#she yearns for affection and love from jackie

[biblicalhorror]

Sometimes I DO project lesbian fantasy goggles onto television characters. Many such cases. But not shaunajackie. Why else would they be Like That

[hes-writer]

Patreon Masterlist

These are exclusive fics that you can read on my Patreon!

* = complete, ^ = in-progress, + = will be posted on tumblr, (s) = smut (implied or mentioned) writing count: 78 pieces

**billing cycle currently paused** | new patrons will still be charged

This is a reupload of my masterlist with sneak peeks of each piece so you know what's up :D

Multi-Part Series | One Shots | Drabbles | Extras

* Unwavering (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) - 6.5k, the one where harry cheats (again)

"Right. Maybe we can go out tonight to grab some dinner," She suggested, a hopeful glint in her eyes and he almost felt guilty for putting her on the back burner of his mind. "I really have to go, baby," Peeking his head around her frame, he spotted the untouched toast and apple juice resting on where he should be. "I'm sorry."

^ + Roommate Series (3) (4) (5) (6) - 9.8k, the one where harry and y/n are roommates

He sighed, “I finished my coffee ages ago. I was just waiting for you to finish studying so we could leave together and go home,” Y/N dropped her fingers from his wrist, slouching the slightest bit as butterflies attacked her stomach. “Don’t look at me like that. I just wanted you to get home safe,” He nudged her forehead with the ball of his palm, his face contorting to annoyance.

^ + Notes on Camp (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) - 16.5k, the one where harry and y/n are camp counsellors

Y/N looked around to be met with puckered lips and clenched hands as the campers practically requested for her to kiss their favourite counsellor. Wide, hopeful stares were willing her to commit.

“Alright, alright,” She bent her upper body to reach his cheek, licking over her lips once before pressing it on his skin. It was only a quick peck and then she pulled back. He stayed unmoving.

Jacky and Emy poked their finger at him on opposite sides. His cheek dimpling with their small indents. “Maybe you should do it again?”

* Friends Don't (1) (2) (3)- 3k, the one where lines are crossed

“It’s Harry Styles fanfiction on Tumblr,” She suggested a conversation, shyly smiling in embarrassment. “I can see that,” He murmured, using his thumb to scroll through the rest of the story, “It’s . . . interesting. People write these about me?” His retort made the situation seem like an utter surprise.

* Digress, Progress, Regress Series - 5k, the one where harry falls out of love

Y/N wondered if there was a chance to fixing what has been lost--what has disappeared as the canvas soaked through in a permeated osmosis. Coating the brush of blue with white paint took several layers to completely cover the mistakes. There had to be an effort in wanting to make the faults and errors completely opaque from the eye; the bleary, watery irises soaked with tears, dampening her lashes in a thick haze as she cried.

Tickle Fights (1)  - 1.2k, the one where bff!y/n teases harry about his boner

“What’s going on here, Harry?” The light tone of her voice indicated that she was teasing him, paired with the subtle movements of her lower half. Harry whined in response, feeling the blood rush downwards to make him even stiffer. “Does this feel good? Got hard over me straddling you, huh?” It was almost degrading, the way Y/N formed her question yet Harry couldn’t help a whimper from lingering in the air. He nodded, hands sliding down to grip at her moving hips.

Real Mature (1)  (2)  - part two is patron exclusive! - 603 words, the one where bff!harry and y/!n fight

“You shouldn’t have. I’m sorry for being bitter about you and Ruby,” She rested her forearms on his shoulders in a slant when he stood to his full height. “I know you’re happy with her,” Harry gave her a shy smile that confirmed his words. Ruby is someone special to Harry now and Y/N had to learn how to share his time, attention, and affection. “I reckon I’m just missing you a lot more now,” Y/N’s tone was sad and despondent, trailing her gaze to the floor where she almost chuckled at Harry’s fuzzy bunny slippers which she had gotten him.

^ Fine Line Series: Adore You - 1.1k the one where harry and y/n are friends with benefits

Still, with her back against the wall and Harry’s fingers still gripping her hips—she waited for his response. I told you I loved you. Say it back, Y/N thought. “I love her, Y/N,” He mumbled against her neck in a drunken stupor. So close.

Kinkmas Blurbs (1 - 7) - 4.6k, the one where it’s all smutty

Maybe it was the way that his jaw ticked harshly every time he threw his head back at a particularly good stroke. You wondered what he was imagining that had him bucking his hips to his fist before realizing that the movements would probably cause you to wake up. Still, his hooded lids didn’t peel open—not until a core shaking fondle of his heavy balls forced a choked whine out of his throat.

Harry’s neck snapped to your figure, catching the way you looked at him as if you were in distress that he wasn’t cumming anytime soon—not when you were there, willing and able to help.

“Fuck, love. ‘M sorry,” He mumbled, not stopping the flicks of his wrist. In fact, you swore that you could hear the squelching of his clear pre-cum squishing between his fingers.

The Secretary (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) 11k, the one where harry is the CEO and y/n is the assistant (cheating fic)

Two months ago, Y/N unburied a not-so-hidden secret that Harry tried to bury. Two months ago, Y/N walked in on her boyfriend and his secretary fucking on his office table. Two months ago, Y/N experienced everything from pain and discomfort, to disappointment and being scornful. She threaded the line of confronting him or waiting for the day he came forward and admitted it himself. There was a desire for Y/N to see Harry sweat beneath her beady eyes, watching him scratch the back of his pants in a nervous manner. She wanted to hear him stutter as he spat an excuse, she yearned to see him pleading with his gorgeous green eyes for her to stay.  Y/N craved for his throat to close up, whimpers choked from his trachea because he was losing his stability as she walked away from him.

(s) Tension (1) (2) - 5.3k, the one where harry and y/n hate each other

“S’that why you hate me so much?”

His fingertips tapped his thigh methodically, crumpling a faint thud against his jeans. With how close they were sitting, Y/N’s bare knee brushed against his clothing. A burn of desire and anticipation lit inside of her like a dose of gasoline another in a flaming hot fire.

Harry shook his head, “Don’t hate you."

Champagne Problems- 4.4k, the one where marriage is a sensitive topic, the 1 - coming soon!

The freshly popped bottle of champagne poured into the flute on the table beside her bubbled and simmered, the sizzling reaction of the golden liquid ignited a moment of realization within her. The reason why her body felt more weighted, why tears filled her glazed eyes, pricking her corneas and threatening to spill down her face. Y/N’s heart had cracked–she was certain that everybody around her could hear it.

One Shot

(s) Achy Back - 813 words, the one where harry draws y/n a bath

A pout sat on her face as Harry stopped himself from ducking his head and catching her plush lips with his, craving the sweet taste of her and her strawberry lip balm. Her arms wrapped around his snatched waist, halting his breath at the tightness of her embrace and settling for a kiss on her forehead, the scent of her shampoo wafting in his nostrils, knowing that she had taken shower hours prior.

A Letter to the Man I’ve Loved - 1.5k, the one where harry receives a letter from his ex

Is it really worth it to look back in retrospect about ‘what had been’ when she can think about ‘what could have been’ if both of them realized their faults? Granted, he was more resilient in that sense than her, but he was no better at the time. She made mistakes and it had haunted her to this day, practically killing her with each moment she spent without him by her side.

Renegade - 981 words, the one where harry and y/n do a tiktok dance

“What are y’doing?” Harry asked, his eyes wide as his large palms ruffled the fluffy towel on his damp curls. The steam from the bathroom escaped to your bedroom where you were panting with effort, your chest heaving so hard that the peaks of your breasts rose with each breath.

“Uh, what are you doing?” You retorted slowly, hiding your hands behind your back were your fingers gripped your phone. Your thumb dug hard on the volume bottom, frantically trying to decrease the music from the phone speaker.

(s) Drop the Towel - 644 words, the one where harry does the ‘drop the towel’ challenge

You gasped at the sight, the knife clanging on the marble counter, “Ooh, hi there,”

He smirked cockily, watching your eyes observe his body, tongue subconsciously peeking out between your lips until you snapped your head to the window, “Oh my god! There are people out there, Harry!” You wailed in alarm, bending over to hand him his towel.

All I Ask - 2.2k, the one where feelings aren’t mutual

“I don’t want to be scared of what will happen tomorrow or if all we have is right now because we’ll have nothing left but I am,” A sob ripped through his throat, emotions were heightened tenfold because she was so close yet so far and they were still Harry and Y/N but at the same time they weren’t. They’ve changed over the span of one night. “All we have is tonight,”

Little Prince - 583 words, the one where 7-year-old harry takes care of his best friend

“Y/N? Y/N! Are you okay? I’m so so sorry, I didn’t mean for that to happen. I swear I wasn’t mad at you, I was just jok- Why are you smiling?” Harry yelped, panic evident in his shrill voice. His hands wandered towards her face, tilting it left to right, up and down, searching for any visible and invisible injuries besides the bump on her forehead.

