#until i saw Hugh Laurie existed

[nerdynonbinarylife]

When I started watching House like 5 Months ago I was like: "Wow, that guy is attractive. But it's 15 years ago and he is over 60 now, so he probably isn't that attractive anymore."

Hugh Laurie over 60:

goddamn hugh laurie is so attractive

[lilydalexf]

Old School X is a project interviewing X-Files fanfic authors who were posting fic during the original run of the show. New interviews are posted every Tuesday.

Interview with Audrey Roget

Audrey Roget has 10 fics at Gossamer, with some different ones at AO3, fanfiction.net, and her website. You might know her from her very good fics or as part of Musea, a collective that all wrote fic and posted X-Files fic recs. I’ve recced some of my favorites of her stories here before, including Three Times Dana Scully Didn’t Go to San Diego for Christmas and The Shirt. Big thanks to Audrey for doing this interview.

Does it surprise you that people are still interested in reading your X-Files fanfics and others that were posted during the original run of the show (1993-2002)? A little, yes. Not so much by folks who were around in those days. I sometimes go hunting for beloved stories from the early years, both those I read and loved, and those I never got around to. I am always delighted to hear that later generations of fans have stumbled across my stuff, especially since I haven’t posted anything new in a number of years. It’s fantastic that both years-long fans and new ones are out there continuing to rec fic from all eras, and to maintain archives for fans yet-to-be born. What do you think of when you think about your X-Files fandom experience? What did you take away from it? What did you take away from your experience with X-Files fic or with the fandom in general? It may sound corny, but the main thing I think of, and the thing that has ultimately been most valuable and lasting, has been the friendships. The feeling of having found a tribe – not just of TXF fans, but of other people who could be as enthusiastically engaged as I was (if not more so) with fictional stories and characters – was mind-blowing. Since I was a kid, I had often mulled over the books/movies/TV I loved and speculated internally about what happened off the page or off-screen, or created new stories for characters in my head. But, except for an elementary school phase where I and my two BFFs regularly played Charlie’s Angels, I hadn’t engaged in that kind of gleeful immersion in a fictional world with others until TXF fandom. My involvement in fandom followed pretty quickly from getting hooked on the show, so for me, it’s all one big ball of experiences. Even as my interest in/involvement in fandom has waxed and waned over the years, I’ve been lucky to remain friends with wonderful people who I originally connected with as fellow fans.

Social media didn't really exist during the show's original run. How were you most involved with the X-Files online (atxc, message board, email mailing list, etc.)? What got you involved with X-Files fanfic?

My initial entrée to the fandom was through fanfiction. I didn’t get interested in the show until mid-season 5. Around the same time, I read an article in a zine called Might (co-founded by Dave Eggers) about this thing called fanfiction that people would write and publish online. At first I thought it was satire or a joke – the fic cited involved Wilma Flintstone and a polished sabre tooth, as I recall – but then realized this was an actual thing. So I figured that a show then at the peak of pop culture must have fanfiction, and I went looking. Early on, I scrolled atxc on a daily basis and downloaded stories. But I didn’t engage in discussions about the show on Usenet, since I only knew how to access it with my Earthlink email client, and I didn’t want to post using my real name.

Later, I set up a pseud address with Yahoo and subscribed to a couple of email fanfic/discussion lists, and stayed subscribed to those for years. There was also a period in there somewhere – of maybe only a year or so, when I think about it – when I’d often nerd out into the wee hours with other fans via IM chat groups. That was around the time the small writers’ collective Musea was founded, and we were active for several years after the show’s initial run. In the early aughts, I followed many authors to LiveJournal and eventually set up my own account and stayed involved in fandom that way, until it mostly dispersed as well. What was it that got you hooked on the X-Files as a show? In a word: Chemistry. I had casually watched a couple of episodes during the first four seasons, but I’m not a huge sci-fi/horror fan at heart, and the story lines didn’t immediately grab me. But I happened to tune into The Red and the Black in 1998, and BOOM. For the first time, the intense layers of emotion and attraction between Mulder and Scully really struck me – and then of course, upon further viewing, I realized it was unmissable, an essential element in the fabric of the show. As a wise woman once said, a switch had been flicked. Mulder and Scully’s magnetism was like nothing I’d ever seen, and though I eventually came to appreciate the storytelling, humor, production values, and other components that made the series so successful, watching those characters interact has always been what kept me coming back. Were you involved with any fandoms after the X-Files? If so, what was it like compared to X-Files? I was part of a list-serv discussion group for The West Wing for a while, which was a fun melding of character and plot analysis with political discussion. Later, I got into the House, MD fandom, again mostly as a fanfic reader/writer. I was finding that other fandoms, unlike TXF, were more dispersed, the networks of people structured more loosely, if at all. There were fanfic and discussion communities on LiveJournal, and fanfiction.net was the other main hub for posting and reading, but if there was anything centralized like Gossamer, Ephemeral, or the Haven, I never found it. Within all those fan communities, as in TXF, there were partisans for various characters and pairings, and flame wars erupted over plot developments that outraged this faction or that. One main difference was that those other shows had larger, ensemble casts and more varied subplots. So on one hand, there was more opportunity to explore back stories and multiple perspectives. In House MD in particular, there were several entrenched rival shipper camps, which were about equally grounded in canon, rather than TXF’s central ship. I was less into TWW fic, but my impression was that readers were less militant about their pairing preferences than TXF or House fans. Who are some of your favorite fictional characters? Why?

I was deeply fascinated by Greg House for several years. (And the love-hate chemistry between him and Lisa Cuddy was a strong draw for me.) House MD came early in a wave of TV shows centered on anti-heroes, and Hugh Laurie brought amazing complexity and thoughtfulness to the character.

Philip and Elizabeth Jennings (The Americans) are a lethal pair of antiheroes. The inherent moral conflict of a sympathetic narrative from their POVs, and the global political conflict they embody was TV catnip for me. The internal struggles at the hearts of those characters were so exquisitely written and performed, they completely fascinate me.

The West Wing felt so much like a show created specifically for me. I’m especially fond of story arcs and scenes that centered on CJ Cregg, Charlie Young, and Josh Lyman. Though I loved Martin Sheen’s human portrayal of Jed Bartlet, the fact that he was the President always made him a little untouchable in my mind. But CJ, Charlie, and Josh were basically hard-working functionaries who were ambitious and idealistic and funny and flawed, and they spoke to me. What is your relationship like now to X-Files fandom? Do you ever still watch The X-Files or think about Mulder and Scully? Do you ever still read X-Files fic? Fic in another fandom?

I do continue to think about Mulder and Scully and watch episodes somewhat often. I’ll sometimes run a favorite episode as background when I want something comforting on. I read TXF fic pretty regularly, which can inspire me to go back and watch a particular episode or story arc I haven’t thought about in years. Just recently, I started listening to The X-Files Diaries podcast (@XFDPodcast, @admiralty-xfd), and that’s a fun dive into the characters, and how other fans react to and interpret episodes.

Every once in a while, a TV show or movie – and more particularly, the characters – will grab my attention and make me curious about how fanfic writers have interpreted the original material. Random example, I saw Singin’ in the Rain for the first time in a theatre a couple of years ago, and the chemistry of the three leads sent me to AO3 as soon as I got home. I also loved the first season of Mercy Street and found some well-done stories in that fandom. I usually peruse the Yuletide gifts every year and have been amazed by the sheer variety, creativity and cheekiness of the output. There are a bunch of other shows I’ve followed faithfully, and sought out fanfic – Broadchurch, The Killing, Agents of SHIELD, Elementary, The Good Wife. Although I’ve found some well-written stuff in those fandoms, I’ve rarely gotten the same charge from them as reading TXF fic. Do you have any favorite X-Files fanfic stories or authors?

syntax6 (@syntax6) – Universal Invariants/Laws of Motion. I’d also shout out to syn’s Hunter fics, too – well worth reading even for those who have never seen or particularly loved the show itself.

