I am a fan of musical theatre above just about everything else. I also love horror, Nickelodeon, Disney, Disney Channel (yes, those are two different things) and all incarnations of Sailormoon. Yes. All of them.
I recently graduated with a degree in Art Education, but sadly, I am not yet teaching.
I am Catholic and proud. While my passion for the faith waxes and wanes, I still love the Catholic Church and am likely to do so for the rest of my life.
Who here loves Sailor Moon? Everyone? Good, that’s what I thought. Is anyone here a collector or admirer of Sailor Moon merchandise? Well then I have just the site for you.
Sailor Moon Collectibles is your number one source for all Moonie merch. From product reviews to shopping guides, this site has it all.
The page is easy to navigate depending on your interests, be they dolls, apparel, role playing, etc and includes a lot of interesting information about the items. Each section is further divided by production company or corresponding season of the anime so you can get right to the items you’re looking for. The site is not a complete listing of every Sailor Moon item ever made, and there are more in-depth sites out there for specific items, but SMC works as a great overview for past Sailor Moon products.
What I really love about Sailor Moon Collectibles, however, is the accompanying Tumblr, which constantly updates with new information about Sailor Moon products being released around the world. With all of the new interest in the series from its 20th anniversary, many new products are being marketed in Japan, the US, and even a few other countries such as Italy and the best way to get this information (without having to search for it yourself) is by following Sailor Moon Collectibles on Tumblr, without which I never would have known about this beauty:
I want this so bad, you don’t even know. I don’t care that it’s make-up and I wouldn’t actually use it. The Crystal Star is my favorite transformation item and this is the greatest version of it I’ve ever seen.
The Tumblr also gives out “heads up” alerts for merchandise on eBay when it shows up at a decent price. This is really helpful for beginning or casual collectors since there’s so much Sailor Moon merchandise online and so much of it is ridiculously expensive that many of us need help cutting through the clutter to get reasonably-priced, worthwhile products.
There’s great new stuff coming out all the time and Sailor Moon Collectibles is always right on top of it, ready to share not only the news of new items but also price and availability details for buyers. Check the site or follow the Tumblr for great info on Sailor Moon Merchandise, both new and old.
Okay you guys, my computer was broken for about a week and a half at the beginning of June so I’ve been catching myself up on what I’ve missed out on in that time. Of course I ended up missing out on some of the most exciting news of the year:
Translation by Miss Dream
I mean, do you understand? Do you understand? The Sailor Moon Musical will once again be a thing that exists, not just on YouTube and in crazily expensive memorabilia shipped in from overseas, but as actual live theatre! I just can’t even compose myself right now.
For the second year in a row I was unable to watch the Tony broadcast (grumblegrumble *work* grumblegrumble *adulthood*), so once again I must turn to YouTube to see the performances. Rather than posting all of them like I did last year, I’m just going to post the ones I was most interested in for this year’s ceremony.
Motown: The Musical
I’ve kept a tentative interest open on this musical since I first heard of it a few months ago. The story of black artists in the music industry is rife with drama and can certainly make for great musical theatre but I wasn’t sure to what extent this show would be a jukebox musical so I figured I’d wait and see some more from it. Would it include well-known songs in addition to an original score, or would it be entirely comprised of existing music?
Judging by the performance it seems to be the latter option, which doesn’t exactly thrill me. Just to be sure I checked out the show’s broadway.com page and found this in the description: “an explosive new musical featuring almost 60 of the most beloved hits in the Motown music catalogue.”
Good Lord, 60?? Even sung-through musicals barely reach that high of a song count! I don’t feel this is one I’ll personally try too hard to see, but the cast looks and sounds phenomenal and it’s been selling really well every time I check the Broadway grosses so there’s clearly an audience for it. Maybe it really comes together when seen as a whole so if it tours I might give it a shot.
Cinderella
Though nominated in the Best Revival category, this is technically the first Broadway production of Cinderella, despite it being over 40 years old. This doesn’t really have anything to do with the performance, I just found it shocking and thought it was worth sharing so you could be as dumbfounded as I was when I learned this little fact.
The performance here is lovely; this cast is great, but the biggest stars of the number are those costumes! I mean, did you see that??? Those dresses just morphed in front of your eyes! And they do that live and in person eight times a week! I understand the basic concept behind the design but the flawless execution is beyond my comprehension. It is simply magic. Thank God they took home the award for Costume Design.
