SA fanfic, but we did write at least 1/3 of the GOOD SA fanfic. OOOOOOOOH.

BACK TO BRAZIL

idk about these Brazil pics. Their cast is attractive, these pictures have a cool sepia-toned vibe, and there are a couple I sort of love, like this Wendla picture, and I love that the cast all looks young. The girls a little more than the boys, but that usually happens in SA.

But then again, no promo photos from any production of SA (the whole set is here for the record) should result in responses such as:

Arqueete *naf says:
*POPSICLES, REALLY
Jaymee says:
*NORWAY MAY BE THE WINNER, BUT DAMN IF BRAZIL DIDN'T GIVE THEM A RUN FOR THEIR WTF MONEY

Rachelle Dulcinea *naf says:
*WHY IS ILSE NAKED
*WTF MARIANA
Arqueete *naf says:
*Melchior: In situations like that, you just don't ask why.
Rachelle Dulcinea *naf says:
*WHO THE FUCK IS INA

Isn't Jonathan Groff gay?

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 01:52:04 GMT

Tonight is a Glee night, and so I shall post a funny Lea Michele video.

The Best of SA_Lulz

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:09:48 GMT

So. Spring Awakening, right. I like it. It's great.

It's also pretty... depressing from basically the middle of act one onward (as Seth Rudetsky once said, "If you don't know Spring Awakening, essentially, A) Devastating B) Fabulous") and we've all liked it for a very long time now. I think people like us (being... me and musicisgone and our MSN chat friends) can only like something that sad and watch it so many times before, well, things like our sa_lulz community and the Melchior Gabor Twitter happen. We are bad, bad people who are being very disrespectful to real life, serious issues.

...we try and remind ourselves as we lol inappropriately.

After spamming musicisgone with old macros tonight, I thought I'd share with you all the best of sa_lulz (well, the best of the macros at SA Lulz that people who read this journal INCLUDING YOU LOSERS WHO HAVEN'T WATCHED THE SHOW YET would understand without explanation)

(Those are the Bad Idea Bears from Avenue Q for you non theater types)

I AM CUT OFF FROM THE INTERNETS WORLD

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 07:05:20 GMT

Just putting it out there to the world that for whatever headdesky reason, I am not receiving e-mails as of this morning. Period. This happened to me once before and lasted a few days or something and was obnoxious. If it doesn't come back soon, I'll like... switch my LJ e-mails over to working ones or something, maybe, idk, but in the mean time I haven't gotten notifications from any replies from today or last night.

If for some odd reason you need to e-mail me, um... you should be able to reach me at arqueete at gmail.com

What, you say? That's all? E-mail, straight and to the point? There's not going to suddenly be an LJ cut to some videos or something now?

Quick, a picture of Matt Doyle's dog!

There.

Update: A couple e-mails from early morning on the 11th are trickling in. This is a good sign.

HELLS TO THE YES

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:56:42 GMT

People of LJ, last night was a busy night for Mr. Matt Doyle.

And actually got to, gasp, do some ACTING on Gossip Girl other than "stands there and is the boyfriend" for once! ...and then is gone. Matt said on Twitter that he has no idea if he'll ever be back.

msmoocow also quoted this article about the episode to me:

*But we must look forward. Maybe once Eric's heart has mended and he stops playing Taylor Swift's "Forever and Always" and lurking around Jay Brannan shows in Hoboken like I did all summer, he can finally blossom as a character -- and hey, maybe find an even better boyfriend. You know, one that he actually kisses. Since Connor's already gone through Jesse Swensen and Matt Doyle, we assume his taste is strictly Spring Awakening, so might I suggest cutie Kyle Riabko, who played Melchior in the summer tour cast? Or if Little E really wants to step it up in the steam department, how about Jonathan B. Wright, whose cheek bones I pretty much never get tired of looking at? Or hey, for some English lovin', Jamie Blackley, from the London tour, who, I can tell you personally, is a fox.