JET – I re-read Small Lives Awake every year around Thanksgiving time. Other annual holiday re-reads: Revely’s The Dreaming Sea and Jordan’s Through the Fire (both set at Halloween).

Amal Nahurriyeh’s Casey universe – the rare post-col fic that felt hopeful, made extra intriguing by a kick-ass original character. [Lilydale note: the series starts with Machines of Freedom and has lots of additional fics and snippets.]

Prufrock’s Love – Finding Rokovoko was genuinely terrifying and tender.

melforbes (@melforbes) – Seaglass Blue is a recent favorite, lyrical and bittersweet.

These are just a few (apologies to those that didn’t come to mind immediately). Fortunately for readers, there’s an astonishing number of authors who have written in TXF fandom whom you can depend on for a good yarn, insightful character study, and/or ingenious “fixes” where 1013 went awry.

What is your favorite of your own fics, X-Files and/or otherwise?

Probably the two set in my own (former) backyard of Southern California: Enivrez-vous and Ravenous. I’d first read the Baudelaire poem that was the source of the former’s title back in university days, so I was tickled to be able to use a few lines as an epigraph. Do you think you'll ever write another X-Files story? Or dust off and post an oldie that for whatever reason never made it online? It’s not out of the realm possibility. I’d meant for “Three Times Dana Scully Didn’t Go to San Diego for Christmas” to be followed up with “And One Time She Did.” In fact, the idea for that never-finished story was what inspired “Three Times” in the first place. I have a couple of scenes sketched out and – unusually for me – even know exactly how to end it. Every year, November rolls around, and I think I should finish and post it…maybe in 2021?

Where do you get ideas for stories? Sometimes it’s from my environment. “Enivrez-vous” and “Ravenous” describe places that I’m fond of, that made me want to place Mulder and Scully there. “What Not to Wear” has that element too – I set it in Memphis as a tribute to a great trip there with a sister Musean. But WNTW was also inspired by a kink challenge in a years-ago LiveJournal thread, so sometimes ideas come from fandom discussions or even other fanfics. In the House MD fandom, a fic by another writer made me want to continue the story, and the author kindly allowed an authorized sequel. What's the story behind your pen name? I wanted my pseudonym to sound like it could be a real person’s name – or at least, maybe like a romance writer’s pen name – rather than an online handle. I also wanted to use a slightly obscure fictional character, to amuse anyone in the know. I had long had a bit of an obsession with Whit Stillman’s 1990s film trilogy, which started with Metropolitan; the 3rd installment, Last Days of Disco, came out the same year I started down the TXF rabbit hole: 1998. The central heroine of Metropolitan – who is mentioned in or makes a cameo in the other two – is Audrey Rouget, a lover of Austen and, eventually, a book editor. I altered the spelling of the last name as a nod to every writer’s companion, Roget’s Thesaurus. Do your friends and family know about your fic and, if so, what have been their reactions? I have a few close friends – from outside TXF fandom – who know that I’ve written fanfic. I don’t know if they know my pseud; if they do, or if they’ve ready any of the fic, they haven’t said so to me. They are fannish sorts themselves, but not really TXF fans. A smattering of other friends and family members know or could intuit that I’ve been a fangrl on some level for years. My boss, whom I’ve known for about 3 years, recently mentioned off-handedly that she was really obsessed with TXF “back in the day,” and I am DYING to know if she got involved in fandom, but don’t think I’ll ever work up the courage to ask.

Is there a place online (tumblr, twitter, AO3, etc.) where people can find you and/or your stories now? Most of the X-Files stuff continues to be generously and steadfastly archived by Forte at The Basement Office. The House MD stories and some TXF things are at fanfiction.net; same for AO3. If ever post anything new, it will probably go to TBO and AO3. I really ought to get it all together in one place, one of these days…

(Posted by Lilydale on April 6, 2021)

[lanajvmeson]

emerges frm a field of corn slinking in w a faux mink shrug dangling around my elbows n a strand of wheat between my teeth..... farmer eleganza.... hlo! my name’s nai. i am bt a humble ghoul arrived to haunt ur home. 23 n she/her pronouns n i live in manchester. fun fact my friend’s neighbour used to b harry styles PE teacher. i played delilah yrs ago as carlson young (n even cara delevingne at one point what the fk) which feels so weird n ancient to me nw bt i missed her a lot so decided to spruce her bk to life.... ANYWAY delilah’s pinterest is here n i’ll jst leap right into things without further ado

(NICOLA PELTZ, CIS-FEMALE) - Have you seen DELILAH ASTOR? LILAH is in HER JUNIOR year. The POLITICAL SCIENCE MAJOR is 21 years old & is a CAPRICORN. People say SHE is BEGUILING, BLUNT, CUNNING and APATHETIC. Rumors say they’re a member of CALLOWAY. I heard from the gossip blog that SHE WAS IN A REHABILITATION CENTRE IN SWITZERLAND INSTEAD OF DOING CHARITY WORK LIKE HER SOCIAL MEDIA CLAIMED.  (NAI. 23. GMT. SHE/HER.) 

HISTORY

their family is kind of modelled off the sedgwick family like old money n pretty dysfunctional bt all abt keeping up a seamless facade of perfection... with a pinch of the kennedy’s in there. her dad’s high up in politics n his dad before tht ws in politics n it’s just a long prestigious line of clones in expensive suits as far as delilah’s concerned. her dad i picture as like.... nate archibald’s grandfather in gossip girl.... personality wise.

for as long as she cn remember she’s found this cookie cutter white picket fence life boring. stifling. to delilah it’s like being hemmed in a stuffy room n forbidden frm opening a window. it’s all vry Rich People Problems i wnt lie bt <3 she feels everlastingly bored. All The Time. plus her family hs always been a focal point fr tabloids etc which doesn’t help this feeling of not rly Living but just being the focus of a spectator sport. they’re lowkey a bit of a household name so they get a bunch of scrutiny n......... well. new bullet point alert! cue a powerpoint transition

(self harm & depression tw) frm being young delilah always knew there ws sort of. a white noise inside her where everyone else saw a technicolour movie screen. it rly hit her at like 12 i’d say as she was jst coasting towards adolescence. it ws pretty obvious frm her behaviour i’d say bt her parents only became Aware it ws a problem when she stuck a fork into a socket n short circuited the power in the house. she got shocked unconscious n when she woke up she told the in house dr they’d called (to keep it under wraps frm outsiders) tht she just.... couldn’t feel anything. she’d been reading frankenstein (she’s always liked gothic literature) n thought it’d zap her to life like the monster

her parents got her on medication n figured that wld fix everything. they didn’t like to talk abt things and that was that. it wasn’t to be mentioned again

delilah’s parents r just very.... sterile. family is abt appearances. they’ll be all smiles n flowing conversation when ppl are around bt it feels like being an actress n reading frm a script. being a toy in a dollhouse

she had two siblings: an older sister named clara & a younger brother named elijah. clara ws always like.... the Dream daughter. did everything right. amazing grades. america’s sweetheart. LOVED by the press. did sm charity work. elijah was fine/kind of a slacker compared bt coasted by on athletic prowess (captain of the rowing team). delilah hs very much always been the anomaly in this idyllic line-up. middle child effect! altho having said tht she’s always ran w the popular crowd of her age group bc Rich + Pretty = Status. it’s all quite superficial n delilah’s attitude on the matter can b summed up w this photoset. having said tht there was Some merit in constantly being paraded around as “such a pretty thing” bc a few modelling agencies attempted to scout her bt delilah found that boring. she wants to b called brilliant not beautiful. her mother called this her “not playing to the advantages that god gave her”. with a tight-lipped smile and a “god forbid i use my brain”, delilah only disappointed her further <3