Stressed Out - 1.8k, the one where y/n has a huge term paper due

“What d’ya mean I don’t get it?” He closed the paperback, making sure to clip in his bookmark to save his spot.

A pregnant pause slithered the room. Her fingers typing against the keys of her laptop ceased as she shot him a glare, “You’re not studying, are you? All you do is write songs, fiddle with a few instruments and sing it in front of people who adore you,”

Valentine’s Day - 1.5k, the one where harry runs into trouble and y/n is there to save him

“Shit! Are you crazy?” Y/N gasped in surprise when the passengers seat was occupied, the door opening and slamming shut all while the car moved at a speed of 15 km/h —cursing her forgetfulness for not clicking the locks shut.

“Keep driving!” The passenger shouted, looking back through the windshield.

Dream With Me - 1.3k, the one where y/n has trouble sleeping

Harry’s admiration gets interrupted when a sudden jolt took over Y/N’s body. He dropped his mouth open a little in shock, rubbing her back soothingly when she whimpered quietly, “Shh, it’s okay. You’re safe with me,” She must have had experienced one of those moments when she was falling until her vision drooped to a shaded black.

Pet Name - 1.2k, the one where bff!harry just wants y/n to call him by his pet name again

His voice emulated a soft, syrupy tone that lingered in the air whenever he spoke. He was the colour honey itself–golden and yellow like the colour of the sun. Harry was bright in its sense of intelligence and the way he illuminated the whichever room he entered. His kindness catered to everyone’s needs and left pieces of his heart wherever he went.

Harry was honey.

Shave - 768 words, the one where harry helps y/n shave her coochie

She sniffles some more, “I’m trying to shave, H. It’s so itchy but I-I can’t reach down there,”

Y/N began to sob. The rattle of the razor clanking on the bathtub floor where she sat her bum on the edge. Her baby bump was causing her to teeter over the porcelain which urged Harry to swiftly plant his hands on her to keep her steady.

“I’m so huge! I’m the size of a house,” Y/N palmed the crest of her bump, rubbing it loosely as she admired the stretched skin yet slightly wishing that it would disappear and she was holding their baby in her arms instead.

(s) Don’t Worry, Darling - 1.5k, the one where y/n rides harry

He slipped down the headboard, resting his back flat on the mattress with Y/N sliding with him. She positioned her feet to rest near his knees, wrapping their limbs together so she could have some sort of sanity whilst Harry incepted on his shattering thrusts. Feet were planted on the mattress to give his lower half elevation to propel his hips against Y/N’s core. Harry’s fingers left white marks on her skin, gripping the plush flesh and essentially spreading Y/N open as he rapidly shoved his dick over and over inside of her with no signs of slowing down. He staggered for a few moments when her pulsing core emitted dazing throbs over his leaking cock but Y/N was quick to duplicate and resume the pace he had set with the movement of her hips.

To Be Loved - 2.3k, the one where y/n’s feelings are more than friendly

“I love you. Don’t you love me back?”

Harry’s eyes visibly widened, clearly taken aback by the question spewing from Y/N’s mouth. Her heat cheeks and a shy stance; knees knocking against his knobby ones while her dainty hands interlaced her fingers.

Revelation - 2.1k, the one where famous!y/n and harry are spotted together (pre-relationship)

Before there were Harry and Y/N--the power couple--there was Harry and Y/N.

Y/N, who was one of the most sought after female artists in the industry because of her angelic voice. The woman who had managed to catch the lingering stares of every household and the ears of many listeners with her truthful songs; narrative from the experiences she had gone through and shared through the art of songwriting.

Harry, who was quite the artist for the night. Harry’s limbs were being pulled metaphorically every which to ensure that the cameras captured him clapping respectfully in the audience. Others were asking him to stay for a bit more time backstage for content for an upcoming video. Right now, he was sat in his uncomfortable chair beside a handful of producers and well-known singers. A brief hug and whisper with Ariana Grande were enough for their fans to implode about a possible collaboration, granted that Harry had written a song for her album before. But Harry was certain that that feature wasn’t coming for a long while.

Apple Cheeks - 1.1k, the one where harry says something and y/n isn’t listening

Clearing his throat, he began, “I love you, Y/N. And I know that it might be too soon considering how short our relationship has been so far but I-I really do have strong feelings for you,”

Harry dropped his gaze as soon as he managed to peel off the first three words from his hoarse throat. “You don’t have to say it back. I just wanted to let you know that I really care for you and me. I definitely something for us in the future and I hope you feel the same,”

Dreadful seconds shivered up Harry’s spine. His stare was still fixed on her shuffling feet and the floor. It was painful to hear nothing but silence so Harry decided to courageously lift his head up.

Affliction - 1.5k, the one where Harry breaks down (TW: depressive thoughts)

It wasn’t even that Harry did not know how to say ‘no’ because he truly did. However, anyone would be worn-out by the amount of exhaustion carried on his back. That cold shudder of loneliness--even when he wasn’t alone-- because nobody shared the experience of defeat with him. The twitch of his ears straining to listen when nobody would do the same for him. A subtle jerk of the corners of his lips because he could not keep the smile plastered on his face like paint chipping off the drywalls. The flutter of tired lids waiting to be shut tightly as tears were wrung from his green eyes, lashes tickling his skin underneath the violent colour of his eye bags.

From the Dining Table - 748 words, the one where y/n’s new boyfriend looks a lot like harry

Y/N wondered if her former lover shared the same thoughts as she did. The girl that he woke next to—was she still there? Did they share the bed together—not just in the morning—but the nights as well? If so, did Harry love her like he did with Y/N? Or was he just pretending to be okay like she was?

Blanket for Two - 990 words, the one where y/n kicks harry out of bed

And now, Harry was in bed with the woman he loves. Her light snores echoing in the dim room and he was staring up at the ceiling, shivering in his bones. If she were awake, Y/N probably would have made a snide, joking comment about how he shouldn’t sleep naked, especially in the winter.  Not like she didn’t do that either--she was practically naked with the thin camisole over her body.  The difference was that Y/N had an extra layer of blanket keeping her warm, shielding her skin from the night air and Harry only had the friction of his palms rubbing against his arms.  He was sure that he was a hint away from his teeth chattering. Harry had half the mind to dip his freezing feet beneath the blanket and jolt her awake with the change in temperature.

That’ll show her, he thought.

Around 1:32 - 3.2k, the one where y/n has a wet dream

“What?” Harry spat, tugging his shirt over his head, waiting for you to form a coherent excuse. “‘Think that jus’ because you woke up horny from a dream that y’can touch yourself? What a slut.  Are you that desperate?”

Your cheeks flamed at his words of degradation, doubling your arousal and one that had you smushing your thighs together to relieve the ache. You rolled your eyes as he continued his rant instead of using the time to keep you satisfied.  That was his job, wasn’t it? To make you cum and make you feel nothing but pleasure, yet here he was shaming you for touching yourself. Granted, you did it without his permission and done so while he was asleep beside you, but still.

“Wouldn’t have touched myself if you treated me well.”

+ Stories in My Eyes - 1.2k, the one where dad!Harry gets woken up in the middle of the night

And while he liked to think that he had gotten the hang of—quite literally— his kid dangling on his leg like some sort of koala, pulling on his hair every time he gave Beau a piggy back ride, and the random visits late at night where the small child would stand at the doorway with his teddy bear so quietly only to say, “Can I sleep with you and mumma?” He was not at all prepared for tonight’s’ events.

+ Feather Boa - 1.5k, the one where harry comes home after the Grammys

Y/N rolled her eyes, “Oh, stop that!”

“Stop what?” Harry nudged the strap of his custom tote bag higher on his shoulder.

“You just won a Grammy, you goose!”

Harry’s gaze softened, endeared at how happy Y/N was for him. She was jumping on the tips of her toes, hands clasped in front of her as she stared at him with admiration and awe.

(s) Roughed Up - 2.8k, the one where harry’s domestic and y/n’s mind wanders

You whimper in return, almost collapsing straight on his body when Harry uses your body to move you up and down his cock. His curls flop on the soft pillow beneath his head, sweat matting the tiny hairs to his face. The way he looks at you with such intensity and a certain kind of awe as if he couldn’t believe that this was really happening is rewarding. Hooded eyes observing how your body twitches in his grip, gasping at how strong he felt underneath you like you were merely a ragdoll to be played wit

Pudding Cups - 1k, the one after harry steals food from the kitchen (Notes on Camp Extras)

“So is it common practice for counsellors to steal food from the kitchen?”

