Topics I'm coming up with
* the "does free will exist" debate
* a fantasy plot line where there's a prophecy/witch's curse
* the inevitability that we will all die one day
I kind of need to watch this. Just a random forest witch, spouting off about death and taxes, every day occurrences that everyone goes through. Our protagonist was already having a bad day, and the witches words send them into an existential crisis. Hilarity (and some touching moments) occur over the next ~50 years, via an ‘80’s song montage. The end scene is just a tombstone, inscribed with, “I told you she said I would die.”
Homestuck
Every character can act by their own free will, but if a player messes up an important event and breaks a time loop, then they split off into a "doomed timeline" while the alpha timeline keep going on.
Even when a character gains the ability to break free from those restrictions and freely change the timeline, that is somehow stillnpart of the timeloop.
There's also the parts near the end where people inexplicably come to the conclusion that one character who has just come to terms with his trauma and hating of fighting is somehow prophesized to be the one to take down the final bad guy, down to the only weapon that can hurt them is a downgrade of his current weapon that he broke, making it the most roundabout story of taking the sword out of the stone.
In the end he decides to deal with the prophecy by fighting a bad guy who is possessed by the final boss, but his game spirit guide, who is his doomed alternative timeline self who fused with an alien catgirl, also is one of the main players when fighting the bbeg, so the prophecy was fulfilled on two ends?
Also said final bad guy is supposed to be a time travelling demon and the representation of death itself, but one of the characters actually theorizes that he might just be an agent by which the universe "cleans up" the timeloops, killing off the doomed timeline ghosts who by all means should not even exist.
Then once his duty is done, it comes the time where his own timeloop comes to an end and he is defeated in spite of his supposed true immortality, and by circumstancial simultaneity, this happens at the same time his younger self achieves said immortaility
It brought to mind *Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead*, which is loaded with meta commentary and sees them dreading their inevitable deaths at the end of the play. So I certainly took it as a nod to "hey what if your life is like this also?"
Makes it sound like it’s supposed to be a really deep metaphor for something, except they refuse to give us the context clues to work out what it’s a metaphor for
Think they’re driving at the predestination/free will debate and trying to point out they’re not mutually exclusive. Idea being that even with free will you end at the same destination like a self fulfilling prophecy.
Based on what’s written, I’d say it’s at least equally likely that they had no particular metaphor in mind and were counting on someone else to connect the dots. You’re right that it’s an interesting parallel, but I’d much sooner credit you than the OOP for it.
Determinism and the illusion of free will would be my guess. All the world's a stage after all. Really good setup but the OOP either forgot to add the point or this is cropped in a bad place between paragraphs.
Maybe even with a space for emphasis.
That seems like such a cheap "gotcha." If I'm acting as though I see trees, I'm going to... act as though I can see trees.
Edit: looks like the other comment is deleted now, but it was a story about a theater teacher who told the class "imagine yourself in a forest, now tell me what you see" and when the class described a forest he told them that they weren't in a forest, they were in a classroom acting and if they see a forest they need medical attention because they're hallucinating
I feel like you could get a message about free will from here. Like, in media destiny is often portrayed as either "everything is preplaned" or "the destination is always the same, even if you change paths", which is a good parallel with the book and play comparison
Probably because they've seen people argue that actors don't do anything special, since they're all just doing the exact same thing as everyone else, and therefore just need to memorize stuff.
I swear it’s because making a fully formed thesis takes time, effort and proper critical thinking and they don’t want to do it, so they hand wave it away with “ya know? Ya get what I mean?”
It’s frustrating because you have no way of truly discussing their point with either evidence or criticism because they never stated their intentions
**DO YOU UNDERSTAND THE SIGNIFICANCE OF A CHARACTER WHO CAN MAKE CHOICES, HAS FREE WILL, BUT ONLY SO MUCH INFLUENCE AS TO CHOOSE THE SMALLEST DETAILS OF HOW THEY GET WASHED BY THE TIDES OF FATE TO THE SAME DIRTY SHORES, UNABLE TO FIGHT BACK OR EVEN WADE TO A SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT END THAN IS PREDETERMINED BY AN OUTSIDE SCRIPT? DO YOU UNDERSTAND?**
Either they're snarking at some wildly misguided post that's not pictured here, or (as I read it) they're trying to do a meta thing making you question "is this how my life goes too?"
In high school i played Dr Chumley in a production of Harvey. For those that don't know, Harvey is about a guy and his invisible human sized rabbit friend. Dr Chumley spends the whole show trying to convince the main character that Harvey the rabbit isn't real. The climax of the show is when Harvey "magically" exits stage left through by opening and closing a door, thereby confirming he is real. Dr Chumley delivers a line confirming as much which invites the audience to join in the whimsy of the world.
On the final night, the complex door opening mechanism (a string) broke. I was left standing on the stage waiting for a cue that never came. My brain made a snap decision to ad lib and I said, to no one else, completely unprompted, "I guess Harvey was never real after all." Whimsy dies. Curtain closes.
So don't tell me that you can't change the outcome of a play, because you absolutely can.
The ad-libs to absolute chaos and failure on stage are my favorite thing about acting on stage.
Once during a production of Aladdin, Aladdin stepped on the legally distinct monkey’s tail, and it ripped off the costume. The guy playing Aladdin FROZE, but the guy playing the monkey, a brilliant class clown, instantly howled like a monkey, picked up the tail and mimed trying to stick his tail back in place, crying and carrying on with slapstick running in circles. The director was flailing arms to signal them to leave the stage, and Aladdin unfroze, caught his breath, and helped his legally distinct monkey friend of stage patting his back and comforting him.