(drugs & ed tw) delilah gt pretty heavy into partying fr the sake of trying to Feel something. intense on the drugs front (coke n prescription pills). rarely eating. she got a silver broach of a swan tht she pins to most of her clothes n u can unscrew the swan’s neck n pull it out to reveal a little powder spoon. still wears this today. clara n delilah were always super close n clara wld cover fr her a bunch. making up lies n jst having her back to their parents if they ever asked where she was / she ws in trouble n needed to keep it under wraps. when delilah hd an article in a tabloid pretty mch like this one clara talked their parents dwn frm sending her to a rehabilitation centre in switzerland. they gt it pretty much scorched frm existence bt delilah kept a clipping bc honestly she thought it was funny hw pale her mother went abt it

(car accident & drunk driving & death tw) at a fancy benefit the astors were all attending among 4857925974 uppity families delilah wound up heading off w some of the rich kids n one thing lead to another n a couple of them gt arrested fr a coke scandal. delilah used her phone call to contact clara n fr once clara hd let loose a little n hd something to drink bt still drove to the station to bail delilah out n try n fix her mess bt.... skipped a red light n crashed. she died upon impact.

(hospitalisation & drugs & addiction tw) this made delilah spiral massively obviously.... she clung on by the skin of her teeth fr a while bt she rly was just getting quite out of control doing an extremely excessive amt of coke to get by at this point so her parents actually did.... end up shipping her off to switzerland for rehabilitation. they didn’t tell anyone this tho n as far as ppl were/are aware she was doing charity work with habitat for humanity in trinidad. her parents literally........... hired ppl to take photos of things there n a social media team posted them to her instagram account jst. the most elaborate lie.... it’s a lot.

delilah jst pretty much went along w whatever they said at the facility bt didn’t absorb any of it too much.... she did get sober there bt it was vry much bc she had no other choice rather than a want to......... she even pretended to “find god” while she ws there n memorised bible lines to recite w a coolly detached smile. in her head she ws probably thinking abt hw her mandated therapist cld gladly eat shit and she’d be happy to watch. it was just like.... everyone there was RLY hideously overpaid bt did they actually Care abt their work or patients? debatable. wasn’t the most healing experience thru delilah’s eyes bt... maybe it’d work better if she’d actually opened her mind to it bt anyway...... <3 cornelius fudge voice: she’s back. the dark lord.....

PERSONALITY:

nw tht her history is out of the way i’ll leap like a flea off a shaggy dog’s back into personality! aesthetically she almost ALWAYS wears white/cream. reminds me of the woman in white frm sharp objects. rarely she’ll dabble in silver or gold or like..... vry pale green bt.... always muted tones. usually white or cream. big white sunhats. white sunglasses. white pussybow blouses w a little white skirt n a pearl barrette in her hair. she even smokes white sobranie cigs tht r imports like it’s a lot she’s truly committed to the aesthetic.... paired w like. classic patent mary janes.... she tends to flutter around the place like a silk moth. likes lace too. hs a very put together image n even demeanour like she’s very lithe n graceful n drifts like a ghost which kind of contrasts w... who she is at her core bt in the astor family it’s all abt appearances <3 the only deviation from this is she sometimes wears dark blue mascara once in a blue moon n if ppl comment on this she’s like. idk what ur talking abt? glides away like a ghost in a haunted mansion n is never seen again.

very perceptive. incredibly observant. yrs of early life media training n being born frm politicians means she’s an excellent liar. she knows ppl n knows what makes them tick bt she’ll only use this when necessary. she isn’t a terrible person bt she knows how to b Very mean n will equip this as a weapon shd a situation call fr it. also more prone to lashing out since her sister......... she hs sometimes played chess games socially fr kicks

dark n biting sense of humour. rather frank abt things. VERY ruthless when scorned bt she isn’t particularly?? emotive abt it??? her bf cheated on her once n when he told her she slapped him rly hard in front of sm ppl he knew n then jst walked away. blocked him on literally everything. removed him frm the face of the earth as far as she ws concerned. had him blacklisted frm every event n told ppl they’d be cut too if they continued to associate w him. goodbye sir <3 u are the weakest link <3 needless to say he regretted it <3

very loyal to u until she isn’t. finds it very easy to cut ties if need be. once her trust is broken it is gooooone baby goone.... the trust is Gone. selective in who she cares abt

vry cavalier abt sex. she doesn’t sleep around hugely i dnt think??? bt when she does it isn’t often tht emotionally invested she’ll jst out of the blue very nonchalantly blow out a wisp of smoke n b like. so u want to fuck me then? cool. proceeds to get up as if she’s walking to leave n then looks bk n is like what do ur legs not work? follow me. n leads them somewhere

nothing rly.... moves her particularly. she isn’t very animated. it’s like she jst finds the entire world thoroughly unimpressive. it’s difficult to stimulate excitement from her. it’s like that hugh laurie quote where he realised he had depression bc “boredom is not an appropriate response to exploding cars”.

has a pet swan bk at home she’s named lilith inspired by satan’s offspring. lilith bites ppl if they get close n is honestly an abomination of a bird. delilah finds her funny n throws her bits of croissants sometimes bt even she isn’t immune to her pecks. in some ways they’re similar...... hv a graceful surface appearance / aesthetic bt a darker attitude beneath the surface

WANTED CONNECTIONS:

exes: the ex bf tht cheated on her n she got blacklisted from 94872347 social events cld be a fun thing to explore..... delilah wld be EXTREMELY cold towards him n honestly want him dead. wouldn’t show any shred of caring abt him at all she’s very gd at stoning her emotions n keeping them inside. hasn’t cried since her sister died as an example of how..... withdrawn she is from confessing her innermost thoughts n desires. maybe an ex bf before tht that she rly didn’t take seriously at all..... typically she just isn’t interested/invested in romance she’s vry apathetic abt it all

party friends: those tht run in similar rich kid circles tht she would have smuggled off with at fancy events so they could let loose.......... ppl tht r completely her opposite who she finds interesting bc they represent everything she always wanted outside the oppression of her strict regiment family....... mutual bad influences tht are heavy into drugs n always enable each other...... u name it!

hook-ups: she doesn’t have a HUGE amt of these bt.... maybe a select handful.... some she wld have hooked up w once n never again n just been like >_> if they implied they shd as if it was preposterous n she was thoroughly over it.... some maybe she’d find interesting enough to extend beyond tht...... none she’d invest in if she cld help it altho? maybe someone as an exception to tht rule cld be fun

friends of her sister: (death tw) clara was universally well liked for being rly sweet n well intentioned n she attended yates only two yrs delilah’s senior so she might have some connections here still somehow??? cld be angsty to work with

i won’t lie i’m rly hungry as i write up these wcs so my brain’s going blank n i’m gna have to sprint to get some toast bt <3 roommates, enemies, competitive friendships, resentments, angst, chaos, drama, strife, u name it n i am dwn!!!! hits post n takes off galloping dwnstairs

[avanneman]

The Code of the Woosters

The 23 episodes of “Jeeves and Wooster”, a British TV series starring Stephen Fry as Jeeves and a young Hugh Laurie as Bertie Wooster that ran from 1990 to 1993, are now available via YouTube. If you don’t know who Jeeves and Bertie are, you probably won’t enjoy the series. If you do know, you’re almost sure to have quibbles.