Harry lifts his head up at inquiry, shifting his attention from gently taking out the contents of the reusable bag towards Y/N.  She was laying on his mattress, flat on her back as she stared at the wooden ceiling.  If she looked closely, Y/N was sure that his light bulb was flickering the tiniest bit and usually, she would’ve been freaking out over the fact that she was in the middle of the woods, hovering over a potential power cut.  But the fear subsided once she reminded herself that Harry was around.

“Hopefully not,” He muses with a suggestive eyebrow.

Drabbles:

(s) Drabble #1: Fratboy!Harry - 469 words, the one where y/n meets fratboy!harry at a party

Y/N snapped her head towards the member. When she applied for the rush, she didn’t expect that she would have to sleep with someone in order to officially join the sorority.  “What? Why him?

Sadie chuckled, sensing the panic in her voice. “Don’t worry, Harry’s nice. Besides, everybody does it,” She swirled her drink around, mixing the liquids together. Her lashes draped over her cheeks, almost touching the apples. “Are you in?”

Drabble #2: Asshole!Harry - 848 words, the one where harry cheats

You were calm, silent, and patient to see where he would take the conversation. Guilt was not present when you stood face to face in a battle of tranquility that pierced through your heart. His eyes gleamed in concealed smugness while his tongue curled in endless apologies. You knew him too well that he didn’t even stand a chance to hide his true intentions. But to Harry, you were a naive little girl that failed to acknowledge the difference between his acting and the truth.

(s) Drabble #3: Tease - 1.4k, the one where harry teases y/n

Harry plunged two fingers in her hole carefully, biting his lip to suppress the sound he was bound to release from the feeling of her wet walls suffocating his digits. He delivered punctual thrust, making sure to graze her sensitive spot to heighten her arousal. “Harry,”

He stepped back abruptly, pulling his fingers out and creating distance between them. “We have dinner to get to,”

(s) Drabble #4: Dessert - 1.7k, the one where y/n makes dinner but harry wants dessert

His thoughts were always about her no matter how hard he tried not to. And the fact that she took the time out of her day to prepare him something that he will enjoy; well, Harry’s heart just about swelled up to three times the size in his thumping chest.

She pulled away, shaking her head adamantly, “No way! I spent all day cooking and you’re not gonna skip it just to eat my pussy,”

He the corners of his eyes squinted in offence at her description, “Your pussy’s top tier, baby.” Harry ‘tsked’ his tongue, “If yeh didn’t know that already, then I’m doing a horrid job,”

(s) Drabble #5: Mine - 579 words, the one where harry is obsessed with y/ns tits

But he couldn’t exactly do that when all Harry wanted to do was do her. The smooth skin was supported by a navy blue push-up bra; he could tell by the lace mesh that he could see peeking out. It gave Y/N every favour because Harry was trying so hard not to let saliva pool in his mouth and drip out in a line of drool, his eyes widening with each movement she made with her arms, jostling her boobs a little bit here and there.

“Hello? Can you hear me?” Y/N waved her arms to catch his attention. A frown creased her brows as he blinked sluggishly before finding enough coherence to recognize that she was trying to talk to him.

(s) Drabble #6: Early Mornings - 1k, the one where harry thinks y/n is prettiest in the morning

“Get to see ya’ when you’re most beautiful,” Harry tickled his nose on hers, smiling at the way the feature scrunched up as she giggled. He groaned at the contractions her walls gave while her tummy flipped in gentle laughter. “Oi! What’s so funny?” He smushed her face with kisses, pausing his thrust halfway through which had her whining.

Drabble #7: Getaway - 952 words, the one where harry is always cold in the mornings

"Y/N, have you taken my purple bathrobe?"

“No,” Y/N tugged the lavender coloured fabric by the sleeves first. Then, by the lapels draping over her chest, drawing them tighter to block the gust of wind currently caressing Harry’s floppy curls.

Twisting his body, a knowing look overtook Harry’s face as Y/N exited the cabin door. The sheepish smile on his lover’s face granting all the information he needed for this morning’s chilly inception.

There she was, clad in the said purple bathrobe.

Drabble #8: A Little Chilly - 451 words, the one where harry sleeps on the couch

“‘S my bed. Dunno why Lydia can’t jus’ stay on the couch,”

“It’s Y/N!” She wailed, walking closer to the doorframe with her arms crossed over her chest.

“Dear, we didn’t know that you were coming home,” Anne tried reasoning with him, not seeing the gravity of the situation as Harry was making it out to be.

Text Messages:

Text Messages #1 - ‘would you love me if I was snail?’

Text Messages #2 - ‘did you know we had a quiz today?’

Text messages #3 - ‘did you steal my hoodie?’

Notes/Behind the Scenes

Notes: Tarnish

Notes: Stressed Out

[caldoww]

Thoughts - Things from 2021

A list of some of the books, movies, TV shows and music I’ve enjoyed this year. I recommend them all!!

[They’re not all new releases, just what I’ve got round to this year]

[I don’t read much at all, I’m trying to get better with it, so not many entries on that side]

Short Stories:

Fish Soup, By Margarita Garcia Robayo (Translated by Charlotte Coombe)

A collection of two novellas and a handful of short stories from Columbian author Margarita Garcia Robayo. She writes with a sense of blunt poetry, often depicting an exhaustion/dissatisfaction with the reality of life with occasionally hallucinatory descriptions of situations and the characters’ understanding of them. Often, the characters are doomed to live painful lives, unable to come to terms with their reality, however, in the final novella, Sexual Education, our protagonist is shaken awake to the truth of her situation, but is still unable to escape. It all culminates in a despondent yet powerful depiction of how the religion and education given to the girls is warped by misogyny. Robayo has a vivid and unique style that perfectly matches her material - read it, it’s great!

Poetry Collections:

The Adoption Papers, By Jackie Kay

This is a collection of poems that explore the adoption and childhood of the author, Jackie Kay, a Black girl growing up in a white family in Scotland. She approaches her story with so much empathy, telling it from the perspective of her biological and adoptive mothers as well as her childhood self. The identity crises, the guilt and the yearning all comes across in complex and affecting poetry. The best sections are the ones from her own perspective, but the format of the different views adds so much to the story and the understanding of the situation. Always good to support Scottish writing, especially when it’s this incredible.

The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde, By Audre Lorde

I bought this at the start of the year, a pretty broad collection of Lorde’s work. I flick through it on random days, reading random poems, dog-earing the ones that I like. Audre Lorde is my favourite poet - I find my feelings expressed in her words, my thoughts pushed further along their train. The poems are political, personal, persuasive and peaceful. One of my many favourites: 

I don’t need to be rich just able to know how it feels to get bored with anemones

With every line, the meanings contrast and flow together like water falling down steps. I love her - read anything of hers.

Novels: Conversations With Friends, By Sally Rooney

One of only three books I’ve managed to read this year - this one was a breeze. I loved Normal People, her break-out novel, so I went back to read her debut. I’m not quite sure what it is about Rooney’s writing (apart from the fact I love it) that makes it so easy to read and get through. Not to say it’s shallow or doesn’t deal with anything too complex. I found this book quite intellectually challenging, as opposed to the pure emotionality of Normal People. This novel uses Rooney’s naturalistic style and pitch-perfect dialogue to paint a complex and vivid picture of the politics of a group of people, forcing you to challenge your previous assumptions and your trust of our unreliable narrator. The exploration of power dynamics within friends and lovers has given me a lot to think about in my own life, creating both anxiety and shame. Really interesting and intensely readable. If you struggle with getting through books, I think Rooney’s writing is very encouraging. Also, like Normal People, Conversations With Friends is getting a TV adaptation with the same creative team. Normal People is one of my favourite shows of all time so I am very excited for this adaptation and I think they’ve already nailed the casting - Sasha Lane is incredible.

TV Shows: Adult Material (2020)

I’ve already written a post about this show (check it out here) but I’d just like to reiterate that this show is incredible and really knocked me out. With a sharp, impactful script and terrific performances, it’s a stand-out in British TV limited series.

Feel Good (2020-2021)

I love Mae Martin so much. They’ve created a show that is funny, warm and emotionally ravaging. It can sometimes lose its way narratively but there are some moments that just go through me. I cried, laughed and sat and thought for a long time after it was finished. The final scene is just so god damn lovely. I really hope Mae Martin continues writing and acting - I love their stand-up, but I think scripted drama may/mae be a medium that they’re able to make some great stuff in. 