Matilda
Beautiful performance. The cast has performed the “Naughty/Revolting Children” combo a few times already to promote the show on various television programs so I’m glad they also included “When I Grow Up” to make it a little more special for the Tonys and just because I love that song (or at least, what I’ve seen of it since I still haven’t seen this show). I love that it calls attention to the fact that “When I grow up” is kind of an ever-moving goal; we continue to grow throughout our lives and probably never really feel like the all-knowing, fearless, confident beings we thought we would become when we became “grown-ups”.
Guh, I just really love everything I’m seeing/hearing of this show and am dying to see it.
Bring it On: The Musical
I pretty much gushed about this show when I reviewed it so of course I was pumped up for their performance! I think this is the first time I’ve ever actually seen a show before it performed on the Tonys, so maybe that’s why I’m feeling like something is lacking from this showcase. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but something seems off to me. Maybe it’s that the show closed and the cast hasn’t performed together in almost six months; maybe it’s the cuts made to the song to shorten it; maybe it’s that the lighting cues seem just a teensy bit behind; or maybe it’s just because this number was so phenomenal live and that can’t quite be re-captured when seen on video.
It’s probably that last one, since the experience is so great in my memory it just can’t be matched by anything other than a live, in-person performance. I’m glad this song was performed because it’s one of my favorites from the show and it shows off a decent amount of the cheerleading and most of the cast gets to shine, though it’s a bummer the song doesn’t feature Taylor Louderman’s character since she was more or less the lead and did an excellent job. I’m really glad Ariana DeBose got the spotlight for her section though, because she was one of the standouts for me when I saw the show but hasn’t gotten much mention in reviews I’ve read of the show (including my own, which I rather regret) so it was great seeing her work the stage in her featured part.
Kinky Boots
I think this show looks pretty great. Cyndi Lauper did the music; Jerry Mitchell the choreography; and it’s about the creation of the perfect drag boot so everything about it says it’s gonna be a fun night at the theater. This performance is exciting and though it doesn’t really revolutionize my view of the show, it reinforces my desire to see it.
Pippin
Still just in awe of this production’s seamless incorporation of the circus performance into the show. It works so well with the music and the Fosse-style choreography and I don’t have much to say about this that I haven’t said before: Patina is still flawless; the production is still gorgeous; and I still want to see it. Thankfully, it’s touring.
Well, despite my intentions I think I ended up talking about almost every performance. Whoops. Well, it was a night of great performances, what could I do? The ceremonies seemed pretty nice this year. I’m glad they were once again held in Radio City Music Hall because I love the grandeur of that huge performance space and i really liked that the casts of other shows introduced the performances. Even if the connection between the two shows was pretty forced at times, it was good to see them there to remind people that so many great shows are still running and gave a good sense of the community of Broadway. Hopefully something similar will be done at next year’s ceremonies.
And hopefully I’ll be able to watch them live, because I’m sick of having to rely on YouTube!
I can’t say I ever felt the need for another Monsters, Inc. movie. Oh, don’t misunderstand; I loved the original, but it was a movie that I felt told its story very well and didn’t seem at all incomplete. (Of course, I wanted to know how the Boo/Sully reunion turned out at the end of the movie. I mean, I’m not made of stone! Still, I couldn’t see a movie made out of that alone). Then the decade which passed after the original’s release pretty much solidified in my mind that Monsters, Inc. was a standalone film. As such, when news of Monsters University reached my ears I was certainly interested, as any “True 90′s Kid” is required to be, but perhaps not as ecstatic as I was when, say, Toy Story 3 was announced.
The movie had some convincing to do, in order to get me excited, and to put it simply: it has.
The fact that this movie is a prequel rather than a sequel is a large part of what has me interested. Even though it’s going in the opposite direction of where my interest lies after the first movie (Are Sully and Boo still friends? Did she outgrow, or stop believing in, her monsters? These are the things I need to know!) it has me interested mainly because of what’s being revealed about Mike Wazowski. Mike, as Monsters, Inc. fans know from the original, is employed as a Scare Assistant: the less glamorous employee who helps out the much-admired Scarers in their job of collecting children’s screams to be converted into energy. What’s interesting is that Mike appears to be very proud of his job in the original movie, if a little jealous of the recognition Sully and the other Scarers get. In Monsters University, however, it is revealed that Mike’s dream was to be a Scarer.
I think this makes the movie more interesting, because it throws a wrench in the workings of this character. One of the toughest things to get right about a prequel is to make it interesting when the intended audience essentially knows the “ending” thanks to the already released original movie. This character revelation about Mike presents an unexpected development, because even though we know where he ends up, we now know that it was not at all where he had planned to be. Because of this, the movie has the potential to make commentary on how dreams change and some of the harsh realities of setting yourself up for one goal and realizing that it wasn’t the right one after all; stories that aren’t often told in children’s movies but probably should.