Jeeves, indispensable personal manservant, and his employer, mentally negligible man about town Bertie Wooster, were the supreme creations of P. G. Wodehouse (pronounced “Woodhouse”), the most gifted (to my mind) author of light fiction who ever lived. George Orwell, who wrote an intelligent though ultimately too generous discussion of Wodehouse, explained to ignorant Americans that Bertie was a pre-World War I Edwardian “knut”, a languid, yet somehow charming fellow whose general incompetence somehow makes it appropriate that he should have more money than he can spend.

The fact that a lot of Bertie Woosters got slaughtered in the trenches of World War I somehow did not decrease the market for Wodehouse’s fiction. Wodehouse, who always looked rather determinedly on the bright side of life, at least in public, shrewdly guessed that a lot of people would prefer to pretend that the Great War never happened, and so made the world of the knut even more extravagantly self-indulgent and unreal than it had been in the balmy days when King Edward was still alive,1 creating a world of young men in spats, white flannels and cucumber sandwiches, smart flats and country homes, heiresses and French maids, all of them pure as the driven snow—for Wodehouse’s world is as innocent as the real one is wicked.

What makes Wodehouse worth reading is the wonderful dexterity of both his language and his plots—“musical comedy without the music,” he liked to call it, although few musicals could match the twists and turns of his absurdist plots where everything is first turned upside down—very often due to Bertie’s blundering—and then flipped rightside up again thanks to Jeeves’ brilliance.2 Wodehouse drew heavily on the tradition of Gilbert and Sullivan for both his plots and language, translating them onto the written page. He had a wonderful ability to mix the clichés of formal and colloquial English—ponderous “Establishment English” and English “public school”3 slang, in particular—turning them inside out or leaving them rightside in while placing them in incongruous surroundings, shifting constantly from outrageous overstatement to similarly outrageous understatement within a single sentence.4

When I first saw the Jeeves and Wooster episodes I was disappointed that every line of Wodehouse’s superb verbal stunting wasn’t faithfully replicated on the screen—absurd, no doubt, but, as Bertie would say, there it is. After almost thirty years to collect my thoughts, I find that, so far, my original judgment was a bit harsh. Stephen Fry makes an excellent Jeeves, though there’s often an ironic tone to his supposedly respectful responses to Bertie’s inanities—as though Fry feels the need to let us know that Jeeves knows how stupid Bertie is—which strikes me as lazy and self-indulgent. The real Jeeves, one feels, would be above the need to signal his superiority.

Laurie’s Bertie Wooster is more of a mixed bag. In the first scenes of the first episode, Laurie engages in some horrible mugging, intended to let us know that Bertie’s suffering from a hangover, but if the plot didn’t make that clear, we’d never have guessed. Eventually. Laurie improves, and physically he makes an excellent Wooster, his tall, spindly, eccentric frame making even the most elegant outfit look somewhat ridiculous, and thus serving to ridicule rather than distinguish its wearer.

The trappings of twenties and thirties elegance are very well done, but the Brits, of course, never tire of this. British studios must have roundhouses of puffing locomotives, garages bursting with antique sports cars, taxis, and limos, not to mention immaculately maintained country homes and smart flats. The theme music, a sort of palm court jazz, if that isn’t too rude a term, is quite catchy as well.

The attempts to “open up” Wodehouse’s world are another matter, and an area where devotees are likely to quibble. The series takes us inside Bertie’s “Drones Club,” but the members are depicted as emotionally stunted six-year-olds, while I always envisioned them as emotionally stunted thirteen-year-olds. I ended up bailing on the series back in the nineties for its lack of “respect” for Wodehouse, but if I persevere through the whole thing this time around I may be more forgiving.

Afterwords In the “real” twenties, knuts were better known as upper-class twits or “Bright Young Things.” The current British series The Windsors does a better job taking down the modern-day upper-class twit, because The Windsors deals with shagging and snorting as well as cigarettes and liquor, which are the only sins permitted in Jeeves and Wooster, though The Windsors still keeps it light. For a grimmer touch, you can find a TV adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s Decline and Fall, in which all the Bright Young Things are damned to Hell—or at least would be if Evelyn had his way. Variations on these themes can also be found on the once legendary Upstairs Downstairs series, which you can get on Amazon, if not elsewhere, as well as the execrable Downton Abbey—execrable if not indeed damnable—which I ridiculed both here and here.

Back in his heyday, between the two big wars, Wodehouse was the beloved pet of virtually every English writer, from Orwell on the left to T. S. Eliot (officially an American, of course,5) on the right, first because he was so funny and second because he offered no competition to them, despite writing of a world that they all knew never existed.6 The Wodehouse cult endured a great crisis in the early days of World War II when Wodehouse and his wife, enjoying an extended vacation in France, managed to get themselves captured by the German army. They were interned as enemy civilians, and Wodehouse agreed to make a few radio broadcasts for the Germans, in which he explained that his hosts, once you got to know them, proved to be rather jolly chaps in the whole. This naturally enraged the British population, who regarded Wodehouse as nothing less than a traitor.

The intelligentsia can always love an outcast—some more than others, of course—and Wodehouse admirers like Orwell rallied round in an excessive manner, rushing to “explain” that Wodehouse was a political naïf who knew not what he did. I think one can wonder about that. Wodehouse was quite a wealthy man—rarely the mark of a naïf in the first place—and many wealthy people on the eve of World War II feared that a “long war” would inevitably lead to crushing taxation and endless governmental regulation of every aspect of society no matter who “won”. Better to have the whole thing settled and done with, so that, hopefully, we could somehow find our way back to “normality”. Far more illustrious men than Wodehouse—Picasso, Matisse, and Andrè Gide, for example—were willing to make their peace with the Nazis. One must learn to accept that which one cannot change, after all.

Edward VII, who reigned from 1901 until 1911, was the figurehead monarch of a society that was moving rapidly towards civil war (over the question of “Home Rule” for Ireland) when an even greater external crisis intervened. Great Britain, as it then was generally called, was spared a civil war at the expense of about 600,000 dead and an equal number of wounded. On the one hand, there was almost nothing that Edward could do to prevent the smashup. On the other, there was almost nothing he did do to prevent the smashup. ↩︎

Eighteenth century literature featured many plots where, as Orwell (again) put it, the elements fit together like the teeth of a zipper, but the real classic that prefigures Wodehouse is Beaumarchais’ Marriage of Figaro, far better known in the U.S. via Mozart’s opera. Wodehouse no doubt got the idea from Gilbert and Sullivan rather than the “original”. ↩︎

English “public schools” are what we would call private schools. Wodehouse was immensely happy at his school—confusingly known as “Dulwich College”. It isn’t hard to guess from his work that he found the idea of an all-male society revolving largely around sports and adolescent hijinks immensely appealing. ↩︎

Wodehouse came from a seriously “colonial” family, and according to Wikipedia was raised for the first two years of his life by a Chinese nurse. I’ve read (somewhere) that the historian Edward Gibbon was cared for in his first years by a French nurse, and William F. Buckley was initially raised by a Spanish one. Not being exposed to your “native language” from birth can perhaps lead certain spirits to experience language as “naturally” artificial. ↩︎

Wherever he went, Eliot liked thinking of himself as a “metic” (Greek for “resident alien”)—St. Augustine’s notion of the proper role of a Christian while here on earth. I once read an interesting biography of Eliot that collected the opening remarks of addresses he gave, largely in the U.S. and the U.K., in which he would politely but firmly explain to his audience that he was not one of them. ↩︎

Not every writer adored Wodehouse. It’s typical of writers, regardless of background, to think of themselves as aristocrats and identify with the aristocracy, but some British writers, raised in the “Dissenting” tradition, hate everything about the whole country house fantasy. The fact that Wodehouse created a sort of “Disney version” made it no more palatable. ↩︎

[alecthemovieguy]

How ‘Tomorrowland’ reminded me that optimism is not a dirty word

“Dreamers need to stick together.” — Athena (Raffey Cassidy), “Tomorrowland.”