There have been 12 ever ensemble members/swings (not counting the adults) in Spring Awakening on Broadway. So far one third of them have been on Gossip Girl. Plus one non-ensemble SA cast member. Gossip Girl is the new Law and Order for theater teens.

NEXT.

We've been very excited for Matt to sing some Kerrigan/Lowdermilk. And then he did. A YouTube commenter kindly says:

You know, I really have always liked Matt Doyle, but I never got the extreme hype. This prooved to me that he really is as talented as all the fangirls scream. Still wish I'd seen his Melchior.

YOU BETTER BELIEVE IT.

You're welcome.

BUENOOOOO IT'S MEXICAN MELCHIOR

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 22:16:12 GMT

asd;adakdmaldnadnlasd

So I just made a post yesterday and I don't think anyone here cares about this besides the people who've already seen it -- well, I don't know if musicisgone has seen it yet but undoubtedly as soon as she signs on she'll be getting the link instead of a hi from me.

QUICK BACKSTORY TIME. So when Spring Awakening opened on Broadway (in November 2006), they have two Melchior understudies, right, Jonathan B Wright and Robert Hager. In March-ish Matt Doyle (that's my boy) gets hired, Jonathan no longer understudies Melchior, and now it's Robi and Matt. Jonathan Groff (the original Melchior) has to be like, unable to get out of bed before he's willing to miss a show, so it isn't until July that he misses ONE day (and it isn't because of illness, he just takes a day off for a family thing back home). And of course, they put Matt on for Melchior. In August, Robi leaves the cast, never having gone on for Melchior, even though he was understudying the role long before Matt even appeared.

And since that day we have often pondered what BUENOOOOO IT'S MELCHIOR (inside joke about Robi's Mexican pride) would be like.

There's these At This Performance concerts where understudies from popular Broadway shows perform a couple songs. Since now Robi is understudying Conrad Birdie in Bye Bye Birdie (where Matt is playing Hugo), he got invited to perform at this one. And for one of his songs he did Left Behind, which is probably Melchior's biggest song in SA.

BUENOOOOO IT'S ROBI

Actually, with the original Wendla understudy, the too-effing-gorgeous-and-talented Krysta Rodriguez, we could've potentially had Hispanic Melchior/Wendla if they both had stuck around longer.

Actually Krysta is now going to be in the Addam's Family musical... and Matt's boyfriend Wes is playing her love interest.

CRAZINESS.

That is all.

Press Reeltastics

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 05:55:01 GMT

I was going to make a post today as a tribute to the London cast of Spring Awakening in response to this here picture... but then the tour cast went and put their new press footage (as they have a new Melchior AND Moritz now so their old clips were looking a liiiiittle outdated -- which means the new clips have the exact cast musicisgone and I saw twice in Milwaukee!) up on YouTube. AND YOU KNOW I CAN'T PASS THAT UP.

I'll admit, I'm a little disappointed by the audio on these clips -- it's not very well balanced, IMO, you can't hear the band enough and therefore you hear the singers TOO much. And the performances are a little lackluster. But I nitpick. When I make my tribute post to Spring Awakening London I can gush to you about how much better their promo is than anything the American productions have produced.

HERE'S THEIR NEW MONTAGE:

Here's Mama Who Bore Me (Reprise):

Bitch of Living:

Personally, I'm just pleased they bothered to shell out for new press reels. When any show has outdated pics and press reels it kind of bugs me.

Here's (a much longer collection of) some of the press footage that was released of the original cast with Lea, Jon, and John. Their montage here has BoL in the background, but that's an edit made by the site that posted it -- they had the BLAH BLAH BLAH montage-ing just like the tour does now. Which I have mixed feelings about, honestly, whenever they do that, because... people are like WHY ARE THEY JUMPING AROUND LIKE THAT. It's weird outside of the context of the song as a whole. ANYWAY.

