Reblogged
Felt bad for the torment, here’s a little happy
Didn’t want Charles to be left out, though I’m sure he’d prefer to be
My apologies to anyone who just started following me recently but I might be moving to a different art blog (since Tumblr doesn’t have a way to make a side blog into a primary, and I’d really like to interact with people through one designated art place…) Haven’t done it yet, and if I do it I’ll pin a post or smth, but I’m heavily considering it.
Just off my most recent M*A*S*H watch through, and as the Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen anniversary was not too long ago, I wanted to do my own little tribute.
Charles and Father Mulcahy are characters who are written very differently, but both rely on music (in their own ways) to keep their sanity throughout the war. And in the end, they both lose their connection to it in different ways. After Charles works with the Chinese POW musicians on the Mozart quintet (pictured), and they are killed, the safety of his connection to music is shattered, and all he can think about when listening is the violence and bloodshed. This is explicitly addressed in the finale.
However, Father Mulcahy’s loss is not. Yes, they address his going deaf after the explosion, but throughout the entire show he is shown playing the piano, singing, writing war songs. His connection to music is much less emphasized, but it persists through the entire series, and although he may not be a technical prodigy, it brings him joy. And then he loses it, along with the ability to take confessions, and a number of other facets of his job and life that gave him meaning and brought him comfort. Earlier in the show, during a particularly difficult moment, he is consoled by his colleagues performing Dona Nobis Pacem (also pictured). After he loses his hearing, he begins to question God. “Are you Deaf too?” I think this shaken faith and may have festered into an anger that contributed to his problems after the war (he was shown struggling in AfterMASH).
Anyways! Enjoy my angst fest (also I am VERY open to requests, especially for this show rn)
(I’m just gonna tag a few people I thought might like these (I’m a long time lurker, despite the lifelong love of the show) @major-charlie @thebreakfastgenie @statictwoo @hawkeye-pierce-4077 @frankburns-eatsworms
#my art#gershel draws#art#digital art#tablet art#artists on tumblr#digital drawing#tumblr artists#digital painting#painting#music#mozart#mash 4077#mashposting#m*a*s*h#charles emerson winchester iii#father mulcahy#mashblr#m*a*s*h 4077#4077th#francis mulcahy#sheet music#angst#whump#goodbye farewell and amen#emotional whump#crying
Somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind I found this memory. Or was it dream? I think it was a memory. There was a party in a barn of shelter somewhere out in the woods. I was probably 7 or 8? We children were allowed to roam around the property, and there was a pond with a paddle boat. My legs were too short to reach the pedals fully. It was a warm night, and there fireflies and the peeper frogs were chirping. I feel a strong sense of nostalgia from what little I recall.
Reblogged alliumfucker
Does anyone one else remember that terrible Tolkien adaptation called The Lord of the Rings Musical?
It was super weird, very expensive with a moving stage, used almost none of Tolkien’s actual songs and was quickly forgotten…
In defense of the musical, at least it kept the general spirit of things? Like Now and For Always is most definitely a good song that also happens to really capture the general vibe of hobbits, but also Sam and Frodo’s relationship imo? I also really like Wonder as it deals with Galadriel’s emotions towards Lothlorien, how it will eventually fade, etc.
I mean, it was FAR from perfect (really, really far), but a lot of the songs were quite charming and really kept with the feeling of Tolkien even if they weren’t quite right. Admittedly, I really love The Road Goes On, Cat and the Fiddle, Lothlorien, Wonder, and Now and For Always as songs and do listen to them for comfort.
Me: lol what a clever shitpos--WHAT DO YOU MEAN, IT'S REAL?
I like Now and For Always - but if you can avoid the visuals of the “Lothlorien” ribbon dancing video on YouTube you’ll spare yourself some secondhand emotions that are hard to quantify
I think it’s best expressed by imagining that someone like a dad or an in-law or academic mentor kindly took you to see it as a special treat, and is now sitting there next to you with a really polite patient grimace, and when the pole-dancing elves and ribbon-dancing Galadriel come on, you feel like you need to somehow apologise to them for it, like it’s your responsibility to explain or disclaim it somehow. You know? Like, “I’m sorry about this, yes I’m into the idea generally, but I do understand that this is a big ask to sit through.”
guessin’ y’all ain’t heard of the 6-hour Silmarillion opera, eh?