There was a lot of positive buzz around director and co-writer Brad Bird’s “Tomorrowland.”  His previous live-action film “Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol” jolted that flagging franchise back to life, and he directed the beloved animated films “The Iron Giant,” “The Incredibles” and “Ratatouille.”

Upon its release in 2015, the film received middling reviews from critics with audiences equally cool to it. The film managed a $209 million worldwide take at the box office, but with a $190 million that doesn’t factor in advertising and merchandise that sat on the shelf, the film has gone down as a dud.

I saw it during its theatrical release but didn’t review of it. Having recently rewatched the film, I wish I had reviewed it sooner because it is the kind of film — full of idealism and hope — that we need more of. Ironically, it is those very qualities that turned people off.

“An aggressively optimistic script admonishes the lazy and irresolute and urges humanity to end war and save the environment,” wrote Drew Hunt of the Chicago Reader.

Alison Willmore of BuzzFeed News echoed this sentiment calling it Bird’s “most stridently sermonizing.”

“Tomorrowland” does proudly wear its message on its sleeve. Despite all the bad in the world, Bird and his co-writer Damon Lindelof contend that we can still reverse the damage. Perhaps, that is a naive or foolishly idealistic message but it is one worth spreading.

The titular land is parallel dimension free from politics, bureaucracy, distractions and greed, where the world’s greatest minds can build whatever they are “crazy enough to imagine.”

For most of the film there isn't a physical villain. There are adversaries chasing down our heroes — Britt Robertson’s Casey, a scientifically curious teen; Aethena, the android recruiter for Tomorrowland; and George Clooney's Frank, who was once full of hope but became bitter when he was kicked out of Tomorrowland — but the true villain is cynicism and apathy.

It isn't until the final third that Bird personifies those qualities in Hugh Laurie's Nix, the head honcho of Tomorrowland. Thanks to a machine Frank invented, Nix (Hugh Laurie) has seen the end of the world and accepts this as an unavoidable fate. He has given up. He gives a pretty convincing speech on why he has.

“Let's imagine ... if you glimpsed the future, you were frightened by what you saw, what would you do with that information? You would go to ... the politicians, captains of industry? And how would you convince them? Data? Facts? Good luck! The only facts they won't challenge are the ones that keep the wheels greased and the dollars rolling in. But what if... what if there was a way of skipping the middle man and putting the critical news directly into everyone's head? The probability of wide-spread annihilation kept going up. The only way to stop it was to show it. To scare people straight. Because, what reasonable human being wouldn't be galvanized by the potential destruction of everything they've ever known or loved? To save civilization, I would show its collapse. But, how do you think this vision was received? How do you think people responded to the prospect of imminent doom? They gobbled it up like a chocolate eclair! They didn't fear their demise, they re-packaged it. It could be enjoyed as video-games, as TV shows, books, movies, the entire world wholeheartedly embraced the apocalypse and sprinted towards it with gleeful abandon.”

There's truth in that speech. We live in an age in which facts and data are negotiable. And as consumers, we do undeniably enjoying watching the end of days, just look at hit films like “2012” and “San Andreas.”

But “Tomorrowland” argues against this sort of cynicism and giving into fear and anger. Our current president won by preying on these impulses. There is a lot of negativity being forced into the world these days. We shouldn't pretend that it doesn't exist nor should we accept it as the way of the world. Blind optimism isn't the answer and Bird isn't advocating for that in his film. He's pushing for people to unite to exchange ideas and to create.

Children need to be encouraged to dream and to reach for the impossible. Adults need to be reminded of that message too because, as we get older, it is easy to become pessimistic and disillusioned. That is ultimately the root of why “Tomorrowland” failed. People dismissed its optimism as hokey and silly.

Sometimes, you have to let your guard down for a film to work. I did. There are visual wonders to behold in “Tomorrowland” that sent me back to my childhood.

For all of its preachiness, the film is also funny and emotionally resonate. I was reminded of when Disney dipped its toe into science fiction in the 1970s and '80s with films like “Escape to Witch Mountain,” “TRON” and “Flight of the Navigator.” “Tomorrowland” has that same spirit of adventure.

There's a closing montage of people across the globe from different walks of life — artists, engineers, teachers, etc. — being invited to Tomorrowland. The sequence filled me with hope. It made me want to put things out into the world — to try to make a difference in whatever way I can. So, here I am doing my part. What will you do?

[mauvaisxander]

Fanmix Masterpost

All my fanmixes sorted by fandom under the cut. I’m working on putting all my old fanmixes on it now, and will be updating it as I make new mixes. 

Agents Of Shield

     Daisy

          Fault Line

          Lies Made Visible 

     Daisy/Fitz

          Walk The Line

     Daisy/Simmons

          The Great Unknown

     Daisy/Trip

          Change The Weather

     Fitz/Simmons

          All My Broken Heartbeats

          A New Equation

          I Follow You (Deep Sea Baby)

     Trip

          These Small Hours

Anna Karenina

     Anna/Vronsky

          Constellations And Dreams

Arrested Development

     GOB/Tony

          This Could Be Magic, After All

A Song Of Ice And Fire

     Ashara

         With Grace In Your Heart And Flowers In Your Hair

     Brienne

          I Am Not A Maiden Fair

     Brienne/Jaime

          Only Love Can Save Us Now

     Daenerys

          My Voluntary Blindness

     General

          Put On Your War Paint

     Robb/Theon

          A Shock Of Death

     Sansa

          High On Lullabies 

     Theon

          Blossom Every Broken Part

A Tree Grows In Brooklyn

     Johnny

          Kick Drum Heart

     Sissy

          Aching To Pupate

Buffyverse

     Andrew

          Let The World Spin Madly On

          TV Taught Me How To Feel

     Andrew/Xander

          Big Crush On You

     Angel

          The Fragile Substance Of This Soul

     Angel/Buffy

          This Is Not The End

     Angel/Cordelia

          I Loved A Girl (Who Said That I Could Change The World)

          Miles From Where You Are

     Angel/Darla

          Darkest Hearts

          The Undone And The Divine

     Angel/Faith

          All My Love

     Angel Investigations

          What I Stand For

     Angel/Spike

          Nothing More Sadistic 

     Anya

          Cinder And Smoke

     Anya/Xander

          A Tightrope Tragedy

     Buffy

          I’m Only Human

          Looking For Heaven (Found The Devil In Me)

     Buffy/Faith

          Love Hunt Me Down

     Buffy/Spike

          Damage Control

          Dark Little Heaven

          Fire In The Water

          Love Me Mercilessly

          Take My Hand

          You Are Second Hand Smoke

     Connor

          Monster

     Cordelia

          Shed My Skin

     Cordelia/Doyle

          Going Going Gone

     Dawn

          Boundless And Beauty

          Keep On Dreamin’

