#AND CYRANO IN THE NOSE

[ninadove]

I LOVE YOU SO MUCH 💖

Rhyme as Romance in Theatre

Rhyme between two characters is a tool in theatre to show how compatible they are or that they're on the same wavelength or something similar. Possibly the most famous example is the sonnet that Romeo & Juliet form when they first meet in Shakespeare's eponymous play, included here for reference:

Steamy! Two characters meet & they fall into the same meter? Not only that but they rhyme with each other? Not only THAT but they form a perfect sonnet of all things? Bravo, Mr Shakespeare...

But I'm not here to talk about them. I'm here to talk about a far more overlooked instance of stichomythic rhyme in a romantic tragicomedy that conveys the same ideas — that two characters know each other VERY well & are highly compatible — but that also involves a Whole Third Guy.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the love triangle of all time, allow me to introduce the three romantic leads from Edmond Rostand's play Cyrano de Bergerac: Cyrano, Roxane, & Christian. (For those who are familiar, feel free to skip the indented text.)

Cyrano & Christian are both in love with Roxane, who has known Cyrano since childhood but who is in love with Christian. Cyrano, who has kept his feelings for Roxane hidden from them both for fear of being mocked for his large nose, offers his poetic talent to help the handsome Christian, who is awful at wooing women, win Roxane over. (And if this means Roxane finally gets to hear how Cyrano feels, even if the words aren't attributed to him, well, would that be so bad?)

The two gentlemen team up, deciding to be each other's half in forming a romantic hero fit for the ages — Cyrano the eloquence, Christian the beauty. And it works! Roxane talks to Christian (who has memorised lines from Cyrano) and reads Christian's letters (ghostwritten by Cyrano) and falls in love with him! Or is it technically with Cyrano? Both? Neither? Hmm...

Which brings me to the poetry.

The fast-paced exchange here is not a meetcute as it is in Romeo & Juliet, we are well past that & over the half-way mark of the play by this stage. In this exchange, Christian & Roxane have gotten married only moments ago but the two lads are being sent off to war... Cyrano is trying to drag him out of Roxane's arms & Roxane keeps yanking Christian back, the childhood friends sharing this exchange over their tug-of-war with an interestingly silent Christian stuck in the middle:

(The top extract is the original rhyming French in lovely alexandrins, by Edmond Rostand. The first English translation is faithful to the original text literally but does not rhyme, by Charles Renauld. The second English translation is more liberal and does rhyme, by Anthony Burgess of A Clockwork Orange fame.)

Now, I have to admit that the presence of rhyme in and of itself is not so particularly interesting in this exchange because ALL of the play Cyrano de Bergerac is written in verse (!!) but there IS something in this exchange that does not appear in Shakespeare's sonnet...

Cyrano & Roxane are not only having a full conversation while dragging Christian back & forth, they are not only rhyming at the same time, but they are also finishing each other's lines & prompting each other's rhymes simultaneously. A wonderful combination of stichomythia & rhyme 🥳 (Romeo & Juliet features a milder version of this, in which each character gives a complete quatrain before they start matching rhymes a line at a time to show us that they're clicking the longer they speak.) You can see it most clearly in Burgess's translation above, in which the lines are spaced out to make the meter clearer, that they pick up where the other left off & finish the line in a rhyme before continuing.

Even better, almost all of Cyrano de Bergerac is written in couplets, as anglophones can see with "try/dry" at the top of Burgess again. However, Burgess takes his translation one step further in its rhyme scheme during this exchange. By the end, Cyrano & Roxane have completed a full ABAB quatrain. A quatrain may not be as technically impressive or as romantic as a sonnet but it is more so than a couplet, and hey, they're being dragged off to die in a war! The quatrain is appropriately short to squeeze in during the hectic rush & leaves this moment of poetic & therefore cerebral connection between Cyrano & Roxane as the last words we hear before the act ends.

(Let me praise Burgess briefly in this aside. There is one more instance of him deviating from the original couplet rhyming scheme during one of Cyrano's monologues. Cyrano gets caught up in a daydream of Roxane's beauty and Burgess has him slip into a Petrarcan sonnet without even realising it... Aww <3)

The most intriguing part, however, is the content of their conversation. Cyrano & Roxane are not flirting about holding hands & kissing the way Romeo & Juliet are. They are talking about a Whole Third Guy.

Christian — poor Christian — is the subject of this conversation! While being dragged around like a rag doll! Roxane pulls him towards her & begs Cyrano to promise to keep him safe during the war. Cyrano pulls him towards HIM & does his best to make those promises, only becoming still at the final one for obvious reasons (💌).

