#west side story fandom

[princesssarisa]

Musical fandoms and ingenue hate

Is this really such a problem?

There's a YouTuber named Katherine Steele who mostly makes videos about musical theatre, and who has a small video series in defense of ingenue characters, titled "Why Everybody Hates..."

There are four videos in the series: "Why Everybody Hates Cosette" (Les Misérables), "Why Everybody Hates Christine" (The Phantom of the Opera), "Why Everybody Hates Johanna" (Sweeney Todd), and "Why Everybody Hates Maria" (West Side Story).

Some other sources – like TV Tropes, for example – have cited those videos to talk about why these characters are "widely" disliked.

But is it really true? Of all four of those musicals' fandoms, I've only been deep in the Les Misérables fandom, but from what I've seen people say about the others, I had no idea that those ingenue characters got big amounts of hate!

Being indifferent to the character doesn't count as hate, nor does considering her unoffensive but boring.

Do Johanna and Maria get the same kind of real loathing in the diehard Sweeney Todd and West Side Story fandoms that we see in the Les Mis fandom with talk about "that horrid Cosette," "I hate her with a passion," etc?

There is a lot of visceral, venomous Cosette-hate in the Les Mis fandom, or at least there used to be in the '90s and early 2000s. But it has a cause: Éponine. Immature people hate Cosette because she's loved by Marius, when they want him to love Éponine instead. (And to a lesser extent because she "abandons" her father Jean Valjean, but that's more the novel's Cosette than the musical's.)

I know that there's also some Christine hate among Phantom Phans, which is also love-triangle related: they hate her for choosing Raoul instead of the Phantom.

But I had no idea that Sweeney and WSS fans were venomous about Johanna or Maria – are they?

From what little I've seen of Sweeney fans, I've occasionally seen them call Johanna boring or a Mary Sue (and even then, the context has been "I always thought she was, but then [insert actress here] made me appreciate her"). But for the most part, I see people talk approvingly about how she's more complex than an average ingenue, how she can be played as mentally unstable, etc.

And Maria? Yes, there are the people who can't stand how quickly she forgives Tony for killing Bernardo. (Although that complaint only seems to have become widespread with the 2021 film's release – I remember occasionally reading it in the past, but not nearly as much as now.) But apart from that, and from sometimes seeing people call both Maria and Tony boring, I had no idea that anyone hated her! And if you think she had no characterization but "pretty and nice" until the 2021 film, then you've been giving both the stage version and the 1961 film a shallow surface read! She's always had intelligence, playfulness, passion and strength!

I'd like people who have been deep in the fandoms of these musicals to tell me. Is there really a widespread problem of loud, venomous hate for all these ingenue characters, the way there has been for Cosette in the Les Mis fandom? Or is it really just a few people calling them "boring" now and then, with only the love triangles in Les Mis and Phantom making people nastier about Cosette and Christine?

[marsconer]

im too late for the wss fandom but i have so many ideas for a fic…yes, a fic for a musical thats a remake from a movie 1962 that’s an adaptation of romeo and juliet

[richiesnotaloserguyscmon]

just saw this on pinterest and it hit me like a truck

[genericpuff]

I wonder why christian misrepresentation are rarely talked about if compared to other religion misrepresentation. Like, I've seen people really vocal about Greek myths misrepresentation in LO and such (and it's valid because it's a culture and religion) but I rarely saw the same thing with christian even though there are many media who use christian religion innacurately, to the point where it comes off as using it as an aesthetic and not a proper religion.

Is it because of rampant religious trauma especially in western world? No ulterior motives on this question. I'm not a christian and yet I'm curious about this. I apologize if this sounds harsh.

I obviously don't have The Answer(tm) to this but personally speaking (and I'm about to get VERY personal here so take this with MOUNTAINS OF SALT), I think it's just the obvious - Christian mythology is one of the most well-documented and strongly protected out of virtually any other religion on the planet. Especially here in the West, it's commonplace for kids to go to Sunday school, for couples to have Christian weddings even if they're not practising Christians themselves, even the American anthem references the Christian God. It's simply not as easy to 'misrepresent' it because the representation is written into our very fabric of society. Even Greece itself is primarily made up of Orthodox Christians.

So anyone that does 'misrepresent' it are either completely mislead hardcore Christians, or people who are doing it intentionally, such as with the intent to make a parody of it or to deconstruct it through a different context or whatever have you. And of course, people will still get mad at those things, if you're implying that people aren't vocal about Christian misrepresentation then frankly IDK what to tell you there LOL If you want a contextual example in the realm of webtoons, Religiously Gay was dragged to hell and back during its launch for having a very crude and insulting depiction of St. Michael, and frankly, yeah I don't disagree because what the fuck is this-

(like at best it's just terrible character design lmao that said, there's also plenty else to criticize Religiously Gay for, including its fetishy representation of gay relationships and the fact that it's still just the "naive person who looks and acts like a child hooks up with mean person in a position of power" trope, blech, but the character design is definitely the first thing you notice)

There are even plenty of hardcore Christians who will deadass claim "misrepresentation" over things that ARE factually correct but they just haven't read the actual Bible and simply cherry pick what works for their own agenda. And of course those people are routinely called out by people like myself who know for a fact that Jesus wouldn't have promoted the war crimes that many modern day Christians are committing and justifying today. So it really depends on the definition of "misrepresentation" here.