     Dawn/Xander

          Speechless

     Drusilla/Spike

          A Dark Waltz

     Ethan/Giles

         Oxford Comma

     Faith

          Clouded With Dirt

     Faith/Giles

          Perfect (In That Fucked Up Way)

     Faith/Willow

          Walking Into Fire

     Faith/Xander

          A Dime A Dozen Kind Of Love

     Fred

          Don’t Lose Yourself

     Fred/Gunn

          I Love You (I Always Have)

          You Light Up My World

     Fred/Wesley

          I Ache For You

     General

          At The Bronze

          Darkest Before Dawn

     Giles

          A Sinners Heart

     Giles/Lilah

          Without An Honest Heart

     Illyria

          Phoenix Throne

     Illyria/Wesley

          A New Empire

     Lilah/Wesley

          Complementary Colors 

     Oz/Willow

          A Perfect Fit

          You Picked Me

     Scoobies

          A Life Worth Fighting For

     Spike

          Battle Born

     Tara/Willow

          Dreams Of Starry Nights

          Every Moment Was So Precious 

     Wesley

          My Lying Technique 

     Willow

          Darkness I Became

          Twilight Galaxy

     Women

          Bright As The Sun And As Bold As The Moon

          My Own Hero

Bully

     Cliques

          Just A Stupid Kid

     Gary/Jimmy

          Shades Of Wrong

          Strange Type Of Chemistry

     Gary/Pete

          All That You Are (Is All That I Need)

Cabin In The Woods

     General

          Doomsday

Choices Stories You Play

     Kenna

          I Won’t Run

     Kenna/Raydan

          I’d Follow

Chronicles Of Narnia

     Caspian/Edmund

          Until The Stars Fall

Community

     Abed/Troy

          Holding A Heart

Cougar Town

     Laurie/Travis

          Hearts Given Freely

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend

     Greg

          Never Wanted To Stay

     Nathaniel/Rebecca

          The Chase Is All You Know

     Rebecca/Valencia

          Not Fade Away

Dead Poets Society

     Neil/Todd

          Nothing Like You And I 

Dollhouse

     Adelle

         Last Call For Sin

     Adelle/Dominic

         Falling From Your Grace

     Alpha

         Our Vintage Misery

     Alpha/Echo

          A Taste Of Poison Paradise

          Dirty Little Damsel

     Bennett/Topher

         Two Atoms In A Molecule

     Echo

          I Don’t Exist

          Memories Fade

     Echo/Paul

          Gravity Sings

     Epitaphs

         This House Is Falling Apart

     General

          Go Back To Sleep

          We Do What We Must Because We Can

     Mellie/Paul

          My Sweetest Downfall

     Sierra

          Pins In Your Fingers

     Sierra/Victor

          You’re My Everything

     Topher

          Afterglow Of Rapture

          Dead Hearts Are Everywhere

          What Fine Design

     Whiskey

          Weary Of This Melody

Don’t Trust The B In Apartment 23

     Chloe/June

          All The Violent, Sweet, Perfect Words That You Said

Downton Abbey

     Branson/Sybil

          (You’re) The Home My Heart Searched For

     Edith

          I’ve Been Waiting (For My Planets To Align)

     Thomas

          Love Is Just A Lyric In A Children’s Rhyme

Durarara!!

     Anri/Masaomi/Mikado

          By Mistake Or By Design

     Izaya/Shizuo

          Violent For You

Fallout

     Charon/Lone Wanderer 

          You’re My River

Firefly

     General

          We Stood Up

     Inara/Mal

          The Dizzy Dance

     Kaylee/Simon

          Memory Of Home

          The Bed Of Stars

     Zoe

          I Fought The War

Friday Night Lights

     General

          God Love Your Soul And Your Aching Bones

     Jason

          Strength In Pain

     Jason/Lyla

          Too Much Is How I Love You

     Jason/Lyla/Tim

          Carousel 

     Julie/Matt

          She Is The Sunlight

          Wonderstruck

     Landry/Tyra

          I Will Love Until

     Lyla

          Heart Full Of Mess And Lore

     Lyla/Tim

          Burn Me Up

          Never Gets Dull

          Our Love’s The Only Truth

     Matt

          Looking For Wisdom

     Vince

          Everybody Loves Me

Friends

     Chandler/Monica

          I Could Live On Your Love

Geek Charming

     Dylan/Josh

          Movie Loves A Screen

Hannibal

     Will

          Blood On My Name

Harry Potter

     Dean/Seamus

          Makes My Heart Scream Colors

     Harry/Hermione/Ron

          Our Hearts Are Joined

     Hermione/Ron

          The Key To Your Heart

          Will You Be The Queen? And I’ll Be Your Clown

          You’re My Favorite Book

     James/Lily

          Head Over Feet

     Luna/Neville

          Love Planted Deeply

     Percy

          The Higher I’ll Climb

     Remus/Sirius

          Born A Lion

          Lines Of Lightning 

     Ron

          The Call

     Sirius

          Ghosts That We Knew

How I Met Your Mother

     Barney

          That Boy Is All About Fun

     Barney/Robin

          A More Uncertain Future

          Change My Orbit

          Your Perfect Disaster

     Lily/Marshall

          Growing Old With You

     MacLaren’s Gang

          High 5 (Friends Til The End)

     Ted/Tracy

          I’ve Missed You But I Haven’t Met You

          Under My Umbrella

In Your Eyes

     Dylan/Rebecca

          Echo

iZombie

     Liv/Major

          You Mean The World To Me

     Liv/Major/Ravi

          More Than Life

Kill La Kill

     Elite Four

          Dire Dreams

     Ryuko

          Meaning Of Resistance

King Falls AM

     Ben/Emily/Sammy

          My Heart In Your Hands

Les Miserables

     Bossuet/Joly

          A Drop In The Ocean

     Combeferre/Jehan

          Our Own Constellations 

     Cosette/Eponine

          Spoken Words Like Moonlight

     Cosette/Marius

          Sunlight In A Jar

          Sweet Love

     Courfeyrac/Marius

          Finding Something To Do

     Enjolras/Grantaire

          Our Hands Clasped So Tight

          You’re The One (I Had To Meet)

     Jehan

          Marvelous Things

     Les Amis

          A Dream Inside Our Heads

     Marius

          The Way It Ends

Leverage

     Eliot/Hardison/Parker

          I Fall Into You

Lizzie Bennet Diaries

     Lydia

          Sweet About Me

Marvel

     Avengers

          All Is Lost, Hope Remains

     Bucky/Natasha

          Darkness In My Heart

     Bucky/Steve

          Calling Me Home

     Clint/Natasha

          Runnin’ Wild

     Elektra/Matt

          Your Devil Side

     Frank

          Cross The Line

     Jessica

          I Am Steel

     Natasha

          Fishnets And Malice

     Peggy

          Something Good Can Work

     Pepper

          Woman King

     Pepper/Tony

          Love Will Be Our Wings

Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries

     Dot/Hugh

          Me Following You

     Jack/Phryne

          Anything Could Happen

          I Can’t Waste A Falling Star

Mortal Instruments/Shadowhunters

     Alec/Magnus

          I Saw Heaven’s Skies In Your Eyes

Neon Genesis Evangelion 

     Asuka

          Raise Hell

     Asuka/Shinji

          Hand In Unlovable Hand 

     General 

          People Are Just People

     Kaworu/Shinji

          A Prayer Left Unprayed 

          C’est La Vie C’est La Mort

          Nothing More Than Stardust

     Misato/Ritsuko

          One More Night

     Shinji

          I Am (Not) Running Away

          Searching For A Paradise

          You Were Just A Wish

Non Fandom

     Bumpy Relationships

          Get Me Right

     Cats

          Nine Lives

     Cheer Up

          Comedy Tonight

     Christmas Filk

          It’s A Fanboy Christmas

     Finnish Music

          Finland Finland Finland (That’s The County For Me)

