#[ theatre. ] matilda

[ameliadoesstuff]

ninjago & musicals

[pawnmower]

Has anyone noticed that in a lot of musicals, the shift from act I to act II is VIOLENT. Like it’s honestly comical.

My favorite examples are probably Wicked and Matilda. Like, Matilda goes from cute coming of age to a traumatized, abused, and literally MAGICAL stick-it-to-the-man.

Wicked is more of like a tonal shift but it’s still absurd. Elphaba goes from somewhat quirky, different smart girl to animal rights activist against the government to a flying MENACE that has fully given up on humanity, except for two people, one of which was almost burned at the stake and is no longer technically part of humanity.

[lux-et-astra]

words musical theatre people can spell:

uncoupled

supercalifragilisticexpialidocious

revenge

syzygy

chimerical

words musical theatre people can't spell:

sorry (how many Rs again?)

revolting (who needs a g on the end)

vug (i overcomplicated, dads!)

[davidtennantgenderenvy]

ROLES I WANT DAVID TENNANT TO PLAY IN MUSICALS: THE MASTERLIST

Okay so I've divided this into three categories, which you shall see below!

Roles I Think David Could/Should Play NOW:

Charlie Guiteau in Assassins

someone in Brigadoon bc it would be funny

The Emcee in Cabaret

Ryuk in Death Note

The Man In The Chair in The Drowsy Chaperone

The Dysquith Family in A Gentleman's Guide to Love And Murder

Herbie in Gypsy

Hades in Hadestown

Frollo in Hunchback of Notre Dame (okay give him like five years)

The Baker in Into The Woods

Lord Chancellor in Iolanthe

Albin or Georges in La Cage Aux Folles (either one as long as the other is played by Michael Sheen)

Trunchbull in Matilda OKAY HEAR ME OUT (he could also do Mr Wormwood)

Henry Higgins in My Fair Lady

Fagin in Oliver

Tateh in Ragtime

Riff Raff OR Frank N Furter in Rocky Horror

Shakespeare in Something Rotten

Squidward in SpongeBob (im so serious)

Sweeney Todd (utterly delusional but I need it to happen)

The Wizard in Wicked

Roles I Think David Would Have Nailed When He Was Younger

The Balladeer in Assassins

anyone in Cats please it would be so funny (especially Munkustrap)

Connor Murphy in Dear Evan Hansen (like Campbell era come ON)

Motel in Fiddler on the Roof

Marvin in Falsettos (he MIGHT get away with that now not sure)

Monty in Gentleman's Guide

J.P. Finch in How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying

Molina in Kiss of the Spider Woman

Emmet in Legally Blonde

Seymour in Little Shop of Horrors

Edgar Allan Poe in Nevermore

Leo Frank in Parade

Narrator/Cat in the Hat in Seussical

Georg in She Loves Me

any character Christian Borle played in Spamalot

Tobias Ragg in Sweeney Todd

Roles David Quite Doesn't Have The Instrument For But I Would Watch Him Do Them Anyway Bc He Would Act The Hell Out Of Them:

Any Elder in The Book of Mormon (Younger)

Robert in Bridges of Madison County

Bobby in Company (Younger)

Jervis in Daddy Long Legs (Younger)

Lucheni in Elisabeth (Younger)

or death. Rudolph too tbh

Bruce Bechdel in Fun Home

Edward Rochester in Jane Eyre

Henry Jekyll/Edward Hyde (younger)

Judas in Jesus Christ Superstar (younger)

Javert in Les Miserables

Christian in Moulin Rouge (Younger)

Pierre in Great Comet (this one actually kills me bc he and Phileas are so similar)

OR ANATOLE HOLY CRAP

Gabe in Next to Normal (Younger)

Erik in Phantom of the Opera

Mark Cohen in Rent (younger)

Noel Gruber or Ricky Potts in Ride the Cyclone (younger)

Archibald Craven in The Secret Garden

Joe/Josephine in Some Like It Hot

BURRS IN THE WILD PARTY OH I WISH THIS WERE REALISTIC IT WOULD BE SO GOOD

GOD this is long please spill the opinions so this was worth it

[snekjoy]