When I said "love triangle" at the start of this post, I really meant it! This is not a jealousy angle, with two guys who dislike each other fighting over the same girl. The play, for better or worse, does not let any of the three couples be Together & happy for more than a few moments, but to me that is only further support to the threesome argument...

If you need further convincing, know that the next time we see Cyrano, he is A) in between delivering a love letter to Roxane & writing her his next one, & B) fretting over Christian going hungry & calling him handsome.

And if you STILL need further convincing, please enjoy the 2015 production's blocking of the stichomythic promise exchange:

(Roxane in the gown, Christian in the cape, Cyrano in the nose!)

[rhymingteelookatme]

christopher eccleston the man that you are. the eyes. the ears. the magnificent nose. what was i thinking not having watched your who run sooner

[star-lights-up]

what in FUCKING HELL has james mcavoy's cyrano de bergerac DONE to me

jesus FUCKING CHRIST AAAHHH

[kply-industries]

[scooteriaferrari]

Okay, but like, imagine Leroux!Erik meeting Cyrano de Bergerac, and Erik just stares at his nose, for like, a solid five minutes.

[blooms-in-april]

Controversial take I guess, but I feel that Cyrano's giant nose (or giant nose equivalent ) is an important part of the storyline.

The entire Cyrano story revolves around him believing he is too ugly to be loved. And he has a reason for believing this! A rather big reason!As wrong as it is, people DO judge others based on appearance. Not fitting the socially accepted standard of beauty DOES impact how people treat you! Cyrano isn't simply building up his insecurities out of nowhere. He's not just a man with poor self esteem and anxiety. He's a man who does not and cannot fit societal beauty standards and it affects his life, specifically his romantic relationships.

When you take away the nose (or nose equivalent) you take away the conversation about how people who look different are treated differently. People argue that the nose is unrealistic- but the giant nose is just a rather on the nose theatrical example. People who don't fit the social standard of beauty do exist. And they do face struggles and rejections because of their appearance. And when you take away Cyrano's nose, Cyrano's REASON, I feel you take away a big part of the story's heart and power.

[gnougnouss]

Ya know I think Cyrano (2021) is pretty mid but one thing it DIDN'T fuck up is Roxane's casting

She is sooooooooo pretty it's insane. Like yeah I get it I too would do the stupidest shit Like getting a much smarter guy to write her letters so that she falls in love with me like completely understandable mate

[dkniade]

headcanon/scenario (I’ve been thinking about team dynamics again)

In Fontaine, Childe learns about (the play) Cyrano de Bergerac, and learns some Cyrano monologues

Next time he does the weekly spar, he starts throwing in some French Fontainian into the list of things he say in battle

— Oh ! frappé par la seule arme noble qui soit,

Et par un ennemi qu’on sait digne de soi,

Sur un gazon de gloire et loin d’un lit de fièvres,

Tomber la pointe au cœur en même temps qu’aux lèvres !

If I’m not mistaken (though I’m by no means fluent. Do correct me, if there are mistakes), I do believe it means…

-- Oh! struck by the only noble weapon there is,

And by an enemy who you know is worthy of yourself.

On a field of glory and far from a feverish bed,

Falling off the peak of one’s heart at the same time of one’s lips !

…?

[longagoitwastuesday]

“Traveler in Space”, Cyrano de Bergerac (1950)

[paracosmaii]

please heal me, VapoRub. Please work your magic

[pegasusdrawnchariots]

Kind of mental in hindsight that we got an adaptation of Cyrano de Bergerac where for the entire duration of the 2nd half of the "non, merci" tirade ("mais chanter, rêver, rire...") Cyrano takes his nose/mask off while lost, vulnerable, in the reverie of what he claims is his ideal lifestyle*...

...& for the entire duration of the 1st half of the "non, merci" tirade, he sits quiet & bitter, sardonic, starving, focused carefully on peeling a red apple (🫀) that he doesn't even eat but rather throws to his best friend at the end of his speech to catch single-handedly

In case u somehow missed the whole thing abt hiding vulnerability behind "insurmountable" façades in this play, & also the fact that Cyrano spends 5 acts striding about the stage like an open wound, this blocking will pointedly illustrate it for u

Henri Lazarini rlly set out to give the Cyralebret girlies everything & I owe what he did with Benoit Solès & Vladimir Perrin my life ❤️

*which is definitely not an attempt to romanticise loneliness & how you'll be forever alone (TO YOUR WHOLE BEST FRIEND whom ur apparently ignoring) in the face of a certain recent crushing rejection

[cielospeaks]

-go: teases cyrano

me: im in danger

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL - Thailand Stuck the Landing! Thailand!