While following your dreams is important and I don’t think we should ever teach our children to limit themselves, it’s also important to teach them that dreams can change and sometimes you can work for an ideal and find out down the road that it’s not quite the right fit. It’s good to teach them to be open to adjusting their goals, rather than doggedly pursuing one dream and ignoring other possibilities.
Perhaps I’m reading too much into this and/or putting too much weight on an animated movie, but I do take entertainment directed at kids pretty seriously, both for my own entertainment and for what message it sends to young people. From what I can see, Monsters University is poised to pay off well in both respects.
This past Sunday the Broadway-themed show Smash aired its series finale. After a lackluster first season, tenuous renewal, and falling ratings despite fan campaigns to save the show, NBC has signed the “Do Not Resuscitate” order for this floundering series. The writers seemed conscious of the fact that they would likely not get a third season, though, so we did get a decent finale for the show.
A horror movie from the early 80′s may not seem like a likely choice for a discussion of sexuality, but when that movie is A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge, it’s quite a different story.
Sex is a common element in horror movies; in fact it’s usually the main indicator of who’s going to die (sexually active people) and who’s going to live (virgins, or at least monogamous partners) but very rarely have horror movies explicitly depicted anything other than heterosexual relationships until recently. There have been exceptions, such as the cult classic Sleepaway Camp, but the second Nightmare film is probably one of the most mainstream horror films to have included not only homosexual subtext but also blatant, in-your-face homosexual text. Today I will discuss three of the main characters from the film: Coach Schneider, the Phys. Ed. teacher; Jesse, the lead; and Grady, the friend.
(WARNING: Under the cut is a lengthy and mildly NSFW article)
I was browsing through some Nightmare on Elm Street videos to include in my final “Women of Elm Street” post about Nancy and came across some promos for this fanfilm that looks pretty great and worth sharing. The post on Nancy will be coming later; I just want to make sure I take time and do justice to my heroine.
The movie appears to be focusing on Fred Krueger prior to his death and eventual reincarnation as the dream killer of the official movie series. Judging by the contemporary look of the trailer, I think this may not be a timeline-accurate sequel, which I think would have to be set no later than the late 70′s in order to pre-date the original 1984 film. As such, I’m not sure whether this will be the backstory for the Freddy we know from the original film series or a brand new vision of the character. In either case, the production looks exceedingly professional for a fanfilm and I look forward to learning more about it.
The creators have designed a new glove for Freddy which leads me to believe that they are revamping the story rather than making a direct prequel to the original films.
I really like the look of this glove. In the preview for the film, the actor is wearing a faithful replica of the original glove, so I’m not sure where or how this re-design will fit in to the movie, but it looks pretty incredible to me. One of the most noticeable differences I can see between this and the original design is the way the finger supports connect to the back plate. Rather than being bolted flat into their support as in the original, they have what appears to be some type of floating hinge which gives them more movement and I think will be really visually effective when in action, giving the glove more life than previous versions.
My only reservation about this film is the fact that Freddy was specifically known as amurderer of children in his lifetime and the only reason he killed teenagers in the movies was because they had grown older in the time between his death and eventual resurrection in the dream world. Now, it’s one thing to hint at or talk about the awful things he did while he was alive; it’s quite another to actually portray them. The official movies were, if not always exactly tasteful, at least restrained by what the Motion Picture Association of America would allow to be seen in theaters and the specifics of what he did to young children were always left in the dark.
Making independent online movies such as this gives filmmakers a blessed freedom from those bureaucratic standards, but with that freedom comes the possibility of going too far for some people’s comfort levels. I’m not saying that these creators don’t have the right to push the envelope, just that I personally may not be able to handle the outcome.
Despite my unease at the possible content of this film, I am very interested to see more. According to the writer/director the project is in post-production, so hopefully it will be available soon. In the meantime, we can keep an eye on their Facebook page for updates!
The beloved musical Into the Woods by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine is set to be adapted as a movie! If you’re unfamiliar with the musical, it is a re-telling of multiple fairy tales whose stories and characters intertwine when they go on their individual journeys “into the woods”. The well-known “happily ever after” ending of each tale is only half of the musical’s story, which continues to explore how these characters grow and learn after their adventures and realize that “witches can be right, giants can be good” and that “wishes come true, not free”. It’s a really excellent musical that I suggest checking out. The original Broadway production was filmed and released on DVD so you can purchase it from Amazon for as little as three bucks to stream online.