The good (matilda 2022) the bad (dear evan hansen 2021) and the ugly (cats 2019)

[wa3v3y]

Musicals ABC

Help me fill this in more! It’s pinned until we finish :3

A ~ Adams Family / A Chorus Line / Anything goes*

B ~ Be More Chill / Beetlejuice / Book of Mormon

C ~ Chicago / Come From Away* / Cabaret*

D ~ Dear Evan Hansen / Dream Girls

E ~ Epic* / Elegies*

F ~ Funny Girl / Falsettos

G ~ Groundhog Day*

H ~ Hadestown / Hamilton / Heathers / Hairspray

I ~ In the Heights / Illinoise / Into the Woods*

J ~ Jagged Little Pill

K ~ Kinky Boots*

L ~ Little Shop of Horrors / Legally Blonde / Les Mis

M ~ Merrily We Roll Along / Matilda / Mean Girls

N ~ Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812

O ~ Octect*

P ~ Parade*

Q ~ Queen of the Mist* / Avenue Q?*

R ~ Ride the Cyclone / Rocky Horror Picture Show / Rent

S ~ Sweeney Todd / Something Rotten / Singing in the Rain / Six

T ~ Tianamen / The Color Purple / The Wiz / The Prom / Tootsie

U ~ Urinetown

V ~ Victor Victoria

W ~ Waitress / Wicked / Wonderland

X ~ Xanadu*

Y ~ You're a Good Man Charlie Brown*

Z ~ Zombie Prom*

Num ~ 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee / 36 Questions / 18mm

*Thank you to other contributors: @forgthetheaterkidgthetheaterkid

@sondheim-girly

@lavaaaaaaaaaaa

@chickensoupbmc

@scarletbeast

@kaleidoscopiccc

@autumnstormsablowin

I tagged everything cause I was bored

[real-odark]

i had a weird dream that matilda and ocean met and they started talking bout books 😭😭

HELP???? ive never seen matilda so i cannot vouch for that girl but ocean😭😭😭 stay in school dont smoke!!!!

[touloserrrr]

[haveyouseenthismusical]

[saintsenara]

Hi! I just wanted to ask: what advice would you give someone who wants to start writing fanfiction for the 1st time, without any real writing experience? Have a nice day!

thank you very much for the ask, anon!

i'm always honoured to be identified as someone who might have something meaningful to say about writing - and so i always worry about doing justice to questions like this without coming across as being flippant.

because i don't think its ever worth giving advice on writing style or techniques, because these are so inherently subjective. i am an unabashed plantser - i have a vague idea of how i expect a story to go [and i always skip to the ending first, harry burns style], but i let the muses take me where they will otherwise - and this obviously affects everything else about my writing process: whether i like to stick to a specific posting schedule [no]; where i begin in a scene [dialogue]; whether i prefer short or long pieces [yes]; what sort of themes i want to look at; my attitude towards the source material [i believe in the value of canon coherence, but i'm not drawn towards trying to make my work unclockably canon-compliant]; what i find useful to receive from others during the writing process; and the fact that i like to play with genres, themes, and pairings.

if these things don't apply to you - and there's no reason why they should, even after you've been writing fic for a century - then i don't think i'm qualified to give you any advice on how you should go about putting words on a page.

but i do think i can give you something.

because if you want to start writing fanfiction - as is the case for everything else you will want to start doing in your life - there is only one key principle to bear in mind:

fortune favours the bold

by which i mean, at the most basic level, that the only way to start writing fanfiction is to... start writing fanfiction. the only way that you'll ever know if it's something you enjoy doing - and what it is about it that you like, what you find instinctive, what you don't, what your "voice" is, which characters you find harder than others to bring to life, what techniques you'll use to plan, how your work will be received, how that will make you feel, how your style will change the longer you write, and so on - is to grit your teeth and just take the leap.

but i also think that remembering that fortune favours the bold is a fandom principle which serves us all very well in a context broader than just tapping out fics while hunched over our keyboards.

because boldness is synonymous with courage - and writing something and putting it out into the world does take courage! - but it's a courage which has quite a distinctive style.