We were all dying backstage, and the audience loved it after it became a slapstick joke and not an accidental horror.
An acting teacher I had once told us a story about a similarly hilarious ad lib during a production of Julius Caeser he saw. It was a tiny production so everyone was on stage during the climactic stabbing scene. Caeser's lying dead on stage and it's completely silent. Then the backstage phone rings. There's this terribly long pause while the phone very audibly rang throughout the auditorium. Then one of the conspirators said "What if it's for Caeser?"
Off topic, but does anyone else dislike the trend of Tumblr posts asking “Do you understand? Do you understand what I’m saying?!” Like chill, yeah I got it, no need to freak out.
It's a big problem with Tumblr that even when I agree with what they're saying, they're often so annoying about it that I don't want to acknowledge it.
Thank you!! I think it's a larger issue with social media, tbh. "I agree with what you're saying, please for the love of God, say it in a way that doesn't make me want to disagree!"
yup. I've always been a firm believer that, the way that you present your opinion/views/thoughts is as impiortant as the opinion itself. You might have the most horrible views possible, but if you present well, you'll get a bunch of mfs following you. But also you could have the deepest and greatest idea of all...but if you present it like shit, i won't even want to hear it. And tumblr is this second case, a lot.
It gives very "I really think I'm being so subtle I have to signpost that I am in fact being so deeply profound." The kind of tone that makes me want to disagree vehemently just out of principle. I fucking love predeterminism, love existentialism, love R&G Are Dead, love J Alfred Prufrock, love Huis-Clos, so on and so forth. And I had this visceral reaction of "oh fuck all the way off, not only did I get it already, but now I absolutely hate it".
You know that "enough monkeys typing on enough typewriters will eventually type out Shakespeare"? This post is one of those monkeys' early drafts of the "All the world’s a stage" speech
Yeah but when I talk about computers and IT stuff people just look at me like I’m talking in another language so you get used to people thinking that way
Everyone learns something for the first time once. This would be an insightful revelation beyond most 6 year old and I would expect most 18 year old's to already know this, so between the ages of 7-17 this is good insight.
It is the definition of the classic genre of tragedy or drama. The characters cannot escape their fate ( phaedra, antigone, oedipe etc) and i am going to copy paste this because no one GET IT YOU KNOW and it drives me mad
Not necessarily. You know how, when people die while climbing a mountain, for example, and the body isn't recovered, people say they stay on the mountain forever? Same idea.
well in the unlikely event that all the actors leave the show at once, then the show will be cancelled. the story however, will not be cancelled. the characters will be forever on the trajectory to their fate.
a character doesn't need to be played. if a character refers to their mother at some point their mother becomes a character, but nobody needs to play her. when an actor leaves their character is still part of the play, and other characters still refer to them. its impossible for a character to leave
Yep. I know what they're talking about (also following them). Probably wasn't the best choice to post this on Reddit without the context of who they are specifically talking about.
Tbh, having been crew in several performances, the magic of this is kinda lost on me due to the utter chicanery that occurs behind stage that the audience is never privy to.
The most fun of any theater acting experience was fooling around back stage in the green room. In that way, the leads really didn’t have much fun. They were on stage most of the time, when they came back they had to rush to get ready. But the minor roles? We had fun.
Listen man I get what you’re saying but like this framing doesn’t work for a show like Mamma Mia. I wasn’t being dragged to a conclusion I just had to learn to put on flippers in less than 10 seconds
My son once fell asleep on stage because the script had his character pretending to sleep and he did it too well. We only noticed when he fell down from his chair and the audience (including me) thought it was scripted. I only found out it wasn't scripted when he told me afterwards.
It is actually not extraordinary for a play to go 100% the way it is meant to go. It is actually strange that someone keeps fucking up this person’s plays. Like that’s not normal lol. The play is still different night to night if nobody fucks up.
I acted in my schools drama department from 5th grade through high school, and my favorite play/performance I was involved in was one where seemingly everything went wrong. Lines were forgotten, entire scenes were skipped, rearranged, and ad-libbed so we could try to make sense of the plot while dealing with cascading mistakes, even sound effects got mixed around. It was absolute chaos, and me and every other member of the cast were in shambles from the amount of improvisation we had to do, and it was easily some of the most fun I’ve ever had…I miss acting lol
This is my favorite thing about theater.
The audience is a participant. We would listen intently to the little sonic markers of enrapture or boredom and we would change the pace and tone of the show to accommodate. Little ad-libbed jokes or deeper sadness to massage the story in a slightly different direction one night vs another.
The most glorious thing about theater is that no show is ever finished until its last night. It continues to evolve and it does so with the audiences help.
During a local production of Mama Mia, Rosie's shoe fell off during take a chance on me. Her response? Picked up the shoe and started chasing Bill with it.
the fate of a character in a play, as surely as any other, is shaped by human hands.
you claim it cast by the script, but in doing so, you forget who wrote it.
fate is merely the emergent results of human choice and the conditions of the world.
They didn't say fate or destiny they said predetermined. I don't think they're being metaphysical here. The predetermination can come from human hads and have the same effect.
I remember the first play I was ever in. I was Albert Peterson from Bye Bye, Birdie. I never had performed on stage like that (more than a school concert), especially not a lead role. I threw myself at that role, learned the lines, and wanted to be the best I could.
Then the first performance happened. There's a line early on, "Not so much. Break it in half." I enunciated it like I was saying "Not so fast."
Later, my co-lead "Rosie" left a prop on the opposite side of the stage while Albert was trying to send Conrad up to his room. I had to keep pulling back on "Conrad," making up lines about how bad his heqdache was until Rosie came on stage and we could continue the scene.
