Evidence:

He drew me fanart for my birthday.



( pick out the references! )

Guys, I don't know if I can write first-person Erik without it coming out like Susan Kay. Despite not having read the novel in at least ten years. I think I've been permanently tainted.

I just don't know what to do.

As anyone who follows loge_no_5 knows, I've been putting up an "Older Fanfic of the Day" to get some older works circulating. However, I've never been good about saving links, or remembering stuff that I've liked, so I'd like your help.

What are your favorite Phantom of the Opera stories? Any canon, any genre, any rating. No limit on how many. If you have a rec list somewhere, or if your ff.n or Fifth Cellar or other account has a favorites list you feel good about, I'd like to know that, too. Don't worry about whether you think I'd like them; I just want to know what's popular--at least in my little circle. You guys have pretty good taste. Oh, and anyone who feels like it and wants to direct people here to leave their favorites, feel free! I need to catch up on my Phantom reading, anyway.

[PSA: masked_ball has prompts open for claiming, if I haven't made that abundantly clear yet.]

I haven't mentioned it here, because I figured that anyone interested would have seen the announcements on various Phantom of the Opera-related communities, but just in case:

Prompt submission for masked_ball's Bastille Day art/ficathon are due tomorrow at noon, Eastern Daylight Time. Just like last time, you can submit prompts even if you don't plan on writing or arting. I want a rich selection for people to choose from, and this is a good opportunity to get some art and fic out there that you've always wanted to see, but maybe don't feel equipped to make yourself. Anything goes. Please come check it out!

Submit prompts here.

My Daroga by ~bdunn1342 on deviantART

My very own Persian!

Anyone who cares has probably seen this elsewhere, but...

Taking over where operanotes left off, loge_no_5 is a new Phantom of the Opera newsletter for the fandom, collecting news and updates from stage, film, fanfiction, and fandom fields. I'm still tweaking the design and the layout, but the first newsletter is up!

Please join, and let me know what you wan to see from a community like this. My aim is to give us a clearing-house for fandom activity around the internet, as I have yet to find a centralized location for Phantom fandom. That means that any news is welcome (though I will not, most likely, be following every move of every person who's ever played in a film/show of that name). But major developments, contests, fanfiction, discussion, and on down through new RPs needing members should be covered, and I'd much appreciate your help in getting this off the ground.

[In other words, yes, I'm crazy.]

Five things lafemmedarla associates with me:

( The Daroga )

( Erik/Daroga )

( Julian Sands )

( Books )

( William Shatner )

Five things inlaterdays associates with me:

Photography
I started "seriously" taking photos in March of 2005, when I visited Seattle for the first time and brought Mr. Daroga's 80's Minolta with me. The photos in the daffodil fields in Skagit county were sort of a revelation; I realized I loved how they looked, and that I had taken them. (That particular lens, too, has a quality I fear I cannot match with my digital.) I joined DeviantArt, and started taking more photos, and spent a lot of money on film and developing.

Sometimes I think of "doing something" with photography, only I don't know what. I haven't made a disciplined study of it, and I'm not sure what direction I'd want to go. I love candid shots, street scenes, taking photos of little things no one notices. I haven't delved much into studio or portrait work, because I guess my documentary impulse is stronger. I'd love to find some direction here, and really learn what works and what doesn't.

Phantom of the Opera
Ah,imagine my not-surprise that this came up. But what to elaborate upon?

I guess what comes to mind most strongly is how I've attempted to "reclaim" POTO fandom--I don't mean externally, from someone else, but for myself. To have a fandom I can operate in. The source itself seems to matter less, aside from the fact that I feel comfortable within it because I know it very well (I love Buffy, too, for example, but feel ill-equipped memory-wise to write or participate). Also, Phantom fandom is small enough to make a little splash in, which (as you know) I have tried to do. It's less, maybe, that I'm still obsessed with the story/characters and more that I still find them useful/interesting enough to build that interaction around. It's something consistent I can go back to and mine. That said, I don't actually feel that any given version of it (even Leroux) is a masterpiece. Which is probably why it's allowed for so much expression over the years. You can't do much with perfection; it's the flawed that can stand to be tinkered with.