Organized, in each category, with ones I'm enjoying most at the top.

March 2025 Week 1

Ongoing Series - Thai

ThamePo (Fri YT) ep 13 end - A truly great final episode. The best that Thailand could do. Good rapping too. (I do enjoy a tonal language rapping) Could have done without the goddamn auto tune on the singing tho.

Still that Notting Hill moment with Po and his friends, “this is Thame, my boyfriend” will likely go down in history as one of my favorite claimings in all BL. And it’s one of my favorite BL tropes. I have already rewatched it multiple times. Genius.

Review 

The boyband idol romance I've been waiting for from Korea, only Thailand did it instead. Quintessentially Thai and very GMMTV with good production values, great chemistry, and a solid support cast. It also was a hung romance mostly driven by external conflict and a found family reunion trope so I didn’t mind (too much) that the romance thread felt secondary. I loved it (except, of course, the singing). 9/10 

Perfect 10 Liners (Sun YT) ep 19 of 24 - I love that GMMTV prop masters are just putting random American 80s bodice rippers lying around Thai men's dorm rooms. I don’t know why I find it so amusing but I do. I’m not happy about the friend snooping in his friend's box (kinky), but I’m pleased with the friendship itself after all is said and done.

“Heaven was fast” made me hoot. So damn funny. And now we have a Cyrano de Bergerac plot? Faifa = the eternal self sacrificer. And that was definitely the best kiss of the series so far. It has gone into consideration for best kiss of the year.

The Boy Next World (Sun IQIYI) ep 9 of 10 - Oh dear, I’m having one of those “please don’t make them actually act” moments. But I'm still enjoying this show. Miracles may never cease. I’ll just skip this front bit of ep 9 in the future. I’m not really feeling the side couple either. But the damn premise is so strong and the leads are good (when they’re not overacting). Mame sure loves her tired old BL tropes like faen fatalle but she has (so far) managed to avoid her worst inclinations with this one. Will she stick the landing?

Meanwhile, the single most unrealistic thing in this whole show is that there are actual physical photos in that yearbook.

Flirt Milk (Sat YT) ep 7 or 10 - Well at least stuff is actually happening in all the relationships. The question is, do we care? Also, I have a terrible case of second lead syndrome, and I have from the very start. I just love that actor. (Oppa!) 

Ossan‘s Love Thailand (Mon YouTube) ep 9 of 12 - I see it’s the Thai tourist board mandated “get them out of Bangkok occasionally” episode.

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Secret Relationships (Korea iQIYI) ep 2 of 8 - Ooo, the bloody nose trope! Haven’t seen that in ages. Ooo x2, toxic exes! But Korea flavored toxic rather than Thai toxic. Interesting. It’s more reserved and mean-spirited and stylishly cruel. I’m certainly intrigued. I quite like the main couple too, they’re awkwardly adorable. I love the way they keep swapping the care trope back and forth. The workplace gossip and family abuse was really hard to watch though. This show is packed full of stuff, all the relationships are complicated and slightly dysfunctional and codependent.

I like it a lot. 

Eternal Butler (Taiwan Fri Gaga) ep 12 end - This was basically a wrap-up ep, it didn’t advance the plot much. Still it was nice to see a show tackle the eternal youth situation head on. The voice over at the end from our robot who will not age talking about the way the world will perceive them as his lover does age, THAT made me tear up.

Last Downlaod

The story of a boy and his bodyguard/butler/robot falling in love. The robot is very queer and kind of kinky and mostly in charge. This dynamic feels a little healthier and less like indentured servitude than the previous installment in this series, but it’s still somewhat troubling in base concept. Nevertheless, casting a pro bodybuilder as the robot certainly help me to rise above my scruples. BL made me do it. I'm a terribly shallow human. Ultimately, I pronounce this show oddly charming - if you can overlook the implications of "just a robot who can't say no." 8/10 

FC Soldout (Korea Thurs iQIYI) ep 8 end - cute scaredy-cat kiss. Cute soft proper kisses too. I love these boys. Adorable confession. I cackled over the resulting dynamic. But the football captain and the idol are still my favorites. Gutted we got no smooches from them. This time, when our captain uses the word "exercise" baby boy, I don’t think he means the football form of exercise.