The issue specifically with LO and Rachel that I personally call her out for (and many others) is that she's called herself a "folklorist" and claimed she's so much more knowledgeable on Greek myth than anyone else, while making a complete mockery of the original mythologies while not being honest about her intent as to whether LO is actually supposed to be a legitimate retelling OR a parody (because it sure acts like the latter more than the former, but she still seems to expect us to take it seriously and consider her knowledge of Greek myth superior?) Which leads to a lot of her teenage audience claiming shit like "Persephone went down to the underworld willingly" and "Apollo did assault Persephone in the original myths actually" and the classic "why would Lore Olympus lie or make up fake myths?"

You just can't pull off this extent of erasure with Christian mythology because we have a whole ass book of it that's been preserved, sold on shelves, and systematically integrated into society for thousands of years. Of course, there are people who will still try their damned best to twist the Bible to match their own bigotry with the whole "Jesus hates gays" bullshit (he would never), but it's met with equal amounts of 'misrepresentation' that are actually fully well-read and are intentionally subverting and changing things to either critique, parody, or restore the original intent of a lot of stories in the Bible without all the manufactured right-wing crap.

Greek myth, on the other hand, has some stories that are well preserved, and others, not so much. And in the modern day outside of the poems and hymns, you'll also rarely, if ever, see anyone use stories from Greek myth to ostracize, torture, and murder other people. "Misrepresenting Christianity" is more often done by actual Christians who are using the Bible to commit hate crimes than the people who have actually read the Bible and are just taking creative liberties with it for the sake of deconstructing / parodying / analyzing / subverting it. Veggie Tales "misrepresents" Christian stories because obviously Moses wasn't a fucking cucumber lmao but it still accomplishes its goal by retelling Christian stories in a way that's fun and educational for children.

By comparison (on the whole, I'm not comparing LO to Veggie Tales LMAO) LO just isn't clear in its intentions beyond Rachel's initial statements that she was trying to "deconstruct" the myths, while labelling herself as a folklorist. Therefore, I'm going to criticize how she does it because the way she's done it up until now has been very mishandled and has resulted in a lot of misinterpretations of the myths simply for the sake of fandom. And yes, these people exist in Christian media as well - they're called TV evangelists.

And that's my (very heavy) two cents.

[racetrackmybeloved]

the way it is literally impossible to watch west side story and not have your eyes glued to mike faist and ben cook in every single dance

[winters-on-the-wing]

actor james and sirius duos

james playing jesus and sirius playing judas in jesus christ superstar.

james playing pierre and sirius playing anatole in natasha, pierre, and the great comet of 1812.

james playing tony and sirius playing riff in west side story. (even though james isn’t white. we’ll pretend for a millisecond that he’s white.)

james playing melchior and sirius playing moritz in spring awakening. (ik that irl james is more like moritz and sirius is more like melchior but i feel like theatrically they’d fit these parts better since melchior requires more singing skill and moritz requires more acting skill!)

james playing davey and sirius playing jack kelly in newsies.

james playing orpheus and sirius playing hermes in hadestown.

james playing dickon and sirius playing archibald in the secret garden.

a couple bonus roles that i think they each would play super well:

- james playing alfred in alice by heart.

- sirius playing odysseus in epic the musical.

- sirius playing bruce in fun home (he would channel his inner orion to the point where he terrifies himself.)

- james playing jesse in tuck everlasting.

- sirius playing jonathan in tick tick boom.

[tragic-ships-tournament]

Tragic Ships Tournament Round 2

Propaganda under the cut!

Herongraystairs:

"Hey is it polyamory if you and your buddy are both in love with the same girl (and each other)? Is it polyam to die of old age and only have your wife and the guy you were platonic married to as a teenager in your final moments? Is it polyamory if you constantly bring up your wife's dead husband and make it clear you're also deeply in love with him?"

Tony and Maria:

"Both the movies have such beauty to them. obv. different strengths between them. I imagine broadway is electric with it all too. I love that they aren't the rich kids but poor and just trying to make something of themselves. Tony has a real shot of getting out at the start, and Maria wants to go with him. The songs are wonderful. I go back and forth on if the ending is better in WSS, where Maria lives, or R&J where they both die. Perhaps WSS makes the love feel more real because Maria can defend it when everything is over?"

[cashthecomposer]

If your favorite musical already has a proshot, just mark the one that is the case for that particular proshot! If it's available for free, mark the maximum you'd be willing to pay for it if it wasn't. ❤️

[txddandersxn]

I just know Neil Perry loves a good Sondheim, West Side Story in particular

[above-the-foldd]

THIS IS NOT A DRILL

new ben cook interview !!!!

all i needed to cheer up<3

[abysmalstarrs]

Chat, if I were to, hypothetically, start a business selling stuff (keychains, stickers, cards, prints, commissions, etc), when should I start? I was thinking around June or July of 2025 (to get supplies ready), but should I wait till I have, like, a bigger following?

(BTW, all the merch would be of literally any fandom I'm in. I would be a mixed book)

[diorgirl444]

RIFF LORTON ANGST IN THE WORKS ‼️‼️‼️

[anton-wyzek]

Man Of The House//West Side Story

[could-they-be-a-pro-wrestler]

How successful would Maria…

Would you like to submit a character? Click this link if you do!

[honeybadgerdontcare394]

Attention all Hogwarts students!

This year's musical, put on by the Music club is West Side Story! We're holding auditions and will post a poll once you've heard all of the contenders.

We're currently casting Tony, so all auditions will be for the lead role.

Up first is one Mr. Ominis Gaunt for your consideration.

(I am also taking suggestions for others you wish to hear audition, for any role in the show, so leave a comment with your favorites and maybe I can make it happen!)

[icedsodapop]

I dont trust White women who watched West Side Story and hate Bernado but their favorite character is Riff. Like, how do you say you are racist without saying you are racist 🤡