     Love

          Perfect Love

     Music I Like

          #Back8Tracks

Orange Is The New Black

     Alex/Piper

          Can’t Fight Gravity

     Piper

          I’m A Guilty One

     Rosa

          Gonna Go Out In Style

Parks And Recreation

     Andy/April

          Wrap The World In Ribbons

     Ben/Leslie

          This Whole Beautiful Thing

Percy Jackson

     Calypso/Leo

          A Funny Little Thing

Person Of Interest

     Finch/Reese

         Save My Life

     Reese

          Flesh And Bone

     Root

          Remember Her Name

     Root/Shaw

          I Come With Knives (To Love You)

          Steal This Moment

Pretty Little Liars

     Alison

          I Was Born In A Summer Storm

          One Of Those Ghosts

     Alison/Emily

          A Fantasy Affair

          Law Of Gravity

     Alison/Mona

          Ruthless Game

     Aria

          Hearts From Iron

     Aria/Ezra

          How Fierce It Would Be

          Young Love

     A Team

          Is It Any Wonder That I Feel Betrayed?

     Caleb/Hanna

          A Drug For Angels

     Emily/Paige

          She Keeps Me Warm

     Emily/Spencer

          Shinin’ Just For You

     Hanna/Mona

          We’ll Be A Sweet Disaster

     Jenna

          (You Never Met A) Bitch Like Me

     Liars

          We Are Fire Born

     Melissa

          Secrets That Are Never To Be Told

     Mona

          Boom Goes The Dynamite

     Spencer

          I Am Titanium 

          Last Piece Of The Jigsaw

     Spencer/Toby

          I See Your Face In Every Star

          Lost Without You

          This Love Is Ours

Princess Tutu

     Ahiru

          Dance With Me Tonight

     Ahiru/Fakir

          Everlasting Light

     Mytho/Rue

          I Was Made For You

     Rue

          Blackbird

Psycho-Pass

     General

          Sins Original

     Kougami/Makishima

          Living With Your Ghost

     Kougami/Tsunemori

          Words In My Memory

Puella Magi Madoka Magica 

     Kyoko/Sayaka

          All Of My Stupid Love

Pushing Daisies

     Chuck/Ned

          Star-Crossed Souls Slow Dancing

Revenge

     Emily/Nolan

          For You, I Would Happily Drown

Revolutionary Girl Utena

     Anthy

          All This Sin And Strife

          Hope That Something Pure Can Last

     Anthy/Utena

          Moondance

          Pull Me Home

     General

          Stand And Fight

     Juri/Shiori

          All My Fragile Strength Is Gone

     Saionji/Touga

          Burn The Ashes

Safety Not Guaranteed

     General

          Gimme Sympathy 

Shakespeare

     Beatrice/Benedict

          Crazy Love

     Ophelia

          Rose Red

Shameless

     Fiona

          Shining Stars

     Fiona/Jimmy

          Burn To Shine

     Ian/Mickey

          Every Truth That You Denied

          Hope Is Our Four Letter Word

     Karen

          Baby You’re A Star

     Karen/Lip

          For Just One Yesterday

          The Wonderful Mess That We Made

     Kevin/Veronica

          Here Comes The Sun

     Lip

          Devil In My Mouth

Star Trek

     Cardassians

          All In Gray

     Filk

          Star Trekkin’

General

          The Future’s Not That Far Away

     Sarina/Seven

          Poetry In Motion

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

     Alexander/Nog

          A Sky Full Of Stars 

     Bashir

          Real Human Being

     Bashir/Garak

          Doctor Doctor (Give Me The News)

          Inside The Lies

          Love&Pizza

          Mosaic Broken Hearts

          No Sweeter Innocence

          The War Is Over (We Are Beginning)

          This Could Be Trouble

          Truth In Your Lies

          You Were A Kindness

     Bashir&O’Brien

          As Brothers We Will Stand

     Dax/Kahn

          Your Kiss Is Like A Lost Ghost

     Dax/Kira

          I And Love And You

          Our Private Galaxy

          You’re The Only One I See

     Garak

          Tell You A Secret

     Jake/Nog

          This Perfect Spot

          Underneath The Stars

     Keiko/Kira/Miles

          Love Was Bigger

     Kira/Odo

          (Your Love Is) Steady And Sure

     Odo/Quark

          Say That We’ll Be Nemeses

     Sisko

          Faith Is All

Star Trek: The Next Generation

     Picard/Q

          That Makes Us Human

     Riker/Troi

          A Moment Of Truth

Star Trek: The Original Series

     McCoy/Spock

          Our Calculation 

     Uhura

          A Star On The Dark Horizon

Star Trek: Voyager

     EMH I/EMH II

         Wings Of Thought

     Janeway

          Find A Home

     Janeway/Seven

          Coming To You

     Kim/Paris

          You Make Me Feel Like I Am Home Again

     Kim/Paris/Torres

          Fall In Love With A B Film

     Kim/Tuvok

          The Color Of The Universe

     Paris/Torres

          Falling Is Like This

          One More Chance (To Be Young And Wild And Free)

          Passion Bites

          You Make My Motor Run

     Seven

          Machine

     Suder/Tuvok

          You Are My Temptation

Stranger Things

     Jonathan/Nancy/Steve

          The Sky, The Earth, And Us

That 70′s Show

     Hyde/Jackie

          Don’t Let Me Fall

     Jackie

          Bubblegum Bitch

The Book Thief

     Liesel

          Magnolia

The Newsroom

     Don/Sloan

          Only Love

     Mackenzie/Will

          I Gave You All

          We Are Love And Misery

The Office

     Angela/Dwight

          Working Hard For You

     Jim/Pam

          The Earth Is Warmer When You Laugh

     Kelly/Ryan

          Reckless With My Heart

The West Wing

     Ainsley/Sam

          You Will Become

     C.J./Danny

          As Lovers Go

          Sweet Nothing

Welcome To Night Vale

     Carlos/Cecil

          I Hear Your Voice (And Suddenly I’m Falling)

     General

          A World Of White Blindness

Wicked

     Elphaba/Glinda

          Swan Song

Wolf 359

     Eiffel/Hera

          A Universe Inside Of You

[ricardosousalemos]

Massive Attack: Mezzanine

“Trip-hop” eventually became a ’90s punchline, a music-press shorthand for “overhyped hotel lounge music.” But today, the much-maligned subgenre almost feels secret precedent. Listen to any of the canonical Bristol-scene albums of the mid-late ’90s, when the genre was starting to chafe against its boundaries, and you’d think the claustrophobic, anxious 21st century started a few years ahead of schedule. Looked at from the right angle, trip-hop is part of an unbroken chain that runs from the abrasion of ’80s post-punk to the ruminative pop-R&B-dance fusion of the moment. 

