(no subject)

[nny]

It's cold and I want tea and sleep and hugs and I'm grumpy. What I am really wanting, at this moment, is to be Bernard Black. I want to stand in front of people with an empty mug and shout "What? What?!" until they get tea for me. And then I want to mutter at them indecipherably, collapse onto a sofa, and fall asleep with a book on my face. Is that too much to ask?

I am starting university in 13 days and I don't have a house. This, I think, explains the constant need for/lack of sleep.

What I have been thinking about:

The problem with writing romantic pastiches when your fandom is essentially slash with swiftly changing shinies is that things cannot be simply flipped. This isn't even going into my small problem with stories that are simply films rewritten with the fandom protagonists as the main characters - I can allow them their place in fandom but I'm really not interested in them myself, because I really don't see the point - this is talking about the way I desire my fic to have a small slice of reality.

Romance films are not about reality, of course. Romance films are about escapism and feelgoodism and other isms I can't be bothered to articulate. A shining example of this is Trick, which is about a Broadway Musical Writer who picks up a Go-Go Boy and they spend the entire night looking for somewhere to shag. And yes, I have thought about the fact that Rodney played piano in his youth and I'm still not writing it, hush now. Anyway, yes; this film takes place in an entirely gay world, with a gay bar, a gay club and a piano bar with risqué and ribald sing-songs. The gay is not an issue because the film is written around a subset of gay culture and it's kept carefully within that.

But when you're pastiching a romance film which is originally about straight characters, meaning that one of them used to be married and the other is engaged, how far does that need to be dealt with within the fic? Because it would be entirely too easy and entirely too annoying to dismiss it out of hand, because this is romance and romance isn't reality. On the flip side of that, The Gay and any and all resulting freakouts/changes/worries could become the central issue of the fic and the romance could be sidelined, which really isn't the point either. So how much is enough?

I have a sinking feeling that I have to rewrite almost the entirety of my fic, which is why I spent much time weeks ago crowing about writing more than I ever had before and then went abruptly silent when it stalled at 18,000 words. In all probability it's really not as dire as all that but I'm having trouble looking at it objectively. Which would explain why I'm back to writing the traditional ficlets and pretending the folder with the notes and story in doesn't exist.

Comments

[skygiants]

*runs to fetch virtual tea and places book carefully over your face*

[villainny.livejournal.com]

*points at icon*

[liz666.livejournal.com]

Am wishing I lived in Bath so could be your tea and book bitch. *HUGSHUGSHUGS*

With the fic, I reckon you should hand it over to a trusted beta and let them honestly tell you want they think of it. They can look at it objectively for you-isn't that what they're there for? Is it the fic I'm thinking of? Cos it's good, touching and sweet and I doubt it needs complete rewriting-I know I can't give you complete reassurance cos I know fuckall but as the reader I thought it was good.

[villainny.livejournal.com]

Seriously, love, that is the only fic that has ever got anywhere near that length. :D

I just... I kind of want it to be a little more complete before I send it off to a beta. I feel vaguely self-conscious about it as it stands, I guess. :/

[liz666.livejournal.com]

That's fair enough sweetie-just speaking as myself I think you're judging yourself harshly with it. You're self conscious because it's based on a terrible film (and there's phone sex XD)! And the parts I got to read made me wish you'd been the writer/director of that film. You're my Joss Whedon baby.

[beeej.livejournal.com]

I wish I had a Black Books icon to use right now, but I don't. And really, there is no excuse for that.

Personally, I love AUs, and that includes AUs wherein my OTP is now staring in An Affair to Remember, or Romancing the Stone. (Actually, I might sell babies to read John and Rodney in Romancing the Stone, because BWEEE!) It's a story I already know and love, now made even better rewritten with characters I also know and love, and the two combined is just happy making. I don't think there there are any hard and fast rules though. Specific situations, conversations, characterizations, etc. will have to change, obviously, but I think it's up to you how to go about that.

[villainny.livejournal.com]

I absolutely adore AUs, please don't misunderstand me there - I have a folder full of ideas and snippets that I intend on working my way through. My point is not that films ideas shouldn't be rewritten with characters, it's that changing nothing about it - down to reusing the dialogue and such from the film - seems a little pointless. What I like is, rather than twisting the characters to fit the film, seeing how the characters and their personalities will change how the film works out. Does that make sense? So I will absolutely read film AUs provided the characterisation is strong and the foremost consideration.

Quite possibly my taste in such things would depend entirely on how far I agree that the characters used fit the characters whose roles they are taking on.

(I loved the Affair to Remember AU, but I haven't actually seen the film, so... :D)

The story I'm writing had to change quite significantly from the film I'm playing with because the characters taken by John and Rodney are not actually the characters that end up together in the film.

*grins*

And you know I couldn't have that.

[the-oscar-cat.livejournal.com]

*sends fizzymakefeelnice and manny with a bottle of red wine*

*includes offer to read fic as impartial reader person who likes your stories*

[villainny.livejournal.com]

*grins*

You're absolutely welcome to read it if you'd like, with the obvious disclaimer that it is really really not finished (to the point of ending midsentence, currently).

By the time I get it done there will be no one still willing to read it, seriously. XD

[villainny.livejournal.com]

Also: I will need your email address for this plan.

I R Brite.

[the-oscar-cat.livejournal.com]

*pets*

oscarcat at gmail dot com :)

[soupytwist.livejournal.com]

I love you and am so impressed you haven't actually killed anyone yet.

And I don't think you'll need to entirely re-write. Add stuff, yes, but like I said the other night, I don't think you'll need as much as you think you do (you are allowed to not tell everything about everything, give your audience credit, darling!) and certainly not scrap everything you've got so far. It's a horrifyingly intimidating prospect, but if you think of the basic things you want to add and then just take it one part at a time, you can do it. You got to nearly twenty thousand words that way. It'll happen, if you want it to.

*hugs*

[villainny.livejournal.com]

YOU!

You I will phone tomorrow. Because I have not phoned you for whole days and it feels wrong and lopsided.

(and I know really. I'm just having one of those 'I 'ATE MY PAINTINGS!' days.)

XD

[soupytwist.livejournal.com]

YOU! yay! I nearly phooooned you at lunchtime because it's slightly like missing a limb but then I was like, poor Nny is probably stressed enough as it IS. so, um, I didn't. but phoneage tomorrow sounds muy excellente, si.

And losing your zebra DOES suck. but it's okay, because Ray will find it again for you. *cuddles*

[villainny.livejournal.com]

Oh. Oh, you just made me so happy.

*snuggles into mental-Ray's arms*

XD