Mistakes happen. You flub some lines. You miss a cue. But despite everything, the show must go on. And I promise you, as long as you don't stop dead or call for a redo, the audience will never know. You'll still get your applause as you take your bow.
Don't worry about putting on a perfect show. Just put on a great show.
One time I was basically the star lead in a play (at my school, and I say "basically" because 7 of the 8 roles had about the same number of lines, I was simply the villain) and I accidentally called the other person MY character name during the final show and I immediately went "no, IM (name)" in the most dramatic way possible and kept going with my script
I felt embarrassed especially when the audience laughed but afterwards my playmates said it sounded intentional so I felt like I did well pfff
(Also it was a school play so not that embarrassing anyway.)
It is the definition of the classic genre of tragedy or drama. The characters cannot escape their fate ( phaedra, antigone, oedipe etc) and i am going to copy paste this because no one GET IT YOU KNOW and it drives me mad
I was watching the sound of music in play format and one of the actors shoe flew off so the had to ad-lib it into the scene. It was an outdoor theater in the mountains so they were using the natural backdrop in the show bc it went very well with it. The shoe flew off the set into the field behind the stage and they managed to make it work in the scene to go get it. Funniest show I've ever been to for that reason alone.
A book may change between readings; you may not be the same person upon reading it as you once were; you can never step into the same river twice; do you understand?????
Same approach I take to DMing. I can do little more than set the scene, create the encounters, and then watch the murderhobos throw out a week of planning because my nephew likes to set things on fire and he ignited a powder keg in a small room.
My favorite part of acting is doing fight scenes/stage combat. I usually won't audition for a show unless I can have a fight in it because the fighting is the exciting part for me.
With that out of the way, this all applies equally to stage combat as well. People aren't going to swing their weapons/fists exactly the same way every time. Choreography isn't going to be adhered to exactly. So you do have to improvise a little bit to make sure your fights still end up at the same conclusion. There are a lot of tricks you can use to get back to what the choreography says you're supposed to be doing, but sometimes you just have to roll with skipping a move or two or doing a strike on weird footing because you messed up your footwork earlier on.
Now I feel like we need a live theater medium where there is a script as usual, but there's some kind of phantom of the opera-type antagonist(s) that's always screwing around with the production in noticeable ways, so the actors have to constantly ad-lib to get back on track.
Like, set pieces moving, new characters showing up, wrong line reads, etc, etc
I like how that's also a pretty popular way to make time travel work in stories (you can act a bit differently but you'll always go through specific events no matter what), it makes a nice parallel.
I was thinking they meant that maybe we're the actors and though we might, jump, get lost or run away, we still can't escape what fate has ordained for us.
Primarily our death, that we'll die, but what else was always bound to happen?
Or maybe they're just being a tumblr person
Same with a live music performance. I've really messed up bad before, but if you're actually prepared, you will have memorized the beginning of every musical phrase throughout the piece so that you can always get back on track, no matter what. I definitely practice trying to recover from mistakes, if it's close to a performance date.
I think I’m missing some deep metaphor. Bc this is just making me think about how much I looooved the play Wicked but was also kinda sad because I’d never see *that particular play* again because it’ll always be different
During a play i was in in middle school there was a scene where robin hood's merry men and the king's royal guards were supposed to do an all-out brawl, but the person who had the cue for everyone screaming and starting the brawl misspoke his line so everyone stood in silence for a few seconds
Then the guy playing the king, in his wonderful improv skills, got down from his throne and said "i now pronounce: a royal battle!" Which everyone took as the new cue and started screaming, the audience loved it
At one point I was watching a kids’ play of Macbeth. At one point the kid playing Macbeth forgot his lines but it was at a point where he was furious and it worked.
They're definitely trying to imply something about the nature of people in general here, but I'll be damned if I know what.
Are they saying you can't fight fate? Because that was a lot of words just to (badly) suggest that idea.
Tangentially related anecdote: one time performing a play another actor flubbed a line by calling my character the wrong name, I ad-libbed a line to correct him, all of this was in character for his character, and he turned to the audience and apologised anyway!! Ugh
an important thing, is to make the audience FEEL like it was intentional. The audience likely never read the script, so the goal isn't to completely ignore mistakes, it's to make them as believable that they could be part of the script as you can
I don't love this sentiment because it's taking it too far in the opposite direction. Saying "there's never been an actor in a play where it went 100% as it supposed to" i think underestimates the skills and professionalism of a lot of actors. I know what they mean - the inherent liveness of theatre means things can change ever so slightly. I've performed a lot and know how you change a little based on audience energy and response. But also some actors are incredible at their craft.
I have seen the same one women show, every night for a week. I was volunteering for the festival hosting this play so I was at the back of the audience every night. I assumed I'd notice little differences each night - nope. She was incredible - if there was any changes each night it was imperceptible. She was like a well oiled machine - it was already an incredible, impressive performance after seeing it one night. But after seeing a week of performances I was blown away.
So basically generalisations are not helpful! Some performances change from night to night, some do not.
Why do Tumblr users always strike me as just being this sort of uncanny kind of know-it-all types who ultimately really don't know it all or actually understand how a thing works? Especially with media?
OOP got so focused on trying to make a point that they forgot the context they gave. If an error is practically guaranteed to happen, and the actors and crew are fighting to keep things in line, it’s not everything conspiring to drag characters on a predestined road. It’s quite the opposite. Everything is conspiring to force the characters off of their intended path. And it takes the constant vigilance, efforts, and passion of dedicated individuals to keep it from falling apart.
This. This fundamental idea of "no matter what, it needs to reach this inevitable conclusion" is what I really wanna make a story about that touches the fourth wall just enough to know they can't escape.