Final Score 

An oddly cute sports reunion romance, about an actor and a football player who meet again for convoluted reasons. Essentially one of them is an obsessed fan, and the other one has been pining since high school. So they're kinda stalking each other. They get together after some shenanigans. With a solid side couple it was only the parasocial relationship thing that wigged me out, but it really bothers me. Especially since, had it not been there, this might’ve been the sports BL of my dreams. 8/10

Fight for Love (Vietnam YT) ep 5 - Full of exes and faen fatales. 

Impression of Youth (Taiwan Weds Viki) ep 9 end - Frankly, if you date a kid you shouldn’t be surprised when he behaves like a kid.

PAUSE.

Is that?! OMG yes. That is Marcus Chang playing the role of the professor! I wonder if this means we might get him in a BL? I might just lose my tiny mind.

Summary  

An artist seeking inspiration goes to a beach town to teach where he falls in love with one of his students. An odd disjointed little show that managed to somehow overcomplicate a simple premise. What could’ve been elegant was instead fussy. Despite some expectedly good sex scenes, there wasn’t much chemistry between either pair. Chemistry might have carried this show but without those naked shoulders to ride on, there was no structure and less hope. 7/10

Checkered Shirt (Korea YT) ep 5 of 8 - Ouch. Denial is apparently a river in Korea. This is a bit realistic for my BL. OH WAIT. The story about a man in the closet is called The Checkered Shirt?! I see what you're doing there. Clever, little KBL. Clever.

Exclusive Love (Taiwan Fri Gaga) ep 5 of 12 - What tf is going on with this show? It’s wild but not in an appealing way, in a weird wet dish towel away. I get why @heretherebedork finds the crazy pining side couple appealing, but they’re too frustrating for me. I now mostly just love the sweetly unhinged little assistant.

It's airing but......

Gelboys (Thai Weds iQIYI) ep 1 of 7 - I’m giving this show a pass. It’s just too far out of my wheelhouse. I don’t have patience right now.

Sashes and Hearts (Pinoy YT) - Philippines is doing Drop Dead Gorgeous only all gay boys queening their asses off. Doesn't interst me, not sure if it's BL.

The Last Time (Thai WeTV) 8 eps - Looks dark so I'm giving it a pass until I know about the ending.

Last Meal Universe (Thailand Sun ????) 10 eps - An alien who has come to destroy earth instead falls in love with Thai food and then the Thai boy who cooks it - realistic, actually. I got a link to watch but it still wouldn't work for me, so I guess I'm waiting to see what happens.

In case you missed it...

Wattpad author talks about trying to make a Thai BL out of her KP fanfic (Allure of the Siren). Trailer here.

A Perfect Match (Taiwan iQIYI) - A not very well regarded Taiwanese sports BL from earlier this year picked up for rerelease. Reports from spies (hi twig!) are that this is a "sports BL that did everything it could to show no sport at all" and NOT good. So it's getting a pass from me.

Next Week Looks Like This:

3/12 My Golden Blood (Thailand Weds YouTube) 12 eps - Trailer. GMMTV taking on Weds nights and midweek discourse (they hope) with this hotly anticipated vampire series. I happen to find Joss watchable but this looks very bad and also very Kissable Lips. But at least Thailand is finally giving us the trashy gay vampires we richly deserve? Just realize we don't deserve much.

3/12 Lost in the Woods (Thailand Weds Gaga) 7 eps - Announced for 2023, adapted from a novel of the same name. Fifa just graduated high school and travels to a remote province to take care of his grandma, before starting uni. There he meets Chief Hem, a forest ranger.

Bah, how annoying. We don't usually have a slump this bad in the spring. What am I gonna do with myself?

Upcoming March 2025

3/20 Top Form (Thailand Thurs WeTV) 10 eps - Trailer. Adaptation of a Japanese manga starring Boom (Chains of Heart) opposite Smart (Don't Say No). Actor recognized as the "The Sexiest Man of the Year" has his first-place position usurped by newcomer. But while he sees them as rivals, turns out the new kid has other ideas. I'm super excited for this but hate watching on WeTV so gonna be a challenge.

3/28 Heesu in Class 2 (Korea Fri ????) 10 eps - Trailer. Adaption of the comic by Lily, about a shy unpopular boy with a secret crush on best friend who somehow also ends up his school's relationship counselor. Supposed to have completed filming in 2022, the fact this has been in dev hell since then somewhat mitigates this being my most anticipated BL of it's original year.

2025 Line Up

BL Announced for 2025 - PART 1

BL Announced for 2025 - PART 2

20 BLs Announced for 2025 That I'm Really Excited About

GMMTV 2025 Line Up - My Totally Biased and Wildly Flawed Feels

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

Aside from that idol boyfriend claiming?!