I May Destroy You (2020)

I was a bit late to this one, I’d seen the rave reviews but had never got round to giving it a watch. It’s excellent. The balance of comedy and devastating drama is something that I think British TV does very well (Feel Good). Michaela Cole’s writing and performance are both so charming, energetic and personable that they keep us going through some devastating subject matter that explores and penetrates a number of different subjects without letting up. One of my favourite aspect of this incredible script is the theme of introspection. Throughout the series, our protagonist, Arabella, is forced to confront her actions and her viewpoint. She looks for comfort in a hard, black-and-white morality which causes her to alienate her friends. The show kind of holds the audience’s hand, encouraging us to have a look at ourselves and accept that things are complicated and we often fail ourselves and others. It’s acceptance but not complacency. The main storyline follows Arabella’s psychological recovery following a night where she was raped. The final episode, where she finally sees the man who attacked her, is something I’m still thinking about. I don’t want to spoil it, please just watch it.

Movies:

Because I watch and love a lot of movies, I’m gonna just bullet point these. I know I’ve missed some films that I’ve loved, they slip out of my head.

Sorry We Missed You (2019) [Ken Loach’s films have so much heart within their realistically horrific subject matter - urgent and empathetic. The theme of time and how it can be bought and sold stands out]

The Suicide Squad (2021) [Lots of fun, made with excitement and care for the material. Post linked]

Dark Waters (2019) [An incredible true story, pushed forward by Mark Ruffalo’s excellent central performance. Inspiring stuff]

Delicatessen (1991) [Delightfully French. Funny, weird and an excellent tale of love and domination in a gorgeously realised world]

Cinema Paradiso (1988) [Delightfully Italian. Charming, lovely and poetic - a timeless portrait of a small community and a childhood through its engagement with its cinema. A real filmmakers film but in a good way]

Widows (2018) [A thought-provoking thriller with incredible direction and acting. Post linked]

IKnowThere’sOthersAndIt’sReallyAnnoyingMeThatICan’tRememberThem

Albums:

Specifically 2021 releases.

Juno, By Remi Wolf

So so so much fun. I’ve been following her stuff for a while and it just keeps getting better. Her first full-length album is an orgy of bizarre quips, crackling guitar and visceral basslines. It’s like a hyperactive friend wanting to make fun out of everything.  An excellent, if rough, debut. Keeping an eye on her.

Sometimes I Might Be Introvert, By Little Simz

Again, an artist I was always a big fan of, but reaching new heights with their latest album. Little Simz has the ability for hard-hitting braggadocio (“Keep it on the move, I'm never static/I go in the booth and show you magic/Got a hard drive full of classics”), catchy tenderness (“I just wanted you to call me, sayin', "Hey, sis, how's your day been?/How's your love life? Who you datin'?”), and intense vulnerability (“I'm not forgivin' for you, man, I'm forgivin' for me”). All her skills are put to use to examine her actions, history and her need to create art across an hour of soulful and glamorous instrumentals. The introspection throughout reminded me of I May Destroy You. I got the chance to see her perform on the tour for this album - just an incredible stage presence that elevated the songs to yet another level. Her support at that gig - Alewya - is also definitely worth a listen. Album of the year.

-

I’m going to try to challenge myself more with the kinds of art I’m engaging with in 2022, hoping to find more stuff like the works highlighted above - 

any recommendations?

[virtuouscandlelight]

Oh absolutely, if you are rambling about my ask I'm sorry

I just love that @sparrowofmyheart and @firstmatesharksteak both have the same basic reaction to the trait

I adore it tho, part of the charm

Don’t be sorry at all ! This actually gave me the opportunity to explain why I chose this as the biggest character flaw for her. I should be thanking you. Various characters actually have a common problem with her persistent affection — but then there’s also characters who love it.

And that’s exactly what I wanted to happen in the writing community. To see how each different character who comes into contact with her, whether it be platonic, romantic, lustful, or familial, all from you amazing people — react to how utterly devoted she is to showering someone in intense love. Like, it’s seriously AMAZING how uniquely different each reaction is toward the same flaw / blessing.

There’s characters like Jackie and Maccus who are emotionally closed off for the most part and only show love in subtle forms that feel suffocated by her light — but then there’s character portrayals who have a softer side for affection after being hardened by loneliness and bitterness that have been yearning for that touch for centuries like Hook and Barbossa. And then there’s the neutral portrayals who tolerate it and don’t really speak on it, Sparrow and Carina. And the more confused, either relenting and cautious portrayals that would probably back off if anything like Salazar and Jones.

I don’t want everyone to love her to death like she does onto everyone I want people to find it almost pitiful too I want people to really want to like her but it’s that smothering touch that turns them away

I created Eleanor this way to purposely make her a character you find it difficult to like sometimes because she’s that much of a dramatic mess.

[artificialqueens]

What's Her Name? (Gigi x Nicky) - Mina

A/N: I’m working really hard on a fairy au right now (go to @goodemornting for updates on that lmao) but in the meantime I wanted to do something different! I hope you all enjoy it :)

Your soulmates name shows up on your arm when you turn 15. Gigi’s only problem is that her’s is in French, and she doesn’t speak a word of it.

Soulmates are a pretty common thing. Realistically they shouldn’t be; even with someone’s name written on your arm, what are the odds you’re going to find them in a sea of seven and a half billion people? Not only is it unlikely, it’s improbable. What if you have a name on your arm like John Smith? How many John Smiths do you have to go through before you can find the “one and only”? Soulmates were romanticized, and frankly unnecessary in Gigi’s humble opinion. She wouldn’t have had the slightest interest in finally finding her own but it’s hard to find someone who doesn’t at least have some idea of who their soulmate is. There are a lot of tells, like what language the name is written in, what gender the name is usually assigned to, stuff like that. Probably the biggest reason why so many people in the world have managed to find their soulmates is because they care so much about it. Apparently there’s also like, a gut feeling you get, when you meet them. Like you know for a fact that they’re the one and only. She’d never experienced it herself, but according to the people in her life who had met their soulmates before, there’s just some kind of pull, like on an instinctual level. This subconscious feeling you have that they’re the right person for you. And when the names match up - well, there’s really no way to deny it, at that point.

It’s kind of a sweet notion, in a way. To know someone all your life by a set of letters and then when you finally get to meet them, that they’re the right person, and they’ve been thinking of you too. Gigi was independent sure, career driven and logical, but she would’ve been lying if she wasn’t the slightest bit interested in what her soulmate might look like, what perfume they might use, what their favorite band might be. It was drilled into her since she was younger, in her defense, but that yearning feeling that encased every bone in her body whenever she accidentally glanced down at the cursive words delicately engraved on her arm made her wish that she could just find them already, so she could focus on more important things than the love of her life.

The only problem was, that the name imprinted neatly on her arm just happened to not be written in English, but some terrible variation of French.

Truth be told, she’d started studying French ever since google translate had helpfully informed her that’s what language the name was written in. She knows it starts with N, probably ends in L or Y, but her soulmates parents must’ve decided to give their child the most unique spelt name on the planet because the letters every French person had told her that the name possessed didn’t form anything that has much of a ring to it. She really hoped it was a girl’s name, because, well, it would be pretty inconvenient for her if her soulmate was a guy (Considering that she’s, like, a lesbian, and all). But other than that there were absolutely no indicators as to what it could say.

It used to bother her a lot more when she was younger. Being seventeen and knowing absolutely no characteristics of your soulmate is both pretty rare and pretty sad, but it’d never been her primary concern. She had other things to fill her life with, like good friends and family, school, art, overpriced coffee. It was frustrating that she couldn’t read it, but also extremely easy to distract herself from. Besides, having no way of knowing what the her soulmates name was gave her plenty of time and energy to spend helping her friends with their soulmate problems, and there’s plenty of those to go around.

Gigi stirred her tea, poking her tongue out slightly from between her lips. She hated that all the tapioca pearls end up sinking to the bottom, she didn’t want to put the straw in only halfway and get a mouthful of tea, but at the same time she didn’t want to drink all the boba all at once because it’s all pooled at the bottom. There were probably more important things that she could be focusing on right now, but this was a major pet peeve of hers. She cares a whole lot about how her bubble tea is consumed! The tapioca should be dispersed evenly throughout the drink, anything else is a disgrace.

Jan looked between her own two multicolored drinks, narrowing her eyes in contemplation. She was probably trying to decide which one to drink first, but it’s still pretty funny to watch. After Gigi had given up on fiddling around with the tapioca pearls, she sipped her tea and laced her fingers together, leaning forward to look at the blonde closer.

“You could try drinking the one they gave you for free.” She remarked, Jan’s golden brown eyes sliding up to meet hers with a sheepish smile. They’d been best friends since grade school but she still got way too easily embarrassed when Gigi gave her advice, it was pretty stupid. “Since you like the other one more, right?”

“I mean,” Jan pouted again, cocking her head like an upset puppy. “I like taro and lychee evenly, I just wanted lychee this time.”

“Hmm.” Gigi hummed, chewing her lip. “I’m trying to decide if you’re an immediate satisfaction kinda girl or the kind to bide your time. Or you could alternate between the two. Get a good mix of the one you’re in the mood for and the one you’re not in the mood for to keep you going.”