I mean, the 1-hour Russian rock opera (“Finrod: the Rock Opera”) is on my work playlist, so… hit me with it.
not only do i remember this, I SAW IT ONSTAGE IN LONDON IN 2008
i was 18 years old on a school trip (which was somewhat motivated by the fact that you can drink in england when you’re 18 and you cannot in the us). we were asked ahead of time which shows we wanted to see. we were given a list. absolutely no one chose LOTR the musical. (or if they did, they never owned up to it).
every tour guide we encountered on this trip asked us if we were going to see any shows. we were going to see phantom, which was as you expected, a decent production, the chandelier falls, the phantom sings, there are no real surprises there. but when we told these poor tour guides that we were also seeing LOTR the musical, they got kind of quiet.
“i’ve heard the sets are really nice”
“they have some interesting sets”
“oh, i’ve heard good things about the set”
my friends, when you have spent a lot of money producing a west end musical, it should worry you when the nicest compliment anyone can give said musical is about the SET.
(the set was genuinely very cool, there were vines all throughout the audience, and the centerpiece of the set was a rotating circle with multiple levels that went up and down, it was nifty)
the puppets were also really dope
none of the comments so far have really captured the experience of seeing this show. the music was... fine. if you remember the late aughts you probably won’t be too surprised, instead of emo music it was off-brand enya for the most part. like if celtic women was sung by men from london. it’s all on youtube.
there are several things you need to know about the stage production:
1. i have no idea how the show opens. there were hobbits onstage as people were getting seated, and they had these massive nets they were waving over the heads of the audience, trying to catch fireflies. no idea how the fireflies worked, that was very cool but this was a liability lawsuit waiting to happen. anyway they caught the fireflies, shouted HUZZAH and the show began. nobody was prepared, there was no warning about fire exits, and everyone in the audience was still talking, so i missed the first 5 minutes
2. gandalf was yelling every single line, no explanation
3. aragorn had stripes of dark paint underneath his eyes like a football player, no explanation
4. arawen kept showing up in the background of scenes she was not in, such as the death of boromir, no explanation.
5. so did galadriel.
5b. i won’t dwell on it too much because it is on youtube, but the lothlorien song is exactly as describe above, EXCEPT in addition to the ribbon dancing there were AERIALS. legolas comes swinging in on a vine, galadriel has a vine/sex swing setup, it was Camp.
6. the orcs. had pogo sticks. for hands.
6b. i need to emphasize this: the orcs HAD POCO STICKS FOR HANDS!!
they used these appendages like sproingy crutches and also as weapons during the fight scenes. why.
7. act 1 ends with the balrog showing up and there’s a rain of gold confetti glitter and a bunch of orcs are in the audience snarling at everyone and oh by the way they’re doing all 3 books.
8. during intermission everyone who wasn’t with a school trip from the u.s. got drunk, no explanation necessary
9. GOLLUM
9b. gollum is wearing a skin-tight costume with a skimpy little tarzan loincloth, and he is giving a very crotch-forward performance. i’m talking crab-walking on his back with his pelvis thrusting with every line. gollum is giving us the most blatant display of raw sexuality i have ever seen in my life. gollum does not just want the precious. gollum is HORNY for the precious.
this actor deserves every award for doing the absolute worst thing in the best way possible.
10 (??). there is another part of the show i did not see, despite being in the audience, and it’s a song that is not part of the album, i think it was maybe supposed to be aragorn’s wedding? anyway, a bunch of extras walk out onstage in what might be gondor soldier uniforms, but they are some very white robes with some very pointy hoods, and perhaps presciently, they are carrying what appear to be tiki torches. someone in the (very drunk) audience shouts KKK, the actors pause, and then they just walk offstage, never to be seen again.