Yeah ThamePo ate this week. No room in brain or heart for others.

Not that it matter right now. Things are lackluster and dire.

(last week)

The tag BLigade: @doorajar @solitaryandwandering @my-rose-tinted-glasses @babymbbatinygirl @babymbbatinygirl @isisanna-blog @mmastertheone @pickletrip @aliceisathome @urikawa-miyuki @tokillamonger @sunflower-positiiivity @rocketturtle4 @blglplus @anythinggoesintheshire @everlightly @renafire @mestizashinrin @bl-bam-beyond @small-dark-and-delicious @saezurumurmurs

[glitter-stained]

Shout out to my brother because as I was summarising some stuff wrt his misconceptions about Jason's character (he doesn't read comics and only knows him from stuff like Titans (hbo), Lego batman videogame etc so i was explaining that mainline jason in his fondational runs is a bit different from what he thought) I compared him to a "teenage emo cyrano of Bergerac" and said that he would recite the nose tirade from that play before going in a fight...

And because the nose tirade is full of length jokes and starts with "that was a trifle short" (though the French original, to be more precise, translates to "that's a bit short young man"),and my brother despite being a grown adult is actually a child, thought of dick's name and immediately suggested Jason quoting it to Dick and making length jokes, this is way too funny picture this:

"Descriptive: ''Tis a rock!. . .a peak!. . .a cape! --

A cape, forsooth! 'Tis a peninsular!'

Curious: 'How serves that oblong capsular?

For scissor-sheath? Or pot to hold your ink?'

Gracious: 'You love the little birds, I think?

I see you've managed with a fond research

To find their tiny claws a roomy perch!'

Also picturing Mask sputtering trying to insult Jason and Jason hitting him with:

--Such, my dear sir, is what you might have said,

Had you of wit or letters the least jot:

But, O most lamentable man!--of wit

You never had an atom, and of letters

You have three letters only!--they spell Ass!"

[schweizercomics]

Swashtober 12: Cyrano de Bergerac!

From the play by Edmond Rostand, based on the life of the historically big-nosed 17th century writer and wit who *actually* fought like a hundred fellers on his own at the Porte de Nesle (he also really chased off that actor, and wrote great love letters, many of which were published and subsequently cribbed by Rostand for the play).

[skyeventide]

the amazon tolkien show was already pretty bad for a number of writing, characterisation, and thematic reasons, and profoundly mid the rest of the time.

then, in the last few weeks they proceeded to publish a magazine cover with barrow wights that are an orientalist caricature that looks like it came out of pre "don't dress up as sexy cleopatra for halloween" discourse. it's cursed wraiths bedecked in coin jewellery, sporting a belly-dancer outfit that is not sexy just because they're undead. that of course birthed the most insanely stupid discourse you can imagine. on one hand having the racists bemoan that the anglo-saxon-inspired burial sites magically transformed into middle-eastern-looking monsters because of woke. on the other hand, the "akshually the lore" people, trying to prove that, in the second age, these humans might well have been remnants of those who came from the east and not the shire-adjacent barrow wights we're all acquainted with, so, gotcha racists! par for the course for insanely stupid tolkien discourse. the point, as usual, being that it doesn't matter whether it's possible by lore. rather, what if we look at the reason why, in this day and age, a magazine SO ironically called "empire" puts on the front page the first glimpse of aesthetics/concept art that are markedly not western, and that art showcases a known orientalist look that doesn't even get the dubious dignity of being put on people and is instead sported by undead monsters? diversity win!

then yesterday they dropped a narvi look and a dwarf poster. we already knew they barely moved past the scottish dwarf stereotype set by peter jackson, a director with whom this series is continually in conversation. we already knew the prosthetic noses of the dwarves in the hobbit movies were silly at best. yet again, narvi is given a fake nose of such proportions that you might think he was about to play cyrano de bergerac. and then there's the poster, where a ring with a giant gem glinting gold in the foreground, in the company of the other rings, stands against a darkened background where a shadowy dwarf grasps forward with clawing, avid hands. of course, after doing some orientalism, it's time to throw some antisemitism in and make sure to hit every box in the bingo. if that poster hadn't appeared on the official account, I'd have thought it a parody.

I've never posted about the show because as a rule I don't feel like wasting too much time on things I think are bad. I sure hope I never will again. I'm also not looking forward to the next bit of corporate diversity we'll certainly be graced with soon enough.