“That’s pretty gross, Gigi.” The older pointed out, wearing a wry smile. “It’s weird that I even have two to begin with.”

“Business as usual for you,” she chided, taking another sip of her single strawberry flavoured tea. Jan was lucky, generally. Gigi didn’t mean that in a jealous way, it was just true, and a little unnerving, at times. The fact that whoever ordered the taro bubble tea had completely took off, prompting the worker to offer it to the blonde, wasn’t even surprising to her at this point. Jan was even lucky in the soulmate department, kinda. The name on her arm was Jacquline Cox, pretty basic, and apparently they’d already met - though Jan hadn’t given her a lot of information about the mystery woman other than something about long dark hair and Persian food.

“It makes me feel awkward,” Jan complained with a sigh. “Who comes to a cafe and orders two boba teas?

“People who are really thirsty, probably.”

“I guess you’re right,” She conceded, but she still looked apprehensive, so Gigi reached across the table and grabbed the taro drink to take a long sip of it. She wasn’t the biggest fan of taro (It’s hard to describe, it’s too earthy for her taste?) but the eyebrow raise from the older woman was funny, so it was worth the slightly unpleasant flavour. “Gigi?”

The brunette glanced up from the tea, watching as Jan’s lip curled up harshly, thinking about her next choice of words. “You said wanted to catch up today?” She asked after a moment, and Gigi buffered briefly before nodding.

“Yeah. It’s so weird not going to the same school.” Gigi smiled sadly, drawing a smiley face in the condensation of her cup, “I’m not used to not seeing you every day, but you said the new school is better, right?”

“It’s not much different than the one we went to last year,” Jan shrugged, “But it’s a good school. It’s nice going somewhere where people don’t all remember me from primary.” She chuckled, rubbing the back of her neck. “It’s how I met Jackie, so I can’t be too mad about it.”

Gigi can’t help being a little bit more attentive after she hears the name, but she’s not very expressive at the best of times, so there probably wasn’t much more than a slight shift in her expression. The shorter woman was pretty good at picking up on that stuff, though, so she wasn’t surprised at the knowing smirk smiling back it her. “You know, you could just ask if you want me to tell you about her.”

Gigi winked, leaning forward on the table and resting her head against her hands. “Tell me then, what’s Miss Jacqueline like?”

“She’s from Iran, transfer student, stupidly funny, super smart, tall,” Jan sounded wistful, smiling serenely. The expression was generally deceiving, but thankfully Gigi had a pretty good idea of how to read her, too. It comes with being best friends for so long. She chewed her boba, waving a hand to encourage the blonde to continue. “I’ve been so happy lately, she really completes me. I don’t think she likes me much yet though.”

Gigi swallowed, narrowing her eyes. “Hmmm, maybe she’s just nervous. Does she have eyes? You’re pretty attractive.” She hesitated, “Probably.”

“Thank you,” Jan giggled, “But that’s not really what I meant.” She sighed, swirling her tea with her straw. “It’s complicated.”

“I’ve got time.” She hinted, rather than say that she’d been waiting on this tea since Jan had first mentioned meeting her soulmate, and that she’d been starved of this kind of thing in her own life so she was more than happy to be hearing about it in her friends.

Gigi had never been good at any of that… romantic stuff, which people often found surprising given how confident she was normally. She didn’t read often, but on the rare occasion that she did, and she got to the romantic part of a book, she felt terribly flustered the whole time through. She had no composure. She’d just have no idea what to say, or what might be tactful to do in any situation. Sure, holding hands and cuddling sounded nice, but beyond that- things like communication, and physical gestures of affection, were intimidating. Not scary, necessarily, or unappealing (because wow Gigi loved to be kissed by g… girls…) but definitely intimidating. A large part of her was worried that when she eventually met her soulmate, she’d embarrass herself with a total lack of expertise in that area. Then again, the whole point of a soulmate is that they’re your one and only, so maybe they’d both be completely unequipped to handle what being a soulmate might entail. In general Gigi was most worried about identifying them, though. Who’s to say that they’d know English? Maybe they don’t know what the name - which was hopefully written nicely since her handwriting could be terrible at times - on their arm says either.

Jan groaned. “She’s so nice to me but she’ll never initiate it? Like if I compliment her she goes along with it otherwise it feels forced?”

Gigi scoffs, picking at her nails, the answer is fairly obvious. “It sounds like she’s doing that thing that people do in the movies.” She dipped her thumb in the puddle of water that’d formed on the table from the drips of condensation dripping off her drink. “What’s it called, playing hard to get?”

“Y’know, that does sound kinda accurate,” Jan smiled, which told Gigi that shes completely right. She’s glad for that, too, because she really just repeated platitudes. “Why don’t we talk about something else? You haven’t told me how you’ve been, recently.”

By the time they’d both finished their bubble teas (as well as the taro one in the middle of the table), they figured it’d be a good time to head home. Gigi begged the shorter woman to keep her posted on the Jackie situation, and Jan swore that she would with a roll of her eyes.

The brunette’s text came in while she was at the mall. When her phone vibrated, she stopped for a second to check the notification. It was Jan, of course, the paragraph of emojis next to her name lighting up Gigi’s lock screen.

The blonde has texted her a picture; she doesn’t recognize the subject of the photo, but she can only assume that it’s the Jackie Cox soulmate woman, or else there’d be no reason for the candid shot. She’s facing away from the camera, looking off into a cityscape, but her head is turned very slightly, and there’s a fond smile practically glowing off of her face. From what Gigi can see, her eyes are a deep wood brown, she’s freakishly tall and probably towers over Jan, and her hair is dark and curled slightly at the tips. She nods sagely, this woman and Jan would look like a cliche Pinterest board aesthetic together. The Persian woman is beaming, which probably means that the two getting along just fine- which is contrary to what Jan had told her so mayb-

Someone (or something? But she’s pretty sure it’s a someone because whatever it is is warm) collides into Gigi’s shoulder, and knocks not only her phone out of her hands, but also her feet out from under her. With an undignified sound, she watches the ground get closer to her, and then blinks in confusion when it suddenly stops roughly a foot away from her face.

“Oh my gosh, I’m sorry!” it’s a woman’s voice, Gigi thinks, and vaguely accented, but her English sounds pretty okay. When she turns her head she is accutly aware of of pale blonde hair brushing against the woman’s shoulders, the sweet scent of honeysuckle perfume, a Lana Del Rey shirt tightly hugging her chest. “I wasn’t looking where I was going, are you alright? Mon dieu, your phone..”

Huh? Gigi followed her line of sight and noticed that her phone was on the floor some ways away. As soon as her eyes landed on it, the blonde woman kneels and lifts it up delicately, wiping it off with the silky red scarf she’s wearing. It’s at that moment that it occurs to her that she’s still being held up by the other girl, and when she’s pulled to her feet, she takes a step back and chews her thumbnail, blinking at the vision before her.

This girl is fairly tall, definitely has an inch or two on Gigi. Her hair is shiny, concealed by a stylish black beret, and her eyes are sharp and seemingly all knowing. She’s remarkably pretty, Gigi’s heart beginning to get that fluttery feeling she gets whenever she makes eye contact with an unfortunately attractive girl her age. She tries to calm it down, though, because she can’t imagine that going all ditzy-highschooler on this girl will help the interaction any. It’s awkward enough as it is.

“I’m fine,” She says quietly, before the blonde girl can begin to fret about her phone. “I shouldn’t have been standing in the middle of the walkway on my phone, so it’s my fault, probably.” Gigi wipes down the wrinkles in her shirt, watching relief cross over the girl’s features. She’s looks French, the brunette concedes. Like she stylishly sell you a baguette on the side of the street, and her accent further hints at it. She’s probably around Gigi’s age as well.

“I’m happy that you aren’t mad.” The girl smiles. “But it’s still my fault.” She clears her throat, rubbing the back of her neck. “Could I make it up to you?” The way she asks it is curious, like she has some sort of other reason for asking, but Gigi holds her tongue. “I was going to this restaurant- pardon me, my name is Nicolette — are you free right now? – Not that you have to be, we could do it later – they make a really good stir-fry.”

For a pretty girl, Nicky stutters more than Gigi would’ve expected. It’s cute, charming almost, and the offer sounds great right about now. “That sounds fine.” She smiles, suddenly forgetting whatever she had come to the mall for because stir fry and French woman definitely sounded like her cup of tea.

“Perfect! I didn’t catch your name, by the way,” Nicolette - that’s a long name, maybe she could shorten it to Nicky - remarks thoughtfully, and Gigi realises that she’s a fool.