M&Ms

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 02:33:47 GMT

So, the Spring Awakening tour vlog, Totally Trucked, has a history of some... pretty strange videos, especially when now-former Melchior Kyle Riabko was involved. Actually almost every time Kyle was involved.

But I don't know, Kyle might have to watch out, because this one is pretty odd.

Also, Christy is gorgeous.

Also, musicisgone and I saw that performance.

Also LMAO WHAT

Where I go, when I go there...

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 01:10:56 GMT

Guys. There is no Glee tonight.

How am I supposed to deal with this?

I don't want to watch baseball. Glee is the only thing I currently watch on TV.

Instead I'll post this video of Lea Michele singing the shit out of a one-woman arrangement of Touch Me, which is the song that Melchior's username comes from.

The song in the context of the show is a big ensemble number, but there is also a duet version of Touch Me that the tour pulls out for promo events a lot. Matt Doyle did it with my favorite Wendla, Christy Altomare (as you can imagine Matt pulls out his crazy falsetto almost to the point of getting old), once, while he was in Toronto subbing for Kyle as Melchior. Believe it or not, though, even though Kyle is preeeeetty low on my list of favorite Melchiors, he started and probably is the master of the Touch Me duet. You give him a guitar and ask him to do something acoustic and he thrives, I'll definitely give him that.

You're welcome.

PUPPIES

Sun, 25 Oct 2009 04:03:39 GMT

Jason: "He can't help to laugh a little at the memory; [Melchior] looked like a wet little puppy. A Victorian puppy."

PUPPIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

I was going to make a serious analysis sort of post today. This seemed more important.

MAMAAAA WHO BORE ME

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 12:04:27 GMT

I was trying to hunt down an old page on Broadway.com which has since vanished, and in the process of beating the search function to death I came across an article they had for Mother's Day 2008 where they ranked mother characters in musicals as "dreams" or "nightmares." No SA adults were ranked, but in the introduction:

And what to make of Melchior's mom? She may be the nicest adult in Spring Awakening, but isn't that a bit like saying Hannibal Lecter was the nicest serial killer in The Silence of the Lambs?

I loled a little.

Melchior's mom is one of my mom's favorite characters in the show. (Melchior, however, she has little sympathy for. She did finally admit that he's "intriguing" but she'd still "never want to be friends with him" because he's too arrogant.) SO THERE'S SOME INSIGHT INTO MY FAMILY.

Speaking of insights into families. The character of Melchior's mother was inspired by the playwright Frank Wedekind's mother.

His mother hated Spring Awakening.

Those are your fun facts for the day.

Extended Run

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 22:35:46 GMT

So, the Spring Awakening tour has a vlog, right. Well, for the first leg of the tour, they also had a web series called Extended Run that one of the ensemble members created, which was like the fake backstage lives of the cast.

During the month Matt was temporarily playing Melchior on tour, he got a couple cameos in Extended Run. That I meant to post about when they happened but I was too busy posting about boys kissing I guess.

I wonder how many people just eagerly clicked that link and then were disappointed to see that the video in question has been taken down.

ANYWAY. For the lulz, here's a compilation of the few scenes relating to Matt.

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 12:48:13 GMT

This post comes in TWOOOO PARTS.

Tonight was opening night for the revival of Bye Bye Birdie (where Matt, my Melchior, is playing Hugo). Which, BTW, I just skimmed the reviews that came in so far and... it's getting burned. Pretty bad. (Only a couple mentioned Matt in passing, but comments about him were always positive!)

During the show he tweeted this pic while waiting to go on.

Rachelle Dulcinea *naf says:
*YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
*I showed Patta earlier
*This was his opinion
*Patta *naf says:
*MATT DOYLE DID YOU BRING ENOUGH GORGEOUS FOR THE REST OF THE CLASS

Speaking of things Matt Doyle is doing, a pic is out of him on Gossip Girl. I look forward to... his scenes being put up on YouTube eventually. I like Matt Doyle. I don't like him enough to watch a show just because he occasionally appears on it usually for under a minute. BUT IF ANYONE ELSE WATCHES IT YOU CAN LOOK FORWARD TO MORE OF HIM.