Dogs
I have always loved dogs, for as long as I can remember. When I was a baby, we had an Old English named Tuppence who (I am told) guarded me while I slept and cleaned my face off after I ate. We had to give her away when I was 6 months old and we moved to Saudi Arabia, but I romantically half-believe that experience set me up for life. (As a side note, I also romantically think my un-remembered year in Arabia set me up for Lawrence.) I am far more likely to notice dogs than people on the street. I remember specific dogs at the dog park, but never their owners. I suppose love of dogs is fairly common because they have been engineered to be perfect companions: at their best, they are obedient, respectful, true, multi-purpose, and aesthetically pleasing. I like cats, too--in fact, I like all animals--and I love having both for different reasons. But I will always put dogs first, if given the choice.

As to what I like in dogs, specifically, I especially appreciate functionality. I don't mean I need a dog to pull a sled or flush game or keep my sheep, but that it bothers me very much that we've bred dogs who cannot survive on their own. All the bulldogs, pugs, dachshunds, etc into whom we've intentionally bred health problems seems, to me, to be abuse, plain and simple. Maybe you think they're cute, and maybe the fact that they're pets means survival isn't an issue, but it bothers me that we've twisted these creatures for no other end than we think it's adorable that their faces are squished so they can't breath and their bodies are deformed so they can't run properly or give birth naturally.

As to my more personal preferences, they tend towards the working/herding group, the sheepdogs and such. I find those qualities to be more advantageous for home life (sticking around, guarding, etc) than the prey-driven and running-off breeds. Overall, though, I love the mutt, and I think that given the fact I've been successful in rehabilitating a problem dog, it's my duty to do so whenever I can.

Writing
As you may have noticed, writing and I have a bit of a troubled relationship. I love it when it goes well, because it's easy. I hardly ever edit anything, and I've been rewarded fine (both academically and fandom-wise) for not being terribly careful. I don't mean I'm sloppy, or that I'm not working at it, but most of what I put out there has been tweaked very little between my brain and your eyes. So I've learned some fairly bad habits, and haven't learned the value of careful editing and plotting and all that.

That's probably why most of my stuff is short. I don't let you see the longer stuff, because it would take more work, and I haven't gotten my head wrapped around, say, rewriting my Phantom novella.

I'm always of two minds about what I want to write, as well. I know full well I've no aspirations to greatness, to literary merit. Most of my favorite books aren't "literary classics," they're whatever moves me. If I could affect someone the same way, I'd be happy. But at the same time, part of me doesn't seem to want to accept this. It's not exactly conscious, but I'm blocked a lot of the time from just going wild and writing what I'd probably want to, if I thought about it.

Orson Welles
I think the thing that draws me to Orson Welles is the complexity and contradiction of him. He was multi-talented, an actor, writer, director, artist, everything. He was an attractive man who is "not my type." And he's at the center of controversy, even today, about what he means to his field(s) and no two books you read about him will paint the same picture. In fact, there are opposing camps of Welles scholars, some of whom seem to want to deny him any agency in his work at all, and some of whom want to excuse his every indulgence. His "failure" is either entirely his fault, or entirely the world's. Of course, most are somewhere in the middle.

In this, he reminds me of the last historical individual I was obsessed with, T.E. Lawrence. Multi-talented, a little (or very) odd, and ultimately disappointed by life, leaving an uncertain legacy that will be argued over for generations. I wonder if that quality is what attracts me, and what it is about that that does. It's true that on my bookshelf, these two men are the only people who take up a comparable amount of space, though in personality/interest/scope they're nothing alike.

What I've read about Welles really makes me like him. I don't think he was perfect, or blameless, or any of that. But he's delightful, even sometimes in his arrogance (and who's to say some of it wasn't earned). And while some consider his acting "hammy," I think he's one of the most charming people I've ever seen on screen, even when the movies are bad. Dirty little secret: my current affair with him actually began as a result of my using his image (this icon, in fact) as the avatar for a male Carlotta-figure for an rp. That character has taken on a life of his own, but he sparked a re-examination of Welles' work for me which prompted... well, what you see.