“Gigi.” She replies, and then adds, “Goode. My name is Gigi Goode.” Inwardly she scolds herself, that introduction could’ve been much smoother. For a minute she thinks she was so weird about it that Nicky has been thoroughly unsettled, but it crosses her mind after a bit of thought that the French woman’s comically widening eyes probably isn’t on account of her stuttering.

“Gigi Goode?” Echoes the girl. “Wait, uhm,” she shakes her head quickly, eyes frantically flicking between her arm and Gigi’s own, which is concealed by her coat sleeve. “Do you-” Nicky fumbled with her shirt, yanking it up with one hand. When Gigi looks down at the girl’s arm, she sees some incredibly familiar letters written, tiny hearts dotting every i. “Do you spell your name with-”

“Yeah. Yeah - yeah I do.“ The brunette interrupts, vision suddenly becoming blurry. She pulls up her own sleeve, feeling like she’s in some kind of a stupor, and holds out her forearm shakily to the taller woman. “Is this your name? I’ve never been able to read it.”

There’s a moment of silence.

“That is certainly my name,” Nicky replies, voice high pitched and frantic. “It’s spelt weird, you know, with the q and u and stuff but - merde that’s my name.”

Honestly, Gigi isn’t really capable of thinking clearly right now, but by the sounds of it she might’ve just found her soulma-

She gets knocked off her feet for second time within five minutes. This time, though, Nicky isn’t able to catch her, because though Nicky is again the reason she goes down, the blonde’s arms are occupied by being thrown tightly around Gigi’s shoulders.

“I’m so glad to meet you!” The woman bursts out, and the brunette’s face warms at the close proximity. “I came to America to look for you, did you know that? I suppose you wouldn’t, as we’ve never met before, but I- well- I’ve been searching for so long and some days I felt like I would never find you- that is a bit too much information for a first meeting, sorry, - and I’ve knocked you over again too, oh-”

“It’s okay,” Gigi dismisses quickly. “I don’t mind.” She doesn’t, though her face is definitely like a thousand degrees right now. Nicky beams at her, strands of angel blonde hair falling in front of her eyes, and Gigi swallows down a bit of flustered anxiety. Her heart is beating hard, she can hardly hear anything through it’s ringing in her ears, and Nicky can definitely feel it, but it’s not so embarrassing when she realises that the other girl’s heart is beating just as fast. At the same tempo, even, though it might be a bit presumptuous to say as much. She clears her throat a few times, trying to figure out something cool to say. “Uhm, well, how about that stir-fry then?”

Not quite, but close enough, because Nicky’s responding smile feels like a billion dollars.

[moviemagistrate]

ONCE UPON A TIME…IN HOLLYWOOD review

ONCE UPON A TIME…IN HOLLYWOOD is my favorite movie of the 2010’s. 

I’ll give you a minute to put your recently-blown mind back together.

So why do I love this movie so much? The overall response to Quentin Tarantino’s supposedly penultimate opus has been very positive if not rapturous, but I’ve seen some surprisingly lukewarm and even negative reviews, with people criticizing it for being slow, meandering, lacking in depth or *shudder* boring. Obviously the quality of any movie is subjective, as I’m quick to remind anyone who hates Michael Bay movies, but I honestly don’t understand people who dislike OUATIH. Maybe it’s a matter of expectations, because I didn’t know how to feel about the film for much of the first time I watched it either.

The year is 1969, a time of great political and cultural change in the country and in the entertainment industry. The star-driven films of yesteryear are giving way to grittier, artsier, more auteur-driven works as we primarily follow Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio), former star of a popular cowboy show whose failed attempt to start an A-list movie career has left him relying on guest spots as TV villains-of-the-week to stay afloat. This is wonderfully laid out in the opening scene where he meets casting director Marvin Schwarz (Al Pacino, easily his best role since JACK & JILL), who lays out Rick’s lowering hierarchical status (“Who’s gonna kick the shit out of you next week? How about Batman & Robin? PING. POW”), while offering him an opportunity to be a leading-man again in Italian pictures.

Tagging along is Rick’s best, and maybe only, friend Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt), Rick’s go-with-the-flow stunt-double who in the slowdown of Rick’s career has effectively become his driver and gofer, as well as Rick’s sole source of emotional support. Rick is also neighbors with Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie), the beautiful young actress and wife of then-superstar director Roman Polanski (whose inclusion in the film is minimal and handled tastefully), as she lives out her idyllic life, beloved by those around her like the ray of sunshine she was in real life. Her gated, hillside home looms over Rick’s, as he ponders aloud about how even meeting her the right way could resurrect his career.

For almost two-and-a-half hours, we follow these three characters as they just live out their lives, Rick nursing hangovers and having emotional breakdowns in front of his 8-year-old co-star on set while contemplating his future, Cliff going where the wind blows him while taking care of his adorable and highly-trained dog, and Sharon as she drives around Old Hollywood, spends time with her friends, and sneaks into a matinee showing of one of her movies, her eyes and infectious smile beaming with pride when the audience laughs at her comedic timing and cheers her martial-arts prowess.

I think it’s safe to say it’s not the film any of us were expecting from Quentin Tarantino. Having only made loud, gory, over-the-top genre pastiches for the last 15 years, you’d expect from the trailers for this to be about an actor and his sexy stunt-double getting mixed up with the Manson family before teaming up with Bruce Lee to save Sharon Tate from her horrific real-life fate, mixed with the filmmaker’s usual self-indulgent homages to films of yesteryear. While some of this is true to some extent, it’s surprisingly a much more relaxed, easygoing dramedy that follows a trio of funny, charismatic people as they just…exist, as people living in the moment instead of relics.

OUATIH is much more concerned with atmosphere, character, and capturing the feeling of a bygone era than the traditional narrative structure. It’s more effective than pretty much every nostalgia trip movie I've ever seen because you can feel Tarantino's affection for this era of his childhood bleed through every character, car, song, radio advertisement, TV show, background poster, etc. It’s through this meticulous level of detail and willingness to just hang out with these characters and take in this world that he reconstructed, Tarantino successfully resurrects the era in all its 35mm glory, but with the knowing twinge of real-world melancholy.

I guess the reason I love it so much is because the love that Tarantino has for everything and everyone in it is so tangible that it’s infectious. Watching OUATIH I honestly felt like I understood him better as both a filmmaker and as a person. He shows a level of restraint and maturity I haven’t seen since JACKIE BROWN. Even most of his trademark foot fetishizing is tasteful and subdued (I say “most” because I recall at least three close-ups of actresses’ feet that definitely made him a bit sweaty behind the camera). He’s a weird, shameless nerd with a big ego, but he’s 100% sincere about expressing his love for film and its rich history. And it’s this love, and the skill and style with which it’s expressed, that just put a big smile on my face each of the 6 (SIX) times that I’ve seen it since it came out. 

Tarantino offers a tantalizing contrast between reality and fantasy. Throughout the film, as the characters of Hollywood live in their own idyllic world, relaxing in pools or driving around in bitchin’ cars, we also see the disquieting eeriness and griminess of the Manson family. The soundtrack and accompanying old-timey commercials for tanning butter or Mug Root Beer that plays through a lot of the film is a joy to listen to, but we also hear news bulletins of the war in Vietnam or the aftermath of the Bobby Kennedy assassination. You could argue this is just to set the scene for the era, but it feels too deliberate, because even after that joyously fantastical ending, we remember that it was just a fairy tale and real life didn’t turn out as pleasantly. Tarantino’s ability to make his world and characters so meticulously detailed and lived-in works to great effect in instilling a bittersweet melancholy to this film in a way I was really taken aback by. It feels like a window into his soul, someone who yearns for the fantasy of the world he grew up in but remembering that not all good things last and not everything in your nostalgic past was good to begin with.

One beautiful, spellbinding scene is Rick and Cliff coming back from their excursion into the world of Italian filmmaking. In this montage, we see Rick, Cliff and Rick’s new Italian wife arriving at the airport and driving home before unpacking their baggage, interspersed with Sharon Tate welcoming a guest at her home and having lunch, before cutting to a series of shots of famous LA landmarks like Grauman's Chinese Theatre, Taco Bell, and Der Wienerschnitzel all meticulously resurrected in their retro glory as they light up the night. “Baby, baby, baby you’re out of time”, sings Mick Jagger as we’re watching multiple stories about people who are each embodying those words: Rick’s career, his friendship with Cliff, Sharon Tate, and Hollywood itself.