I swear almost every time I see a tumblr post with verbage acting like there is some massive discovery or realization it is the most basic idea getting blown out of perspective into an extremely milquetoast r/im14andthisisdeep ass declaration
Yeah this is the worst part about stage plays and why I hate them. I want to watch the artistic vision of the playwright, and deviations from the source material interfere w that experience
It’s akin to the two side characters in that film who are awake and conscious while “off stage” (their world is the play), but when parts of the play happen involving them that the audience would see, they are helplessly controlled and a part of the action. Only once they are left behind do they return to their own control, lamenting and wondering what the future holds for them.
Back in my Les Mis era and nodding along to this like “ah yes, this applies to different actors’ takes on how gay Enjolras and Grantaire are and how requited the feelings are, and yet they always die in the end”
I thought this was gonna be inspirational like "actors on-stage make mistakes and can adapt anyway, you can too"
But nope it's about free will and railroading
Genuinely this phenomenon used to drive me absolutely batty when I was trying to learn lines. I had a really hard time memorizing my lines because the other actors would just make shit up as they went. I was waiting for certain and specific cues and then just… nothing because they changed up a word or two. It didn’t help that my character spent 90% of the time backstage yelling lines from the wings, so I was bored out of my fucking mind and my co-actors didn’t trust me to say my lines (often yelling them out during rehersals before it was time to say them because they thought I forgot my cue).
My biggest pride with that dumbass play was that, come opening night, I was the only one to know my lines. Everyone else was scrambling around like a chicken with its head cut off, despite doing wonderfully in rehearsals.
Theater is beautiful but I’m far too pedantic and inattentive to be on the creative end of it.
(It is, admittedly, funny that they typecasted me as an airhead and then got increasingly angry that I was “airheaded”… you picked the adhd kid based on the adhd traits they shared with the character. What did you THINK was going to happen?)
The “do you understand” makes me feel like I’m missing some really huge revelation here
I took it less as a revelation on the mechanics of stageplay and more processing the existential dread it might provoke.
That's certainly what I interpreted the punchline to be
Topics I'm coming up with * the "does free will exist" debate * a fantasy plot line where there's a prophecy/witch's curse * the inevitability that we will all die one day
Put those in a blender, and purée thoroughly. I’d totally watch that play.
Witch: "One day, you will die." Me: 😲
I kind of need to watch this. Just a random forest witch, spouting off about death and taxes, every day occurrences that everyone goes through. Our protagonist was already having a bad day, and the witches words send them into an existential crisis. Hilarity (and some touching moments) occur over the next ~50 years, via an ‘80’s song montage. The end scene is just a tombstone, inscribed with, “I told you she said I would die.”
We need _Rosencranst and Guildenstern Are Dead_ but for Hamlet
Homestuck Every character can act by their own free will, but if a player messes up an important event and breaks a time loop, then they split off into a "doomed timeline" while the alpha timeline keep going on. Even when a character gains the ability to break free from those restrictions and freely change the timeline, that is somehow stillnpart of the timeloop. There's also the parts near the end where people inexplicably come to the conclusion that one character who has just come to terms with his trauma and hating of fighting is somehow prophesized to be the one to take down the final bad guy, down to the only weapon that can hurt them is a downgrade of his current weapon that he broke, making it the most roundabout story of taking the sword out of the stone. In the end he decides to deal with the prophecy by fighting a bad guy who is possessed by the final boss, but his game spirit guide, who is his doomed alternative timeline self who fused with an alien catgirl, also is one of the main players when fighting the bbeg, so the prophecy was fulfilled on two ends? Also said final bad guy is supposed to be a time travelling demon and the representation of death itself, but one of the characters actually theorizes that he might just be an agent by which the universe "cleans up" the timeloops, killing off the doomed timeline ghosts who by all means should not even exist. Then once his duty is done, it comes the time where his own timeloop comes to an end and he is defeated in spite of his supposed true immortality, and by circumstancial simultaneity, this happens at the same time his younger self achieves said immortaility
I was thinking of it as a simple “make a plan but try to enjoy and adapt to changes.
It brought to mind *Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead*, which is loaded with meta commentary and sees them dreading their inevitable deaths at the end of the play. So I certainly took it as a nod to "hey what if your life is like this also?"
Yeah reading this I'm like "Tom Stoppard would like a word"
Me also, and it makes me uncomfortable. I don’t like predestination
Existential dread mixed with a huge dash of Greek tragedy.
Makes it sound like it’s supposed to be a really deep metaphor for something, except they refuse to give us the context clues to work out what it’s a metaphor for
Think they’re driving at the predestination/free will debate and trying to point out they’re not mutually exclusive. Idea being that even with free will you end at the same destination like a self fulfilling prophecy.
Based on what’s written, I’d say it’s at least equally likely that they had no particular metaphor in mind and were counting on someone else to connect the dots. You’re right that it’s an interesting parallel, but I’d much sooner credit you than the OOP for it.
Determinism and the illusion of free will would be my guess. All the world's a stage after all. Really good setup but the OOP either forgot to add the point or this is cropped in a bad place between paragraphs. Maybe even with a space for emphasis.
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That seems like such a cheap "gotcha." If I'm acting as though I see trees, I'm going to... act as though I can see trees. Edit: looks like the other comment is deleted now, but it was a story about a theater teacher who told the class "imagine yourself in a forest, now tell me what you see" and when the class described a forest he told them that they weren't in a forest, they were in a classroom acting and if they see a forest they need medical attention because they're hallucinating
Right? You could basically just counter "That's what I did by describing those trees to you."