I could go on for days on any of these! So feel free to discuss, if I said anything interesting.

Paris Opera was a living thing, full of a mad collection of people performing and doing their thing. It was somewhat like the starship Enterprise—completely self-sufficient.
-John Mathieson, cinematographer for the 2004 Phantom of the Opera

So my challenge to you: who's who? Any crew, but I prefer TOS and TNG because I know them better. And DS9 (but we already know Bashir is the Persian). Basically I don't know Voyager and Enterprise. And whatever POTO canon you can shoehorn 'em into.

Personally, I want Kirk to play everything.

For anyone interested, but who hasn't been following masked_ball (which you should go check out if you're interested in good Phantom fic/art, because I approve of every one of the entries), I've written fic!

West of the Moon
Fandom: Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera
Characters: Erik, Raoul, Persian
Rating: Teen/PG
Summary: Raoul and Erik are not the men they once were. But the same woman still ties them together.

I was very uncertain about it at first--it was written in response to a prompt by tkp, and I labored over it to the point where I got too close to see if it made any sense (though most of the labor was in my own head). I'm overjoyed that she liked it, and it's inspired me to pick up a few unfinished projects I dropped along the way.

Same thing on fanfiction.net, if that's the way you swing.

To get the taste of my last post out of my mouth, here's a question for a) writers/readers, b) Phantom fans, and c) any for whom those intersect. I think it would be a good idea to get myself writing more, even if it's not linear, that I will eventually use. I also need to build some kind of portfolio. So I have two plans:

1. Write an article for one of the cinema/horror magazines and attempt to get a byline.

and

2. Write more here for the Phantom community for my exercise and everyone's discussion.

My question for you is: What do you think might be good subjects to tackle for either? For 1, what's an angle that hasn't been taken before that I can tackle in a concise fashion? An overview of the History of POTO will only work if I can find a nice hook, and can limit it to a certain theme. For 2, what would you be interested in reading/discussing?

The image (minus one important addition, and it's not the text) comes from an old Japanese Batman comic, as reproduced in Bat-Manga. Does this remind you of anyone?

I really haven't been around lately, have I? I have about a week (give or take a few days) left before my master's degree is FINISHED, which I'm very excited about, except for the next week (give or take a few days) I have to live through. I will be very, very happy when this is all over. My MLS has been just about the most boring project I've ever embarked upon.

And I haven't really commented on anything political or pop-cultural because when I do have things to say, I've been saying them out loud. So you're missing it. Not that most of it's that exciting or pithy. In short: Bogdanovich's interviews of Orson in This is Orson Welles are some of the greatest things I've ever read, I am going to see Twilight, the new Star Trek trailer is APPALLING, I hate that it gets dark here now at 4:30, and tkp is AWESOMESOCKS. I keep hoping I'll catch up on movie reviews and things, and write all those essays I always want to but am too lazy to actually write out.

Until then... there's Lord Death Man.

Through a clerical oversight (on my part), I'm left with an extra ticket to the Seattle tour of POTO.

Who wants it?

It's row C, center left, and $76.98 (incl. fees). The downside is, you'd have to see it with me and my friends, and who knows what that might entail?

Any takers?

You've probably seen this already, the report of the plot of the first act of ALW's POTO sequel:

As for "Phantom . . . Once Upon Another Time": It's set in 1906 in Coney Island. The Phantom, aka Erik, having fled Paris, is running a freak show. At night, he crawls into his lair and makes love to an automaton that looks like Christine.

Christine, meanwhile, has become a famous opera singer. But she's fallen on hard times because her husband, Raoul, has squandered their fortune. So she's accepted a high-paying gig from a mysterious impresario to open a new amusement park. On her first night in New York, she draws back the curtain in her hotel suite and comes face to face with her new employer - flash of lightning, crash of chords - the Phantom!

Christine has a child, Gustave, but is his father Raoul or the Phantom? I can't tell you because no one's seen the second act yet.