According to broadway.com, Rob Marshall will be directing the movie with theatrical juggernaut Disney producing. I’m seeing this as a double-edged sword, really. Working with Disney should mean ample funds for production costs so we can expect great locations/sets, costumes, and special effects which, though not a definite necessity for this musical, will definitely be appreciated. On the other hand, Disney is primarily a children’s entertainment company and despite the use of fairy tales in this musical, it is a very complex and adult story. There are marital difficulties, dark implications, sexual undertones, and overall just a lot of moral complexity that I worry Disney may try to tone down or gloss over.
So far Meryl Streep is confirmed for the lead role of the Witch, and I have confidence in her ability to handle the character. This is arguably the most important role in the story, as it is the Witch’s plans which make the characters’ paths cross in the woods and brings the stories together. She’s also probably the clearest example of the moral ambiguity of the musical, which presents her as controlling and calculating, but also loving and guarded. Her songs “The Last Midnight” and “Children Will Listen” show the heart of her character as well as the show.
This was the only kind of Witchy photo I could find of Meryl…
Additional names loosely attached to the project are Johnny Depp as the Baker (though he’s also been rumored as the Big Bad Wolf), Jake Gyllenhaal as Cinderella’s Prince, and Chris Pine as Rapunzel’s Prince. I don’t have much of an opinion on the Princes, but I think Depp could make a fantastic Baker and it would be (or at least should be) a role unlike his usual schtick. The Baker isn’t creepy, offbeat, or larger than life; he’s kind of just lovable and a little goofy with a soft heart. It’d be nice to Depp take on a character who’s not so grandiose.
One of the best things about this musical being made into a movie is that very few of the characters really need to be played by strong singers and since Hollywood seems nigh on incapable of casting people in musicals who can both act and sing, this one should be very doable. I look forward to this movie, and hopefully it lives up to the strength of its source.
I already talked about my excitement for this revival a few weeks ago, so getting to see some footage from the show definitely makes me a happy camper.
What can I say? The show looks brilliant. The cirque work is phenomenal; Patina Miller is electric; costumes, sets, and lighting are all en pointe. If I could raise any complaint it would be that Matthew James Thomas’ (Pippin) snippet of “Corner of the Sky” sounds a little underwhelming, but to my ear it seems like a studio recording and those always come off sounding rather canned when paired with live footage. He sounds a lot better in “Morning Glow” towards the end of the trailer, so I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt here.
I’m really happy with the way the company looks and sounds. It can be risky bringing in a group of specialized performers to a musical, in this case circus performers, because blending them in with the Broadway performers poses a challenge. Obviously, the circus troupe will be leagues ahead of the ensemble when performing acrobatics and the like, while the theatrical ensemble of trained singers and dancers will probably be stronger when those talents are called upon. Judging by the preview, these talents seem to have been blended very well and no one looks like they’re struggling with something that goes beyond their abilities in any aspect. Many kudos to Diane Paulus (Direction), Gypsy Snider (Circus), and Chet Walker (Choreography) for creating such a well-integrated production.
Now all I have to do is convince my New York buddy to see the show so I can see how everything works out in person!
One of my loves is costuming. Not so much making them, like my cosplaying co-authors on this blog, but just seeing the pieces and appreciating their details. Predictably, my favorite type of costuming is that of musical theatre, but movie costumes are also pretty neat and this tumblr opened my eyes to the concept of recycling costumes which I never even realized was a thing. You see, when a new musical opens it gets new costume designers so even if it’s a revival imitating a previous production, costumes aren’t re-used, and while costumes will often reappear on different performers within the same production (like, when a new actor takes over a role they may inherit a previous actor’s costumes if they are of comparable size) a new show typically means new costumes. As such, I had never really considered that the same didn’t hold true for new movies.
Of course, it was a musical that introduced me to this tumblr
One of the things I admire about the people who contribute to the blog is their keen eye for details and ability to recognize where they’ve been seen before. These aren’t just costumes that look similar to or are inspires by previous designs, they are the same outfit appearing again which can be confirmed by the identical details like pattern and stitching.
Sometimes the costumes go through adjustments in their subsequent appearances, but can still be identified by their construction and the knowledge of whose costume shop they come from. I find these ones even more interesting than the ones which make their way unaltered from one appearance to another because it shows that the storytelling aspect of costume designing is still considered even when a costume is being re-used. It can’t always go from one story to another without being altered in order to create the unique vision of the new movie.
If you’re a costume lover like me, check out the blog, and if you’ve got a sharp enough eye to spot a recycled costume you can submit your findings to submissions@recycledmoviecostumes.com!
Who here loves Sailor Moon? Everyone? Good, that’s what I thought. Is anyone here a collector or admirer of Sailor Moon merchandise? Well then I have just the site for you.