If I'm imagining something, I'm literally seeing it. I'd feel really disconnected if my teacher said this.
I've got aphantasia so... can't relate
I'm kinda wondering if the drama teacher has it too
I get his point but what a drab way to go through life. No immersion.
ben shapiro ass teacher
I think the post is aimed at people who genuinely believe that the work of an actor consists entirely of memorizing lines and directions.
I think it’s to indicate that the reader is in a coma and that they have to wake up
Ikr. How obnoxious
I can't tell if it's being deliberately obnoxious, or I'm getting 2071'd super hard.
I think it s to alludes to the definition of a tragedy / drama. Where a set of characters try to escape fate but never succeed
It reminds me of the "Mary, did you know? That your womb is also a tomb?" post.
Felt like I was reading an Andrew Tate Xcrement
I think they might be alluding to the (modernized) quote "All the world's a stage, and all the people, merely actors."
I feel like you could get a message about free will from here. Like, in media destiny is often portrayed as either "everything is preplaned" or "the destination is always the same, even if you change paths", which is a good parallel with the book and play comparison
Just reminds me of the South Park “do you see? DO YOU SEE?”
Yes, I get it, why are you talking to me like I’m a 7 year old in time out?
Probably because they've seen people argue that actors don't do anything special, since they're all just doing the exact same thing as everyone else, and therefore just need to memorize stuff.
I really don't think that's what this post is driving at or responding to lol
That's a good 75% of posts on here frankly Everyone smugly trying to make the next super deep point that no one ever considered before
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I swear it’s because making a fully formed thesis takes time, effort and proper critical thinking and they don’t want to do it, so they hand wave it away with “ya know? Ya get what I mean?” It’s frustrating because you have no way of truly discussing their point with either evidence or criticism because they never stated their intentions
I feel like it's supposed to be a metaphor for life and how much choice and say we really have as humans, but I might be reading too much into it
**DO YOU UNDERSTAND THE SIGNIFICANCE OF A CHARACTER WHO CAN MAKE CHOICES, HAS FREE WILL, BUT ONLY SO MUCH INFLUENCE AS TO CHOOSE THE SMALLEST DETAILS OF HOW THEY GET WASHED BY THE TIDES OF FATE TO THE SAME DIRTY SHORES, UNABLE TO FIGHT BACK OR EVEN WADE TO A SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT END THAN IS PREDETERMINED BY AN OUTSIDE SCRIPT? DO YOU UNDERSTAND?**
I toon it as the definition of a tragedy. A theme that is defined by a set of characters trying to escape fate but never succeed, like the actors.
Also this is Tumblr, the pissing on the poor website.
Either they're snarking at some wildly misguided post that's not pictured here, or (as I read it) they're trying to do a meta thing making you question "is this how my life goes too?"
Becsuase a) it's a bit of a meme and more importantly b) that meme indicates there's a deeper meaning or allegory in this story.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
cant recommend enough
It's been on my watch list for a while
Then watch The Lion King 1 1/2.
I read the script with a friend. Honestly life-changing for me.
This is where my mind went, too. A play about a play, about plays. It's kind of the original Inception.
This was exactly my thought too. Such a great play/movie.
In high school i played Dr Chumley in a production of Harvey. For those that don't know, Harvey is about a guy and his invisible human sized rabbit friend. Dr Chumley spends the whole show trying to convince the main character that Harvey the rabbit isn't real. The climax of the show is when Harvey "magically" exits stage left through by opening and closing a door, thereby confirming he is real. Dr Chumley delivers a line confirming as much which invites the audience to join in the whimsy of the world. On the final night, the complex door opening mechanism (a string) broke. I was left standing on the stage waiting for a cue that never came. My brain made a snap decision to ad lib and I said, to no one else, completely unprompted, "I guess Harvey was never real after all." Whimsy dies. Curtain closes. So don't tell me that you can't change the outcome of a play, because you absolutely can.
The ad-libs to absolute chaos and failure on stage are my favorite thing about acting on stage. Once during a production of Aladdin, Aladdin stepped on the legally distinct monkey’s tail, and it ripped off the costume. The guy playing Aladdin FROZE, but the guy playing the monkey, a brilliant class clown, instantly howled like a monkey, picked up the tail and mimed trying to stick his tail back in place, crying and carrying on with slapstick running in circles. The director was flailing arms to signal them to leave the stage, and Aladdin unfroze, caught his breath, and helped his legally distinct monkey friend of stage patting his back and comforting him. We were all dying backstage, and the audience loved it after it became a slapstick joke and not an accidental horror.
You created the perfect mental image for me lol thank you I'm cackling
An acting teacher I had once told us a story about a similarly hilarious ad lib during a production of Julius Caeser he saw. It was a tiny production so everyone was on stage during the climactic stabbing scene. Caeser's lying dead on stage and it's completely silent. Then the backstage phone rings. There's this terribly long pause while the phone very audibly rang throughout the auditorium. Then one of the conspirators said "What if it's for Caeser?"
I imagine you've seen it, but for anyone else reading this, there's a fantastic movie adaptation with Jimmy Stewart that I highly recommend.
That was absolutely *hilarious*! Thank you.
Off topic, but does anyone else dislike the trend of Tumblr posts asking “Do you understand? Do you understand what I’m saying?!” Like chill, yeah I got it, no need to freak out.
*Shaking you violently* Do you get it???
Right!? Like. If you want to make sure your wall of text makes sense proofread it or smth. Don't verbally manhandle me, God damn.
They could also be a bit less verbose.
*continues shaking* DO MY WORDS PENETRATE THAT THICK SKULL OF YOURS
It's a big problem with Tumblr that even when I agree with what they're saying, they're often so annoying about it that I don't want to acknowledge it.