Tarantino himself feels like one of the last mainstream auteur filmmakers, as well as one of the last and biggest proponents of shooting large-budget movies on film (even Scorsese’s embraced digital now, the fantastically-talented traitor). And with the rise of streaming services, one can’t help but feel like the movie-going experience itself is also becoming obsolete, especially recently, what with theaters going to war with distributors over fucking TROLLS: WORLD TOUR, not to mention that global pandemic we’ve been having lately all but killing general audiences’ enthusiasm for the movie theater experience (Christopher Nolan’s TENET certainly didn’t help). If all these things, both real and fictional, are indeed out of time, then at least with Tarantino’s penultimate film they get one hell of a bittersweet sendoff, a great time that’s more of an Irish wake than a funeral, and it’s a film I have no issue calling a truly introspective, late-career masterpiece.

And that’s without mentioning uniformly incredible cast. Leo DiCaprio, an actor I normally don’t care too much for, gives the best and funniest performance of his career as a dependent prima donna actor clinging to his remaining fame. Brad Pitt earns the hell out of his Oscar as an embodiment of old-school masculinity and charisma with an amazing set of abs (and everything else) whose outward coolness masks his mysterious past and complete badass-ness. Margot Robbie shines in her depiction of Tate, a beacon of warmth and likability who in many ways symbolized the love and carefree attitudes of the swingin’ 60’s. I’ve heard people criticize her character for not having a lot of dialogue, but to me it feels like they’re ignoring the visual storytelling, which just gives way to them assuming the film is sexist just because the female lead isn’t constantly monologuing. Every member of the supporting cast is memorable with their own quirks and great lines, no matter their screentime.

And of course, it wouldn’t be a Tarantino joint without some truly hilarious and shocking violence, and without going into spoiler territory, the last 20 minutes delivers on this promise to such a degree that I feel comfortable calling it the best thing he’s ever done. Some may decry the climax as unnecessary or over-the-top, but the way it leads to an alternate world while subtly acknowledging what happened in the real one is cathartic beyond belief. And if you’re paying attention, every scene in the movie has been quietly building towards this finale, which to me takes away any potential of feeling meandering in the story. If you saw the movie and didn’t much care for it, I recommend giving it another watch. Having the context ahead of time makes it feel so much more rewarding, and even on the fifth watch I’m noticing clever, subtle set-ups I missed beforehand.

It’s also just super cozy and really easy to watch. The two hours and 45 minutes fly by. I could watch a 4-hour version of this.

Quentin, if you’re reading this, please don’t let your last movie be Star Trek.

[trentononhealth-blog]

16 Stay-Skinny Keys From Ladies That Never Diet

If you never ever get the results from weight loss you're searching for, there's a factor: "Diets do not work," claims Carla Heiser, a registered dietitian as well as board-certified expert in dietary and metabolic medication in Chicago. That's since restricting what you eat is a short-lived option; whereas making healthy selections a component of your way of living can assist you keep your dream weight. Right here are some pointers to live by.

We're not speaking big cuts of meat or healthy protein drinks. "A great guideline is to match a healthy protein with each meal or snack," states MaryKate 'Riordan, BS, RD. "Protein metabolizes slowly, indicating that it will maintain you feeling fuller longer."

' Riordan advises combinations like cheese with grapes and celery with peanut butter for healthy as well as loading treat options. "And, as an included benefit: Protein keeps blood sugars secure for the best fat loss!" she says.

Consume at the table.

We're all active, in between job, college, sporting activities, and everything else. Nevertheless, it's vital to sculpt some time out of your day to appreciate a sit-down meal. Not only is this time you can use to bond with your household, however taking a seat for supper is additionally great for your health and wellness: "Eating mindlessly while doing other points brings about overconsumption, and more probable than not you will certainly be making poorer food options," 'Riordan claims.

Keep healthy and balanced treats on deck.

Snacking obtains a bad rap-- however there's nothing wrong with it as long as you select foods that'll maintain your power levels skyrocketing all day long. Just make sure your only snack when you're really starving (eating out of dullness is a negative routine) and strategy ahead.

" It's easy to overeat and resort to bad food options when you are depriving come nourishment," says 'Riordan. "Making a regimen of having best snacks readily available for in between meals is a pro tip to preserving healthier meal parts and properly sustaining your body."

Completely eat your food.

Chewing is the initial part of the digestive system process, although it doesn't obtain as much attention as it should. Putting in the time to chew correctly can aid the enzymes in your saliva break down your food to ensure that it's more conveniently absorbed in your body. Chewing can also assist you avoid overindulging, which leads to weight gain.

"It takes your mind concerning 20 mins to signal that you are full, so if you take time to extensively chew your food as well as decrease nourishment, your body will have time to understand you're satiated," states 'Riordan.

Usage smaller sized plates.

Big plate = a lot more food, it's as easy as that. "Using a smaller sized plate, like a salad plate, at meals aids to preserve sections and take in less calories," states 'Riodan. This will certainly help you stay conscious of just how much food you're eating, with little to no effort.

Don't describe food as "bad."

It does not pay to refer to brownies as "bad" and kale as "excellent." In a University of Toronto research study, females who were denied of chocolate for a week experienced more yearnings as well as were more probable to consume even more delicious chocolate.

A later 2010 research confirmed the outcomes: If you inform on your own you can't have chocolate as well as try not to consider chocolate, you consume over ... delicious chocolate-- and find yourself scarfing Snickers. It connects back to thinking you're a dieting failing, which makes you feel guilty and also eat way too much because of this. For a better connection with food, ditch "poor" from your vocabulary.

Consume water.

Not just is staying hydrated vital to keeping total health (specifically when working out), but likewise occasionally, we perplex the sensation of thirst for cravings, states the Mayo Clinic "Staying moisturized is crucial for weight management and also for health overall," signed up dietitian Jackie London informed.

While it can be tempting to count on sweet beverages such as soft drink, juice, coffee with sweeteners, and alcoholic drinks, attempt to consume alcohol lots of water instead. Keep a bottle of water at your desk to aid remind you, and carry about a recyclable water bottle when on the move.

Do not lose time on diet plan foods.

Foods with low-fat or low-calorie tags sound good theoretically. The problem is that they're typically greatly processed and also high in carbs. "These will certainly transform to sugar in your body, possibly contributing to weight gain," states Heiser. What's more, firms improve these items after getting rid of fat by pumping them with sugar, salt and other ingredients.

"Women who don't diet regimen are still reading ingredient labels," claims Lori Shemek, PhD, writer of the honest book Fight FAT flammation But they do that to puncture the challenging health insurance claims sprinkled throughout the front of the package to figure out what's really in the food.

Allow on your own off the hook.

You've just consumed a cheeseburger as well as gotten rid of the fries. Even if it wasn't reflective of your healthy eating goals, forgive yourself and also proceed, assuring to eat better at the next meal. Self-compassion can lead to a far better relationship with food and also a healthier BMI, reveals brand-new research from the University of Waterloo in Canada.

Lower self-esteem might cause disordered consuming (like bingeing) that causes weight gain. "Treat yourself like you deal with a loved one: with support as well as affirmation," says Dr. Shemek.

Get your elegance remainder.

When you're active, the very first thing that takes a hit is rest. However if you intend to keep a healthy BMI, research study reveals that sleep takes leading priority. As a matter of fact, on days when you're rest denied and you have to pick in between an extra hour of shuteye or getting up early to exercise, Dr. Shemek recommends snoozing.

"Lack of rest has hormone impacts that develop weight gain and change your hunger to prefer high-calorie foods. Besides, you won't have the energy to exercise successfully," she says.

Do not treat every day as a special occasion.

Workplace doughnuts, a decadent restaurant dish, cake at a buddy's birthday party. These events take place so routinely that it's very easy to validate any type of day as splurge-worthy. While occasional deals with are must-haves, your diet plan in its entirety is what keeps your weight stable, states Heiser.

So select your treats intelligently as well as cut out the rest. Perhaps divide a crème brûlée with your spouse on day night, however hand down the cookies at the conference during the day. Or commemorate your birthday celebration with cake, however not everybody's.

Avoid diet plan soft drink.

Artificial sweeteners are controversial. While some research studies reveal that they do not affect weight, other research suggests that calorie-free drinks may trigger weight gain by boosting appetite. Dr. Shemek encourages preventing them entirely.

"Diet sodas set the mind up for desiring more sugar, and also lots of people obtain addicted to them," she claims. And also, getting a diet regimen soda can make you assume you're saving calories there, so you might too get the mac and also cheese instead of a salad.

Talk (a great deal) over dinner.

Yes, you're at the table to eat, but you're likewise there to catch up with your other diners, so make them the star of the program. The gabfest can reduce you down so you naturally eat much less.

In one study in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, researchers asked individuals to consume a bowl of ice cream in 5 or 30 minutes. Those that enjoyed it slowly excreted more of the "quit consuming" gut hormone called peptide YY as well as reported sensation fuller. So enjoy the lasagna, yet enjoy the business more.

Consume sugar intelligently.