LASTLY, so, I do play Wendla somewhere else, and my PB for her is another understudy, even more obscure than Matt is to Melchior -- Eryn Murman. Matt and Eryn only went on as Melchior and Wendla together a couple times ever, but Eryn's got a website, and on it, and in her photos section...

Fun Fact: Eryn is (was?) dating the other late-Broadway Melchior understudy, Jesse Swenson. As far as anyone knows, they are the only couple to have played Melchior and Wendla.

I had been saying in the In the Flesh post that it gave me a kind of satisfaction that Groff at least acknowledged the iffy moral situation surrounding the sex scene in Spring Awakening. If you're not aware of the controversy surrounding this scene... I won't get into it, but it has to do with Melchior being pushy about it and the fact that he's aware that, uh, unprotected sex can lead to pregnancy, but Wendla isn't.

While looking for something else I just stumbled upon this interview a fan got to do with the last Broadway Melchior, Hunter Parrish.

L: There was some debate on the "sex scene" if it's rape or if it's consensual so I wanted to know what your take was...

H: I could see why you won this contest now! Very good question. In the original book, it is seen as more of a rape. Steven Sater, in looking at that, it was obvious to everyone that you can't create a show in which the lead character rapes a girl, so why would anyone care about him in the end if you know he did that? So, they took some creativity obviously within the storyline and I think - if you can tell the way that the cast does it, which is always different. But, in my opinion, the way we do it now, he loves her and he's very aggressive, but it would be hard to be at angry at him and to totally blame him for doing this against her wishes, which he wasn't. At the same time, he is very aggressive though.

Geeze, Hunter isn't a very eloquent speaker but THANK YOU FOR BEING HONEST ABOUT IT. While I think that the scene is realistic and can be partly forgiven in context, I do not advocate this projecting at SA's teenage fanbase that it is somehow an ideal situation. Michael Mayer (the director), ironically, seems to be the worst culprit in that department. (Well, him and Rosie O'Donnell -- DON'T EVEN GET ME STARTED ON THAT. musicisgone knows what I mean.)

THAT IS ALL.

Man, you just can't call your love your own

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 01:32:48 GMT

The original Melchior (and the first Melchior I ever saw), Jonathan Groff, ~~finally~~ came out of the closet this weekend (at an event that also sort-of former Melchior from the 2001 workshop, Hair's Gavin Creel, was prominently involved with!).

I posted this once way back, but it seems only appropriate to repost.

A gay rights variation of Totally Fucked, with Groff as Melchior/"Harvey" and John Gallagher Jr as Moritz/"Melvin" (and with my Melchior, Matt Doyle, as the soloist in the center).

Harts to you, Groff. Harts to you.

Just being a fangirl

Tue, 06 Oct 2009 07:04:52 GMT

It was almost a year ago when I first heard Matt sing "A Change Is Gonna Come"... and it was like... we always knew Matt was a good singer since obviously the only things anyone knew him from were musicals... but his performance of that song at that benefit concert was just like... I know I must've had it on repeat for hours in the days following that concert. And I sure as hell wasn't the only one.

I listened to it again tonight on a whim... and like... Just the falsetto around 2:25 still blows my mind.

I just needed to post it again. I'm not even going to put it under a cut because idec. ~~And all shall know the wonder~~ The world must be educated to the existence of this.

(msmoocow and I agreed that this one was technically better, but she advised me to post the above on the grounds of being more visually appealing)

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 07:29:45 GMT

So guys.

Two things are coming to my town this October.

I'll give you a hint. The first one sounds like Bachelle and the other one sounds like Bring Bawakening.

THAT'S RIGHT musicisgone is coming to visit me again for a few days and we're not only seeing Spring Awakening, THE WHOLE THING THIS TIME (I don't know if I talked about our experience in Chicago... but we unfortunately missed like half the first act), BUT. Today we called and got the elusive ON STAGE SEATS.