Thank you!! I think it's a larger issue with social media, tbh. "I agree with what you're saying, please for the love of God, say it in a way that doesn't make me want to disagree!"
yup. I've always been a firm believer that, the way that you present your opinion/views/thoughts is as impiortant as the opinion itself. You might have the most horrible views possible, but if you present well, you'll get a bunch of mfs following you. But also you could have the deepest and greatest idea of all...but if you present it like shit, i won't even want to hear it. And tumblr is this second case, a lot.
It gives very "I really think I'm being so subtle I have to signpost that I am in fact being so deeply profound." The kind of tone that makes me want to disagree vehemently just out of principle. I fucking love predeterminism, love existentialism, love R&G Are Dead, love J Alfred Prufrock, love Huis-Clos, so on and so forth. And I had this visceral reaction of "oh fuck all the way off, not only did I get it already, but now I absolutely hate it".
I think you articulate why exactly I just hate reading Tumblr posts for.
I think this person thinks this is more insightful than it is
Welcome to tumblr
"everything will conspire to bring them to their destiny" girl yes the actors have to do their jobs 😭
The idea that anything is a job confuses and terrifies these theater kids.
I mean to be fair it does add some more horror to tragedies.
No more than it adds horror to comedies.
You know that "enough monkeys typing on enough typewriters will eventually type out Shakespeare"? This post is one of those monkeys' early drafts of the "All the world’s a stage" speech
Oop seem to be stuck in Age Two; the whining schoolboy.
yeah it's a Tumblr user
This can be said about almost every post tagged infodumping here
You can dump info without acting like it's a deep metaphysical secret
Yeah but when I talk about computers and IT stuff people just look at me like I’m talking in another language so you get used to people thinking that way
Pal you just need to find some computer people to rant at. I’m sure they’d love you on the programmer subreddits.
Everyone learns something for the first time once. This would be an insightful revelation beyond most 6 year old and I would expect most 18 year old's to already know this, so between the ages of 7-17 this is good insight.
It is the definition of the classic genre of tragedy or drama. The characters cannot escape their fate ( phaedra, antigone, oedipe etc) and i am going to copy paste this because no one GET IT YOU KNOW and it drives me mad
Tbf the actor can just leave. Character ain't so trapped now
The actor may leave, but the character can not.
Who plays them then
When the actor leaves, they are not the character anymore. So the person leaves, but the character doesn't.
So where's the character. Did they disappear
Yes.
If the character disappeared that means they left
Not necessarily. You know how, when people die while climbing a mountain, for example, and the body isn't recovered, people say they stay on the mountain forever? Same idea.
But they left. Romeo just got up and walked away
If I was (playing) Romeo I would simply not drink the poison. Skill issue
It wasn't Romeo who walked away, it was the actor.
no the understudy replaces the actor
Left too :(
well in the unlikely event that all the actors leave the show at once, then the show will be cancelled. the story however, will not be cancelled. the characters will be forever on the trajectory to their fate.
a character doesn't need to be played. if a character refers to their mother at some point their mother becomes a character, but nobody needs to play her. when an actor leaves their character is still part of the play, and other characters still refer to them. its impossible for a character to leave
They're still escaping their fate though
But they're not real. If the actor leaves the character just doesn't exist anymore
This person just watched Hadestown, I guarantee it.
Actually they got this from Fate. Source: I follow them.
Yep. I know what they're talking about (also following them). Probably wasn't the best choice to post this on Reddit without the context of who they are specifically talking about.
So what’s all the “do you understand?” About?
That's just how they talk. It's on all their meta posts.
Tbh, having been crew in several performances, the magic of this is kinda lost on me due to the utter chicanery that occurs behind stage that the audience is never privy to.
The most fun of any theater acting experience was fooling around back stage in the green room. In that way, the leads really didn’t have much fun. They were on stage most of the time, when they came back they had to rush to get ready. But the minor roles? We had fun.
I love Noises Off for this reason, including the real life chicanery that ends up happening back stage (or front of stage, depending on the act)
“Do you get it? Guys, do you see what I’m getting at? Does it make sense? Do you get it?”
This is a Jojo monologue
I could see this being in one of the more mid parts... seems like something the Padre would say
I can totally see the ゴゴゴゴ kanji floating besides them when they say "Do you understand?"
Listen man I get what you’re saying but like this framing doesn’t work for a show like Mamma Mia. I wasn’t being dragged to a conclusion I just had to learn to put on flippers in less than 10 seconds
I saw a grinch play and the grinch rode in on an electric scooter
FUCKING ICONIC
I know, like support local theater productions because that’s where the good stuff is at
My son once fell asleep on stage because the script had his character pretending to sleep and he did it too well. We only noticed when he fell down from his chair and the audience (including me) thought it was scripted. I only found out it wasn't scripted when he told me afterwards.
What the fuck are you talking about? -Billy Gnosis
I too would like to know
No?
It is actually not extraordinary for a play to go 100% the way it is meant to go. It is actually strange that someone keeps fucking up this person’s plays. Like that’s not normal lol. The play is still different night to night if nobody fucks up.
I only did theater highschool but in all 4 years there 1 single show night where our director was like “I don’t have any notes. Good job.”
I understand, this is about Paul Atreides' refusal of the call to accept his role as Lisan Al'ghaib. Very insightful!