The best of it has aged far more gracefully (and forcefully) than anything recorded in the waning days of the record industry’s pre-filesharing monomania has any right to. Tricky rebelled against being attached at the hip to a scene he was already looking to shed and decamped for Jamaica to record a more aggressive, bristling-energy mutation of his style in ’96; the name Pre-Millennium Tension is the only obvious thing that tells you it’s two decades old rather than two weeks. And Portishead’s ’97 self-titled saw the stress-fractured voice of Beth Gibbons envisioning romance as codependent, mutually assured destruction while Geoff Barrow sunk into his RZA-noir beats like The Conversation’s Gene Hackman ruminating over his surveillance tapes. This was raw-nerved music, too single-minded and intense to carry an obvious timestamp. 

But Massive Attack were the origin point of the trip-hop movement they and their peers were striving to escape the orbit of, and they nearly tore themselves to shreds in the process. Instead— or maybe as a result—they laid down their going-nova genre's definitive paranoia statement with Mezzanine. The band's third album (not counting the Mad Professor-remixed No Protection) completes the last in a sort of de facto Bristol trilogy, where Tricky’s youthful iconoclasm and Portishead’s deep-focus emotional intensity set the scene for Massive Attack’s sense of near-suffocating dread. The album corroded their tendencies to make big-wheel hymnals of interconnected lives where hope and despair trade precedent—on Mezzanine, it’s alienation all the way down. There’s no safety from harm here, nothing you’ve got to be thankful for, nobody to take the force of the blow: what Mezzanine provides instead is a succession of parties and relationships and panopticons where the walls won’t stop closing in.

The lyrics establish this atmosphere all on their own. Sex, in “Inertia Creeps,” is reduced to a meeting of “two undernourished egos, four rotating hips,” the focus of a failing relationship that's left its participants too numbed with their own routine dishonesty to break it off. The voice singing it—Massive Attack's cornerstone co-writer/producer Robert “3D” Del Naja—is raspy from exhaustion. “Dissolved Girl” reiterates this theme from the perspective of guest vocalist Sarah Jay Hawley (“Passion’s overrated anyway”). On “Risingson,” Grant “Daddy G” Marshall nails the boredom and anxiety of being stuck somewhere you can’t stand with someone you’re starting to feel the same way about (“Why you want to take me to this party and breathe/I’m dying to leave/Every time we grind you know we severed lines”).

But Mezzanine’s defining moments come from guest vocalists who were famous long before Massive Attack even released their first album. Horace Andy was already a legend in reggae circles, but his collaborations with Massive Attack gave him a wider crossover exposure, and all three of his appearances on Mezzanine are homages or nods to songs he'd charted with in his early-’70s come-up. “Angel” is a loose rewrite of his 1973 single “You Are My Angel,” but it’s a fakeout after the first verse—originally a vision of beauty (“Come from way above/To bring me love”), transformed into an Old Testament avenger: “On the dark side/Neutralize every man in sight.” The parenthetically titled, album-closing reprise of “(Exchange)” is a ghostly invocation of Andy’s “See A Man's Face” cleverly disguised as a comedown track. And then there’s “Man Next Door,” the John Holt standard that Andy had previously recorded as “Quiet Place”—on Mezzanine, it sounds less like an overheard argument from the next apartment over and more like a close-quarters reckoning with violence heard through thin walls ready to break. It’s Andy at his emotionally nuanced and evocative best.

The other outside vocalist was even more of a coup: Liz Fraser, the singer and songwriter of Cocteau Twins, lends her virtuoso soprano to three songs that feel like exorcisms of the personal strife accompanying her band’s breakup. Her voice serves as an ethereal counterpoint to speaker-rattling production around it. “Black Milk” contains the album’s most spiritually unnerving words (“Eat me/In the space/Within my heart/Love you for God/Love you for the Mother”), even as her lead and the elegiac beat make for some of its most beautiful sounds. She provides the wistful counterpoint to the night-shift alienation of “Group Four.” And then there's “Teardrop,” her finest moment on the album. Legend has it the song was briefly considered for Madonna; Andrew “Mushroom” Vowles sent the demo to her, but was overruled by Daddy G and 3D, who both wanted Fraser. Democracy thankfully worked this time around, as Fraser’s performance—recorded in part on the day she discovered that Jeff Buckley, who she’d had an estranged working relationship and friendship with, had drowned in Memphis’ Wolf River—was a heart-rending performance that gave Massive Attack their first (and so far only) UK Top 10 hit.

Originally set for a late ’97 release, Mezzanine got pushed back four months because Del Naja refused to stop reworking the tracks, tearing them apart and rebuilding them until they’re so polished they gleam. It sure sounds like the product of bloody-knuckled labor, all that empty-space reverb and melted-together multitrack vocals and oppressive low-end. (The first sound you hear on the album, that lead-jointed bassline on “Angel,” is to subwoofers what “Planet Earth” is to high-def television.) But it also groans with the burden of creative conflict, a working process that created rifts between Del Naja and Vowles, who left shortly after Mezzanine dropped following nearly 15 years of collaboration.

Mezzanine began the band’s relationship with producer Neil Davidge, who’d known Vowles dating back to the early ’90s and met the rest of the band after the completion of Protection. He picked a chaotic time to jump in, but Davidge and 3D forged a creative bond working through that pressure. Mezzanine was a document of unity, not fragmentation. Despite their rifts, they were a post-genre outfit, one that couldn’t separate dub from punk from hip-hop from R&B because the basslines all worked together and because classifications are for toe tags. All their acknowledged samples—including the joy-buzzer synths from Ultravox’s “Rockwrok” (“Inertia Creeps”), the opulent ache of Isaac Hayes’ celestial-soul take on “Our Day Will Come” (“Exchange”), Robert Smith’s nervous “tick tick tick” from the Cure’s “10:15 Saturday Night,” and the most concrete-crumbling throwdown of the Led Zep “Levee” break ever deployed (the latter two on “Man Next Door”)—were sourced from  1968 and 1978, well-traveled crate-digging territory. But what they build from that is its own beast.  

Their working method never got any faster. The four-year gap between Protection and Mezzanine became a five-year gap until 2003’s 100th Window, then another seven years between that record and 2010’s Heligoland, plus another seven years and counting with no full-lengths to show for it. Not that they've been slacking: we've gotten a multimedia film/music collaboration with Adam Curtis, the respectable but underrated Ritual Spirit EP, and Del Naja’s notoriously rumored side gig as Banksy. (Hey, 3D does have a background in graffiti art.) But the ordeal of both recording and touring Mezzanine took its own toll. A late ’98 interview with Del Naja saw him optimistic about its reputation-shedding style: “I always said it was for the greater good of the fucking project because if this album was a bit different from the last two, the next one would be even freer to be whatever it wants to be.” But fatigue and restlessness rarely make for a productive mixture, and that same spark of tension which carried Mezzanine over the threshold proved unsustainable, not just for Massive Attack’s creativity but their continued existence.

Still, it’s hard not to feel the album’s legacy resonating elsewhere—and not just in “Teardrop” becoming the cue for millions of TV viewers to brace themselves for Hugh Laurie’s cranky-genius-doctor schtick. Graft its tense feelings of nervy isolation and late-night melancholy onto two-step, and you’re partway to the blueprint for Plastician and Burial. You can hear flashes of that mournful romantic alienation in James Blake, the graceful, bass-riddled emotional abrasion in FKA twigs, the all-absorbing post-genre rock/soul ambitions in Young Fathers or Algiers. Mezzanine stands as an album built around echoes of the ’70s, wrestled through the immediacy of its creators' tumultuous late ’90s, and fearless enough that it still sounds like it belongs in whatever timeframe you're playing it.