But I can tell you that Raoul, who was so handsome in "The Phantom," is now a drunken wreck.


Am I right?

I'm posting because I've just come up with a crack!theory to explain everything:

Raoul, depressed over the fact that Christine won't stop singing and moping about Erik being gone, and rather pissed over the whole baby daddy thing, goes completely off the rails and decides that he'll give Christine exactly what she wants--The Phantom. The Phantom described above is actually Raoul in disguise, doing everything he can think of to resemble his vision of Erik. Why, of course Erik would run a freak show and have opera at an amusement park! Being insane as he now is (for no reason), we'll excuse his Christine!bot shenanigans as impatience for the real thing.

Meanwhile, without his knowledge, Erik has perfected his mask of anybody else (specifically, Raoul) and taken his place. Where he proves to be a terrible husband and father, as the toll of all that social interaction after years of isolation leads him further into the thrall of demon liquor. And, er, squandering. Though most of that was done when Raoul ran off with the down payment for his freakshow/amusement park.

It totally works, I swear.

Oh, and

Eight secrets behind the cut, and still taking submissions. I'll be camping for a few days. Play nice!
( Fantasies, Forsyth and Kay )

Ten secrets behind the cut, and still taking submissions if you've got 'em.
( Some Gerik. Some Raoul. Some... Travolta )

Entirely inspired by lizbee's highly entertaining Doctor Who Fandom Secrets posts, I thought it high time there was a special place for Phantom-related ones. There have to be lots. There are so many canons, so many opinions. But, like DW, an entire community isn't sustainable.

That's why I'm hosting it in my journal. Submit your secrets (as many as you like) to this post, and I'll post them when there are enough (or people get bored).

The Rules (formulated by lizbee)

- Comments on this post are screened, and will not be unscreened.
- Secrets may be submitted anonymously, or not. IP logging will be off for the duration.
- Secrets must be no larger than 600x600 pixels. Secrets submitted in .bmp format will not be accepted.
- Do not use fan art or manips without permission.
- Do not hotlink images.
- Please upload your images to one of the free hosting services. I personally recommend tinypic.com. Useful tip: if you upload your secret at Photobucket, your account name will be on display for all the world to see.

One final word: be polite. We all have opinions. Respect them. There's a lot of possible wank in POTO, though tempers are less high than they used to be (it feels like, anyway). Don't post a secret that'd be offensive if it was directed towards your favorite person/character/ship/canon. There's a line here, and I don't want to draw it firmly. There's a difference between opinion and bashing. If I see the latter, I reserve the right not to post it. Just have fun, and we should be cool.

Finally, and most important: Post this call in your journals or forums with a link back here! We want secrets, and not just mine, because you all know those already.

To watch this topic in my journal, track it here and choose the option to notify you when I post an entry tagged "poto fandom secrets."

She's done a better job at this than I could, or at least, a good enough job that I don't have to, so anyone interested in the LJ Advisory board elections should see tkp's post about what we should do. As she says, it's for the children porn! It's outdated now, because I am slow. But still important.

In other news (speaking of) I got linked to a modern day POTO fanfic in which Erik is a professor (with apparently no problem wearing a mask in school, so far it's not addressed), married, with two kids, and receiving sexual favors from an extraordinarily slutty 17-year-old Christine in exchange for good grades. I'd have stopped but then Nadir showed up as a beat poet who tokes up with Raoul, and that was just too amazing for words. It's the only part of this morass of OOCness I almost want to be fact.

As a legit rec, I want to cite cesario's girl!Harry stories, Girl in the War and the prequel, Twelve Hundred Hours. She does stuff with a female Harry Potter that I wouldn't have imagined, but makes sense to me.

In still other (personal) news: Still indecisive.

Title: The Conjurer's Trick
Fandom: The Phantom of the Opera
Pairing: Erik/Persian
Rating: Adult (explicit slash). Don't read if you shouldn't.
Summary: For the Persian, the siren's song reaches back all the way to the Rosy Hours of Mazenderan.
( Rumor swirls around him )

Read/review on The Fifth Cellar