11. the ring gets thrown into the lava, galadriel shows up on her sex swing again, gandalf is alive and screaming about his friend tom bombadil, who does not make an appearance, the show is over and we leave, knowing innately that we will never be the same again
12. the dude who shouted kkk is outside getting arrested, which is an absolutely bananas reason to have an arrest record, wonder what his life is like now, maybe it was boris johnson, it probably wasn’t, but don’t know, who can say.
anyway, dream a little dream of gollum, whose knee pads require no explanation:
Thank you for blessing us with this write-up??? And I’m really glad about the Lothlorien sex swing elaboration, thanks for that too
I recently discovered that if you request “now and for always” on Apple Music it gives you the MOST playlist in response, and have, in consequence, been thinking of this post constantly. Hello!! I love it!!!
(if you request “now and for always” Apple Music gets excited about Bollywood, Finnish folk music, and nerd music, and in trying to reconcile these interests creates the best playlists you’ve ever heard. The guy who wrote the lyrics for the LotR musical was A R Rahman of Slumdog Millionaire fame in the West, and normal fame everywhere else: co-credited on the track are Christopher Nightingale (nerd musician) and a Finnish artist I don’t know well, which is why. Anyway; baffle your algorithm and confuse your neighbors by blasting this, and also, Gollum knee pads. You’re welcome)
@shamwowxl PLEASE KNOW that u are Always in my thoughts
HAVE YOU HEARD ABOUT OUR LORD AND SAVIOUR, THE GROUNDBREAKING WATERMILL REVIVAL OF THIS MUSICAL WHICH SAVED AN ICONIC REGIONAL THEATRE LAST YEAR
AND HAS NOW TRAVELLED TO CHICAGO AHEAD OF ITS DEBUT IN AOTEAROA
They’re all so attractive and it looks like they’re having a good time!
I saw it in Chicago! It was a DELIGHT. Not for purists, for sure, but definitely gets the book's musical vibes in a way that the movies just didn't.
The stagecraft for the black riders and Shelob was great. Didn't love Treebeard; feels like it needed just a few more creative brainstorming sessions.
Gollum was giving it ALL in the Andy Serkis vein, which was impressive, and bravo! But I really yearn for a different interpretation of this character. Andy did it that way already, ya know? A directoral critique, not an actor critique, to be clear.
There is NO Rohan whatsoever and that's actually fine. Horses en masse are, hm, difficult. And we've got a LOT of story to pack into just 3ish hours. We focus hard on the fellowship, Gondor, and Mordor.
The vibes are excellent, the music whips, and the actors are clearly delighted to be doing it.
3.5 out of 4 stars, see it if you can!
I did see it in Chicago and, even as a die-hard Tolkien fan, I absolutely loved it! I’ve been in love with the music for a long time (like since its original runs in the late 2000s) and honestly? They did some really really cool things with it! Instead of having a traditional pit orchestra, many of the actors actually played their instruments onstage. This of course limited the orchestration, but it was a fun effect and lent itself particularly well to the opening scenes at Bilbo’s birthday. The look from the original show was toned down: less makeup, more natural appearances (for the elves and Aragorn in particular).
They had to cut a LOT of things out, as the show couldn’t be a full 12 hours, but overall I still liked it! They even included the scouring of the shire, which was not in the movies, and I think is a really powerful part from the books that should have been included. Tom Bombadil was name dropped, though he didn’t ever appear. At least they acknowledged his existence!
So overall, yeah it’s not true to the books, but it deserves far more credit than it has been given here. I LOVE the music, the creature puppetry was actually incredible (how did they do Shelob???), and I had a really good time! You’ve just gotta go in not expecting it to align with the books too closely, and keep an open mind. But I’ve always been one to find positives in things that other people (especially purist fans) hate.
An abandoned character from campaign that never happened, this is Larkspur, a tiefling/firbolg Circle of Stars Druid. Yes, the sunset colors do look more Lisa Frank than anything, but I think that adds to the design, quite frankly. He was also my backup character for another campaign that fell through (ah, the life of a DND player). I still may do a fully fledged piece with him, just because I love him and I love the celestial motif.