That's right, ladies and gentlemen. We are seeing Spring Awakening TWICE and one of those times we get to SIT ON THE STAGE. My dad's going to KILL US when he finds out we bought these tickets but I DON'T EVEN CARE RIGHT NOW THIS IS LIKE MY DREAM COME TRUE.

Where the top of the image is the back of the stage and the bottom is downstage. Rachelle and I will be in BB 14 and 12 and my mom, sister, and cousin will be in BB 2, 4, and 6. LET ME TRY AND EXPLAIN THIS HERE CHART SO YOU UNDERSTAND HOW AWESOME THIS IS. So, the brown squares represent where the characters sit when they aren't singing (sometimes). They move around all the time, hence why more than one character is listed for most seats. The red seats are the ensemble -- they're the understudies, dressed in every day clothes, who pretend to be regular audience members but then jump up and start harmonizing in certain songs (the names listed were the ensemble members back on Broadway). Someone in my personal LJ who has sat in BB12 broke it down for me:

Taylor (or whoever plays Moritz) will sit [next to you] at the beginning and [Ernst] and [Otto] will be sitting in front of you. [Hanschen] will sit there during Dark I Know Well (and will rock out massively which is epic when Krista is on [for the ensemble seat in BB16]). [Ernst] will sit there during Guilty Ones and will bump into you. [Ilse] and [Thea] will sit there sometime during the second act. It's EPIC!!!!!!!!

I am so excited. So excited. And no, I'm not sitting next to Melchior, unfortunately. He doesn't sit there for very long anyway.

Drive-by Play Quoting

Fri, 18 Sep 2009 12:22:19 GMT

I can't sleep. And I had a bad day today. So that's why instead of replying to the tags waiting on me or something productive I'm gonna share some quotations from ~the play~.

Melchior of the play is not necessarily Melchior of the musical -- for one, in the musical he's meant to be more likeable. But from the standpoint of RP and fanfiction I find the play pretty fascinating (though also confusing, as it's pretty crazy, especially by the end -- and though I analyze a lot of stuff, that doesn't mean I'm good at it), just because since it doesn't have to make time for songs, many of the scenes are like Spring Awakening: The Extended Version, and, you know, it comes from the same time period as its characters, unlike the musical.

SO HERE'S SOME OF MY FAVORITE LINES.

MELCHIOR: Come back to my room. In three-quarters of an hour I'll whip through the Homer, the equations, and two exercises. I'll slip in a few harmless mistakes for you, and this job's done. Mama will make us some of her lemonade, and we'll have a nice relaxed talk about reproduction.

MORITZ: I can't. --I can't relax on a subject like reproduction. If you want to do me a favor, give me your explanations in writing. Write down what you know. Make it as brief and clear as you can and stick it among my books during gym. I'll take it home without knowing I've got it. I'll come upon it unexpectedly. I'll have no choice but to glance through it . . . with a weary eye . . . and if it's absolutely necessary, you could add a few illustrations in the margin.

MELCHIOR: --I don't want my bliss given to me as charity!

MORITZ: But why not?

MELCHIOR: I don't want anything I haven't had to fight for.

SNAP.

MELCHIOR: What I wrote [in the paper Moritz asked for] is fact, no more, no less. Facts well known to you.

THE HEADMASTER: Scoundrel!!

MELCHIOR: Please show me one offense against morals in the document.

THE HEADMASTER: Do you imagine I shall let myself be made a clown of by you? ... You have as little respect for the dignity of your assembled teachers as you have sense of decency! You are flouting the instinctive human feeling for modesty and discretion! You are flouting the moral order itself!

MR. GABOR: [Wendla's mother] wrung her hands and asked me what she should do. I suggested she might stop her fifteen-year-old daughter from hanging around haylofts.

