ysabetwordsmith | Musicals in Fanfic and Canon

I came across the fanfic "A Very Sherlock Musical," which is actually a great deal deeper than it seems. Begin with the premise: So, you know how musicals are set in a world where people just burst into song every five minutes, and everyone around them automatically knows to join in with the tune and choreography? This fic is set in that world. You now know enough to write brilliant fanfic of your own in whatever canon you wish, using the same premise. Add the plot: John finds it extremely frustrating that Sherlock won't sing their theme song with him.

Here we have a motif straight out of crackfic, the musical episode. Yet the author uses this setting to explore some very serious issues -- it's actually a story about attachment problems told through the metaphor of musical interaction or rejection. Touch on another Sherlock motif, and what you have is fantastic analog of asexuality: a situation in which Sherlock doesn't want to do the thing that everyone else is doing, and people think less of him for not liking it and not understanding why it's So Very Important to them. There's quite a lot of astute exploration into how social ties form between couples or work groups, and how that gets expressed.

This story reminds me strongly of "Once More, with Feeling." That famous episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer showed the problems that can come from stripping away filters and forcing people to sing about their feelings. In that show, they're not used to it, because it's not natural; it's demonic influence. Compare that with the above story set in a world where musical interactions are the norm.

Another variation is Happy Feet, in which all penguins are expected to sing, and the one who can't gets rejected.

There is a lot of potential to explore more challenges caused by living in a musical world. Most musicals never examine the fact that they are musicals. They just do their thing, a quirky little commentary on everyday life. But when they become genre-savvy, a whole new realm of possibilities opens up. How does the musicality work? What can go wrong with it? How do people cope with disabilities -- being deaf, blind, mobility-impaired, etc. in a world where singing and dancing are fundamental aspects of every human interaction?

I'm not all that fond of musicals, but I'm fascinated by the "musical world" as an AU setting template.

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(I've only got a sad pre-Serum Steve. Drop in your favorite defiant Steve in substitution)
I know there is a dance troupe that's part wheel-chair users, part one foot after the other.

wheel-chair ballroom
30 years of varied dancing bodies

I know there is also at least one acting group that's combined; they found during one performance in NYC the stage was distinctly not level and an actor hadn't been blocked to brake-lock because they'd not found that precise mark before (they might have had to hit the space 'cold').

>> (I've only got a sad pre-Serum Steve. Drop in your favorite defiant Steve in substitution) <<

Well, Marvel did drop that canonical crumb about Steve being in a barbershop quartet. In a musical universe, permanent singing groups would logically be a type of family.

God, Steve's music after coming out of the ice. O_O I would be buying kleenex by the case.

>> I know there is a dance troupe that's part wheel-chair users, part one foot after the other.<<

That's cool. I've seen wheelchair dancing before, and it's awesome.

In the context of a musical world, I would be interested in exploring how they incorporate that, or not. Some of the moves they use are different, some of what their partners do is different -- you need training for that. Does the culture genuinely believe that musicality is an essential part of life? If so, they will widely teach how to pickup-dance with partners of diverse abilities, and there will be wheelchair-dance-friendly areas and equipment all around. But if they have a narrower focus on fully mobile dance, that's going to cause a lot of tension in society -- every broken ankle becomes a major social impediment, and the typical process of aging even more so.

Musical!Steve, of course, would have damn well gone out and learned all of the accommodations, even if he couldn't get through more than one song without wheezing himself into oblivion. "Girls don't like a guy they might step on," ouch! And then to get thrown into the USO, which in musical!world must have been one of the most prestigious positions, only Steve didn't want it.

I love Infinite Flow. :D Over in T-America, that would be a great match for Haru. Obviously they won't discriminate against soups, they're hardcore inclusive.

>>I know there is also at least one acting group that's combined; they found during one performance in NYC the stage was distinctly not level and an actor hadn't been blocked to brake-lock because they'd not found that precise mark before (they might have had to hit the space 'cold').<<

Yikes. But it's not just wheelchairs. You can't transpose directly from a flat stage to a raked stage because, in dancing, it changes the physics of the moves; and in acting, it changes the view from the audience.

Barbershop, as Steve mentions there, is almost assuredly Steve snarking and playing into the conflated ideas of the past he's probably still not sure how they happened. By now I'd think Steve has figured out about John-Boy and Mary Ellen.

It wasn't that it was a raked stage, it was a warped stage. And off they started drifting, iirc towards the rear.

I have performed dance on a concert stage. Turned my foot landing on the cover plate for the outlet.

>> Barbershop, as Steve mentions there, is almost assuredly Steve snarking and playing into the conflated ideas of the past he's probably still not sure how they happened. <<

Huh, I read it as a reference to how social activities have changed over time.

>> It wasn't that it was a raked stage, it was a warped stage. And off they started drifting, iirc towards the rear. <<

Yikes, that's worse. O_O

>> I have performed dance on a concert stage. Turned my foot landing on the cover plate for the outlet.<<

Bummer. I'm reminded of the "murder box" in swimming pool skateboarding (the drain holes).

Barbershop quartet was having a revival during the 1940s; I'm not sure an asthmatic before inhalers would have been in such a group, and there wasn't a lot of 1940s for Steve to be indulging in hobbies what with missing the second half. Steve however is a walking case study in snark, which is one take away from Civil War worth having. (cf the Queens-Brooklyn exchange on the tarmac)

It's sort of like Natasha baiting Steve about "who's the girl?" regarding Peggy Carter's picture next to Howard's.

An asthmatic shouldn't have been getting into fights at least twice a week either, and that didn't stop Steve. He even tried dancing.

Well, yeah. Maybe this is the real reason Bucky took Steve on the Cyclone, trying to get him a little less reckless that week.

Now Steve can get into daily fights and give a matinee Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Barnes is not amused.

>> Well, yeah. Maybe this is the real reason Bucky took Steve on the Cyclone, trying to get him a little less reckless that week. <<

Trying to meet Steve's adrenaline craving, yeah.

>> Now Steve can get into daily fights and give a matinee Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Barnes is not amused.<<

Poor Bucky. Now he doesn't even get the 2-3 days of grace while Steve waits for the swelling to go down before looking for more trouble.

Barnes:If I get two or three hours, I light a candle from whatever is still on fire.

On the bright side he can afford to toss Steve a box of 8 Crayons and watch him draw things. Too bad he started being able to see red just in time for a war.

>> Barnes:If I get two or three hours, I light a candle from whatever is still on fire.<<

*pat pat* I know that feel, bro.

>>On the bright side he can afford to toss Steve a box of 8 Crayons and watch him draw things. Too bad he started being able to see red just in time for a war.<<

Yeah.

One of the things I did with Steve in LIFC is watch him go nuts over the 64 Crayola crayons. :D

In Just a Kid From Brooklyn Howard uses a box of oil pastels to give Steve a test and a bit of a reward.

Musicals in Fanfic and Canon

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