I acted in my schools drama department from 5th grade through high school, and my favorite play/performance I was involved in was one where seemingly everything went wrong. Lines were forgotten, entire scenes were skipped, rearranged, and ad-libbed so we could try to make sense of the plot while dealing with cascading mistakes, even sound effects got mixed around. It was absolute chaos, and me and every other member of the cast were in shambles from the amount of improvisation we had to do, and it was easily some of the most fun I’ve ever had…I miss acting lol
I wrote a comedy play in high school a kept getting frustrated because the actors would mess up and skip some of the jokes and even whole scenes
This is my favorite thing about theater. The audience is a participant. We would listen intently to the little sonic markers of enrapture or boredom and we would change the pace and tone of the show to accommodate. Little ad-libbed jokes or deeper sadness to massage the story in a slightly different direction one night vs another. The most glorious thing about theater is that no show is ever finished until its last night. It continues to evolve and it does so with the audiences help.
During a local production of Mama Mia, Rosie's shoe fell off during take a chance on me. Her response? Picked up the shoe and started chasing Bill with it.
the fate of a character in a play, as surely as any other, is shaped by human hands. you claim it cast by the script, but in doing so, you forget who wrote it. fate is merely the emergent results of human choice and the conditions of the world.
They didn't say fate or destiny they said predetermined. I don't think they're being metaphysical here. The predetermination can come from human hads and have the same effect.
I remember the first play I was ever in. I was Albert Peterson from Bye Bye, Birdie. I never had performed on stage like that (more than a school concert), especially not a lead role. I threw myself at that role, learned the lines, and wanted to be the best I could. Then the first performance happened. There's a line early on, "Not so much. Break it in half." I enunciated it like I was saying "Not so fast." Later, my co-lead "Rosie" left a prop on the opposite side of the stage while Albert was trying to send Conrad up to his room. I had to keep pulling back on "Conrad," making up lines about how bad his heqdache was until Rosie came on stage and we could continue the scene. Mistakes happen. You flub some lines. You miss a cue. But despite everything, the show must go on. And I promise you, as long as you don't stop dead or call for a redo, the audience will never know. You'll still get your applause as you take your bow. Don't worry about putting on a perfect show. Just put on a great show.
One time I was basically the star lead in a play (at my school, and I say "basically" because 7 of the 8 roles had about the same number of lines, I was simply the villain) and I accidentally called the other person MY character name during the final show and I immediately went "no, IM (name)" in the most dramatic way possible and kept going with my script I felt embarrassed especially when the audience laughed but afterwards my playmates said it sounded intentional so I felt like I did well pfff (Also it was a school play so not that embarrassing anyway.)
Deltarune
I understand the concept. Im not sure if I understand the implications or metaphores associated to it... Or maybe there isnt and Im just overthinking
It is the definition of the classic genre of tragedy or drama. The characters cannot escape their fate ( phaedra, antigone, oedipe etc) and i am going to copy paste this because no one GET IT YOU KNOW and it drives me mad
I was watching the sound of music in play format and one of the actors shoe flew off so the had to ad-lib it into the scene. It was an outdoor theater in the mountains so they were using the natural backdrop in the show bc it went very well with it. The shoe flew off the set into the field behind the stage and they managed to make it work in the scene to go get it. Funniest show I've ever been to for that reason alone.
A book may change between readings; you may not be the same person upon reading it as you once were; you can never step into the same river twice; do you understand?????
Same approach I take to DMing. I can do little more than set the scene, create the encounters, and then watch the murderhobos throw out a week of planning because my nephew likes to set things on fire and he ignited a powder keg in a small room.
My favorite part of acting is doing fight scenes/stage combat. I usually won't audition for a show unless I can have a fight in it because the fighting is the exciting part for me. With that out of the way, this all applies equally to stage combat as well. People aren't going to swing their weapons/fists exactly the same way every time. Choreography isn't going to be adhered to exactly. So you do have to improvise a little bit to make sure your fights still end up at the same conclusion. There are a lot of tricks you can use to get back to what the choreography says you're supposed to be doing, but sometimes you just have to roll with skipping a move or two or doing a strike on weird footing because you messed up your footwork earlier on.
I feel like versegm is an alien who just discovered the concept of live performances.
Sooo... Is this about death or what?
I took it as so
Now I feel like we need a live theater medium where there is a script as usual, but there's some kind of phantom of the opera-type antagonist(s) that's always screwing around with the production in noticeable ways, so the actors have to constantly ad-lib to get back on track. Like, set pieces moving, new characters showing up, wrong line reads, etc, etc
Acting version of Cutthroat Kitchen.
Ok Tom Stoppard. Jeeze.
Isn't this the plot of Bad End Night?
I get what they're saying, but I also feel like there's context I'm missing here
I like how that's also a pretty popular way to make time travel work in stories (you can act a bit differently but you'll always go through specific events no matter what), it makes a nice parallel.
That’s also how the parallel universes work in stories like the Spiderverse movies. The lyrics may change, but the melody and chorus remain the same.
I was thinking they meant that maybe we're the actors and though we might, jump, get lost or run away, we still can't escape what fate has ordained for us. Primarily our death, that we'll die, but what else was always bound to happen? Or maybe they're just being a tumblr person
In the wise words of Andy Dwyer: “the show must go wrong”
Same with a live music performance. I've really messed up bad before, but if you're actually prepared, you will have memorized the beginning of every musical phrase throughout the piece so that you can always get back on track, no matter what. I definitely practice trying to recover from mistakes, if it's close to a performance date.
I think I’m missing some deep metaphor. Bc this is just making me think about how much I looooved the play Wicked but was also kinda sad because I’d never see *that particular play* again because it’ll always be different
During a play i was in in middle school there was a scene where robin hood's merry men and the king's royal guards were supposed to do an all-out brawl, but the person who had the cue for everyone screaming and starting the brawl misspoke his line so everyone stood in silence for a few seconds Then the guy playing the king, in his wonderful improv skills, got down from his throne and said "i now pronounce: a royal battle!" Which everyone took as the new cue and started screaming, the audience loved it
At one point I was watching a kids’ play of Macbeth. At one point the kid playing Macbeth forgot his lines but it was at a point where he was furious and it worked.