MELCHIOR: Farewell, Moritz! Thank you for coming. How many untroubled, happy days we've had in the fourteen years! In the years ahead, things may go well with me or badly, I may become a different man ten times over, but, come what may, I shall never forget you.

MORITZ'S GHOST: Thanks, thanks, dear heart.

I ~~ship~~ love them.

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 08:27:56 GMT

SO THAT MATT DOYLE KID. WHAT THE HELL IS HE DOING THESE DAYS ANYWAY?

He's in the revival of Bye Bye Birdie on Broadway, playing Hugo. They performed "One Boy" as a part of Broadway on Broadway today and he is ADORABLE. On his blog he said: "Hugo is a far cry from Melchior Gabor! It's been a lot of fun going full out with such broad musical theatre comedy." lol melchior

And he doesn't look like as much of a pedophile next to really-15-years-old Allie Trim as we worried he would. (Despite having played a lot of 15-year-olds lately, Melchior included, Matt is actually... 22 I think?)

He also says his character on Gossip Girl will be returning this season. Idk he has to appear for more than a couple lines per episode before I'll be willing to watch any Gossip Girl to see him.

Also, on an unrelated note, people, please tell me it's a bad idea to want to app another teenage boy here? Sigh.

Sun, 06 Sep 2009 05:08:29 GMT

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 11:34:50 GMT

Jamie Muscato (Wendla), Chris Barton (Frau Bergmann), Richard Southgate (Doctor Von Brausepulver/Bonus Background Pantomimes)

Hot.

(It's extra funny because Jamie and Chris were the two Melchior understudies)

Mon, 31 Aug 2009 11:56:34 GMT

SO EVERYONE'S DOING THIS PERSONALITY TEST THING AND I AM ALL FOR JUMPING ON THE MEME BANDWAGON LADIES AND GENTLEMEN.

Melchior is an INTJ.

INTJs are "Masterminds".

Masterminds tend to be much more definite and self-confident than other Rationals, having usually developed a very strong will. ... Masterminds are highly theoretical, but they insist on looking at all available data before they embrace an idea, and they are suspicious of any statement that is based on shoddy research, or that is not checked against reality.

To outsiders, INTJs may appear to project an aura of "definiteness", of self-confidence. ... its source lies in the specialized knowledge systems that most INTJs start building at an early age.

... many INTJs do not readily grasp the social rituals; for instance, they tend to have little patience and less understanding of such things as small talk and flirtation (which most types consider half the fun of a relationship). ... Perhaps the most fundamental problem, however, is that INTJs really want people to make sense. :-) This sometimes results in a peculiar naiveté, paralleling that of many Fs -- only instead of expecting inexhaustible affection and empathy from a romantic relationship, the INTJ will expect inexhaustible reasonability and directness.

I don't know. I guess people are always more complicated than these test things. I do find it interesting that it says that the fundamental problem with INTJs is they "really want people to make sense" -- I think part of Melchior's problem, being a teenager especially, is that he doesn't do this to other people as harshly as he does it to himself. It seems to upset him deeply when he feels things that he doesn't think make sense. (Good thing he never has to deal with PMS amirite).

I'm mostly thinking of how he's very shaken by the whole beating Wendla thing -- she tries to get him to talk about it but he's too distressed and tells her to gtfo (Wendla never really accepts no for an answer, but then again, neither does Melchior). When he doesn't want to analyze shit with you is when you really know you've broken Melchior. GOOD JOB.

I also did Melchior's BFF Moritz just for kicks, and interestingly enough he ended up an ISFJ -- Watson. "... ISFJs are often overworked, and as a result may suffer from psychosomatic illnesses. ... Like most Is, ISFJs have a few, close friends. ... One ISFJ trait that is easily misunderstood by those who haven't known them long is that they are often unable to either hide or articulate any distress they may be feeling." Eeyup.

I tried to do Wendla too but ironically, considering I play her elsewhere, I find her difficult to pin down and I kept getting results that weren't as good.