boldness is not solemn, quietly-enduring, captain-going-down-with-his-ship bravery. to be bold is to be audacious, daring, cheeky, innovative, and a little bit irreverent. it's not someone saying mournfully over your coffin "she fought bravely to the bitter end" - it's someone looking at you in awe and saying "how the fuck did you pull that off?"

and this matters in fandom. because participating in fandom - whether you end up writing fic or not - takes a hell of a lot of brass neck.

after all, each of us has ended up here because we looked at canon and said "sorry - did you think you were done?"

and then - when canon got flustered and started stammering - each of us has rolled our eyes, rolled up our sleeves, and said "don't worry, hen. you can leave it to me."

to be in fandom is to have the audacity to treat the text as a springboard - rather than something which remains behind glass in a museum. it's deciding to fling the characters we love into genres they don't originally come from and revelling in the chaos which ensues. it's finding missing moments and daring them to be just as important as a canon scene. it's the fun of wildly improbable alternate universes - from dystopian horror to coffee shops. it's cheerfully ignoring that there's a point canon thinks its story ends - whether that's finishing narratives which end unsatisfactorily or just playing with happy-ever-after. it's taking two characters who never interact in canon, winking at the camera, and making them kiss. it's taking two characters who never interact in canon, winking at the camera, and making them fuck. it's having the time of your life becoming a malevolent deity and making a character suffer.

while it might not always feel this way, at its core fandom is fun. and it's fun in a way which is quite unusual in this day-and-age - in that it's something we get to shape for ourselves, rather than having to engage with a product according to the whims of the corporation marketing it. it lets us be indulgent without calling us greedy. it lets us chatter away at each other without calling us unproductive. it lets us be sincere without requiring performative earnestness from us. it lets us engage with the uncomfortable and the lurid without the bland sanitisation of respectability.

and it allows us to be hopeful.

and i have always been struck by just how much about fandom rests on hope.

to believe that the dead can live happily in another universe, to believe that time-travel can fix things, to believe that bad people can get their comeuppance, to believe that good people can be imperfect and it doesn't matter one bit, to believe that those who are hurt can be comforted, to believe that justice can be done, to believe that villains can be redeemed, to believe that an insignificant background character matters just as much as the hero, to believe that things can be better - whether your story is overthrowing a corrupt government or letting two people enjoy themselves uncovering a kink, to believe that the most improbable people can love each other - romantically or not... all of this takes hope.

and hope takes boldness.

so be bold and start writing.

be cheeky. take risks. be your own biggest fan. be irreverent. be cunning. recognise that not taking fandom too seriously is self-protective. be self-indulgent. have some self-awareness. be collegiate. gas up your friends whenever you can. be nice to your commenters and try and give them the benefit of the doubt if they express themselves poorly. be curious. regard disagreement as interesting. be compassionate. be tenacious. be prepared to write stuff that flops. be prepared to write stuff that gets left on the drawing-board. be prepared to write stuff people hate. be prepared to write stuff you hate. be audacious. believe you can do it. be hopeful. be daring. be brave. and be bold.

because i promise you that, even if you've never written a word of fic before, you can write your way into and out of anything - any fic, any trope, any pairing, any characterisation choice, any plot hole, any setting, any premise - and have fun and look good doing it.

if you simply have enough nerve.

[omjitskailay]

Musicals that should be gay

Wicked: I mean this is the obvious one. Glinda and Elphie belong together and Fiyero can go fuck himself

Waitress: I'm telling you, I don't Sara Bareilles as Jenna, but imagine her as Dr. Jill Pomatter making out on the examination bed with Jessie Mueller...

Matilda: Ik its not in the original source material but I'm sure it wouldn't hurt to have miss Honey and miss Phelps kiss at the end

Music Man: Mr H. H you can fuck right off because the main star of this musical deserves someone better than you and by better i do mean a girl

My Fair Lady: see above

[ssopimir]

my biggest dream in life is for hungarian musicals to get popular and gain a fandom like so many of them have the potential but no one knows about them😭 istg dm me if ur interested ill give recs and make subtitles for them and shit

[musicals-in-sweden]

Production photos (Part 2) from Matilda the Musical - Kulturhuset Stadsteatern, 2023-2024.

Photography by Sören Vilks