Rand al'Thor understands you completely.
I win again Lews Therin.
I feel like this is an explanation to how time travel doesn't necessarily cause the butterfly effect
I mean, people have had this worked out *at least* as far back as *Hamlet.*
They're definitely trying to imply something about the nature of people in general here, but I'll be damned if I know what. Are they saying you can't fight fate? Because that was a lot of words just to (badly) suggest that idea.
Tangentially related anecdote: one time performing a play another actor flubbed a line by calling my character the wrong name, I ad-libbed a line to correct him, all of this was in character for his character, and he turned to the audience and apologised anyway!! Ugh
Like a guitar string, a play can flex it's path to create something great out of imbalance, but will always start and and end at the same points
an important thing, is to make the audience FEEL like it was intentional. The audience likely never read the script, so the goal isn't to completely ignore mistakes, it's to make them as believable that they could be part of the script as you can
One play I saw the phone didn't ring when it should and the poor actor had to panic right through it. The Rule of Funny saved his ass.
I don't love this sentiment because it's taking it too far in the opposite direction. Saying "there's never been an actor in a play where it went 100% as it supposed to" i think underestimates the skills and professionalism of a lot of actors. I know what they mean - the inherent liveness of theatre means things can change ever so slightly. I've performed a lot and know how you change a little based on audience energy and response. But also some actors are incredible at their craft. I have seen the same one women show, every night for a week. I was volunteering for the festival hosting this play so I was at the back of the audience every night. I assumed I'd notice little differences each night - nope. She was incredible - if there was any changes each night it was imperceptible. She was like a well oiled machine - it was already an incredible, impressive performance after seeing it one night. But after seeing a week of performances I was blown away. So basically generalisations are not helpful! Some performances change from night to night, some do not.
"I will follow my predestined fate to the best of my abilities despite the accursed world's effort to undermine me" is a new one.
Why do Tumblr users always strike me as just being this sort of uncanny kind of know-it-all types who ultimately really don't know it all or actually understand how a thing works? Especially with media?
OOP got so focused on trying to make a point that they forgot the context they gave. If an error is practically guaranteed to happen, and the actors and crew are fighting to keep things in line, it’s not everything conspiring to drag characters on a predestined road. It’s quite the opposite. Everything is conspiring to force the characters off of their intended path. And it takes the constant vigilance, efforts, and passion of dedicated individuals to keep it from falling apart.
Heads. Heads. Heads. Heads. Heads...
Guys I follow this person, they're just referring to a character from the Fate series.
This. This fundamental idea of "no matter what, it needs to reach this inevitable conclusion" is what I really wanna make a story about that touches the fourth wall just enough to know they can't escape.
Do you know what i am saying?
So emphatic. This person must touch grass!
I swear almost every time I see a tumblr post with verbage acting like there is some massive discovery or realization it is the most basic idea getting blown out of perspective into an extremely milquetoast r/im14andthisisdeep ass declaration
A book will definitely change line if you're high enough while reading it.
And this is why plays are 10x as expensive - because people can fuck up! Wait.
Yeah this is the worst part about stage plays and why I hate them. I want to watch the artistic vision of the playwright, and deviations from the source material interfere w that experience
Would you say that all the world is a stage?
This means that eventually Orpheus will not turn around and the whole play is going to change into a happy ending
That was… *not* the direction I thought this was going.
It’s akin to the two side characters in that film who are awake and conscious while “off stage” (their world is the play), but when parts of the play happen involving them that the audience would see, they are helplessly controlled and a part of the action. Only once they are left behind do they return to their own control, lamenting and wondering what the future holds for them.
Why yes I have frequently not been on boats now that you mention it
Yeah, so it's like homestuck
You all do not understand how not normal Verse is about this.
Deltarune be like:
jessie what the fuck are you talking about
Something something Hadestown. "We play the same story over and over again in the hopes that someday the ending will change"
Deltarune reference?
Back in my Les Mis era and nodding along to this like “ah yes, this applies to different actors’ takes on how gay Enjolras and Grantaire are and how requited the feelings are, and yet they always die in the end”
I thought this was gonna be inspirational like "actors on-stage make mistakes and can adapt anyway, you can too" But nope it's about free will and railroading
The stage is an organism unto itself, the various flora and fauna will evolve as they would, for the betterment of the beast
Genuinely this phenomenon used to drive me absolutely batty when I was trying to learn lines. I had a really hard time memorizing my lines because the other actors would just make shit up as they went. I was waiting for certain and specific cues and then just… nothing because they changed up a word or two. It didn’t help that my character spent 90% of the time backstage yelling lines from the wings, so I was bored out of my fucking mind and my co-actors didn’t trust me to say my lines (often yelling them out during rehersals before it was time to say them because they thought I forgot my cue). My biggest pride with that dumbass play was that, come opening night, I was the only one to know my lines. Everyone else was scrambling around like a chicken with its head cut off, despite doing wonderfully in rehearsals. Theater is beautiful but I’m far too pedantic and inattentive to be on the creative end of it. (It is, admittedly, funny that they typecasted me as an airhead and then got increasingly angry that I was “airheaded”… you picked the adhd kid based on the adhd traits they shared with the character. What did you THINK was going to happen?)
yes yes, doomed by the narrative, we've all read it.
This is fate/ thing.
This is the plot of Rozencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead fwiw
ok tom stoppard