Sugar is simply not good for you. "Your body can only take care of a lot at once. If you exaggerate it, you keep it as fat," says Heiser. However that does not suggest you must cut it out totally. "Figure out what your body can deal with," she says.

Do you really feel exhausted as well as bloated after a few cookies? Based on your response, you'll know if you must cut down. After all, food is expected to make you feel terrific-- and also any type of woman who does not diet regimen knows that.

Experiment in the cooking area.

Healthy eating is never monotonous if you're jazzing up your dishes with herbs and also spices. They amplify any meal's taste as well as change fat while still being just as pleasing, says research from the University of Colorado in Denver And including seasonings like red pepper flakes and also cayenne has been shown to boost metabolic rate, aiding you burn a few additional calories from your dish.

So include a dashboard of smoked paprika instead of butter on steamed broccoli. As opposed to simple roasted poultry breast, sprinkle on a range of dried out herbs, garlic powder, and chili flakes. Bon appetit!

Do not count calories.

There's a significant distinction in between exactly how your body utilizes 1,000 calories of processed food and also 1,000 calories of whole foods, states Heiser. Obtaining involved calorie counts could make you deny yourself calorie-dense, yet nutritious, foods like fatty fish, avocado, oils like olive as well as coconut, nuts, as well as dark chocolate.

Concentrate on filling your plate with actual foods with a focus on protein (fish, chicken, tofu), vegetables, and also a resource of healthy fat. All-around meals paired with heeding your hunger cues can maintain you at a healthy weight, she claims.

[kathrwn]

Lana Del Rey is rotting your brain

Read with footnotes here.

We hold these truths to be self-evident: Lana Del Rey does not exist. No, since she is the character performed by the artist Lizzie Grant, whose uncritical approach to American nostalgia does more to invoke the helplessness of American apocalyptica than to make us yearn for simpler times. And just as Lana does not exist, neither does any depth to the project of Miss Del Rey. Between winged eyeliner, prairie dust photo filters, and an affected croon, Lana Del Rey manages to be both campy and pretentious, and does neither particularly well. 

Looking at Lana Del Rey music videos, there are similarities which together comprise a Lana “image,” or a sort of aesthetic uniform which unites the Lana Del Rey Cinematic Universe. Often there are post-production filters which evoke old-school photographs of your mom’s cousin in the 60s, references to film and music stars of the 50s, and a misplaced fetish for the “good ol’ days” of America which turns grit into surface-level beauty. 

Thematic focus is good, especially when the singer is a construction, like Lana is. Critics are quick to notice her sharp devotion to her bit, calling her music a “Southern Californian dream world constructed out of sad girls and bad boys, manufactured melancholy and genuine glamour,” or “a blown-out Hollywood production.” Lana has described herself as a “Lolita got lost in the hood” or even a “Gangsta Nancy Sinatra” which critics have called straight “manufactured.” 

While plenty of songstresses presently play with the heights of glamour that women are expected to summit in the spotlight--Lady Gaga, Cher, and Dolly Parton come to mind instantly--many of them inject irony or camp into their performances, their outfits, their presentation. Parton in particular loves to joke about herself, famously quipping “I'm not offended by all the dumb blonde jokes because I know I'm not dumb... and I also know that I'm not blonde.” 

It undeniable to say these three women also play characters in their music--Lady Gaga is not nobility, Cher’s Twitter is filled with political commentary, Dolly Parton is, of course, not even blond. Lana also plays a character, but why is the Lana character a failure compared to the others? It’s not for want of production--many women pop stars are over-, perhaps even hyper-produced to drive the point home about the disinfectant power pop music holds over artists. Lana is also over-produced, somehow giving her music an auditory sepia tone, as though it were a film from the Golden Age of Hollywood.

But perhaps that’s it--Lana, as a character, is reactionary. She invokes a time well-past, and one well-past for good reason. The 50s and 60s were not heavenly for all, certainly not for black people, not for gay people, nor political dissidents. Lana’s music draws on themes that attempt to highlight the teeming hate and anger of midcentury America, but ultimately fail when she refers to herself as “[y]our Venice bitch” and prides herself on wearing “his favorite sundress” but with a strange sincerity. Often times, Lana infantilizes herself, referring to her lover as “Daddy,” or worrying that he is so superficial he might not love her, perhaps most famously, when she is “no longer young and beautiful.” 

That is not to say that Lana is vapid, but she has adopted the veneer of being so. She has unwittingly become a crooner for the past when her worth was tied to a sexual currency. Her uncritical love for glam and grand cinematisme is part of her pastiche act. But because she is nostalgic, and rarely, if ever, scathing when she sings about outdated courtship and relationship dynamics, she shows just how empty her actual songs are. In dying to know if she will be loved when her skin is no longer elastic, Lana never manages to find validation and closure in herself, instead tying her worth even tighter to a man she calls her “sun,” who plays with her “like a child.” Cool and normal. Newer songs follow this same trend, with cuts like “You’re beautiful and I’m insane, We’re American made” doing little to flatter herself, then listing off American inventions like “Hallmark” and “Norman Rockwell.” (The Norman Rockwell thing is especially weird when she follows it immediately with references to sex and then calling herself--again!--“your little Venice bitch.”) 

There’s nothing many Americans love more than Americana and sincerely yearning for a time they never experienced. Lana, perhaps, is the most “I was born in the wrong decade” singer to grace our airways. Her songs make love, even uneven and abusive love, the ultimate goal. Letting summer--a time that is eternal in the LDRCU and, supposedly, California--wash over her and her lovers until the cocaine and ocean consume them. 

Then, it’s no surprise this cheeky political compass places Lana in the libertarian right segment--she is made to sell, to hit some pleasure center in impressionable brains, to be a sweet spot in pop music that guarantees profits will be made from her work. Her songs are chock full of concrete imagery, which allows them to become realized in her audience's mind, rather than relying on letting the listener make their own emotional connections. There is nothing wrong with that, but it shows why the Del Rey song formula is as successful as it is soulless.

Take, for instance, her famous “Summertime Sadness.” From the red dress she wears, to the pale moonlight, to the “telephone wires above... Sizzling like a snare” we can recreate the scene in our heads. These lines are so evocative, so palpable in what they describe, it wouldn’t be hard at all to envision yourself standing in her same pair of high heels.

However, there is a marked absence of irony or self-awareness in her discography. Her sincerity is her downfall. When she sings “Let me kiss you hard in the pouring rain, You like your girls insane,” does she mean it. And she really means it. She prides herself on her lyrical tendency to degrade women. 

This is not a new criticism of Lana. She herself has said “the issue of feminism is just not an interesting concept. I’m more interested in, you know, SpaceX and Tesla, what’s going to happen with our intergalactic possibilities. Whenever people bring up feminism, I’m like, ‘God, I’m just not really that interested,'” which is proof that Lana is so massively lacking in any self-awareness that her music becomes pointless, useless, and dumb. How is being interested in SpaceX and Tesla at all incompatible with the basic philosophy of women’s liberation and complete personhood? What about the women who were unable to be astrophysicists in the past, but are now writing the algorithms that take us to those “intergalactic possibilities”? How about the droves of young women who unironically listen to this schlock, call themselves insane, and then have no clue how to be a part of a functioning, normal relationship, because they think they have to be a crazy minx? Actually, even better, what about the bat shit insane way Elon Musk treats women, like when he famously pulled his bride aside and told her he was “the alpha.” It’s just bonkers how popular Lana Del Rey’s line of thinking is. That somehow feminism is incompatible with the fetishism of science? 

Perhaps that’s where Lana Del Rey stands out. As soft rock and easy listening DJs give us “Fight Song” and “Firework” ad nauseum, we have grown weary of the female empowerment song. Any song that wasn’t “You’re So Vain,” is extraneous to the genre of girl power pop. Maybe this makes Lana appealing, if only because she shakes up our expectations. Her yearning is to be submissive, not to be dominant, a far cry from the way many chanteuses have embodied the lyrics of Patti Page’s “Conquest.”

If that were all, maybe it could be forgiven. It would be a sweet rebellion against the popular themes of the day, one that has its problems but isn’t overly regressive. Only, the more you dig, the worse it becomes. Not just the content of her lyrics, and her constant playing of the damsel, but the visuals she chooses to use in her videos and albums are beyond simply self-stylized misogyny. Lana has a nasty habit of racializing her character, trying to make simple the complex legacy of mid-century American counter culture.

For instance, in her epic three-song music video Tropico, Lana appears to us in several visions. Once as Eve, once as a sex worker, once as a woman escaped from the city to be with her lover. The first one is the color of the dream of a flower-crown-era-Tumblr aesthetic blogger, the last is similarly as harmless. But that one in the middle is an iffy exploration of the actual economic conditions of sex workers, but absurdly tone deaf in the light of her comments about feminism. And all of the above is extremely tone deaf within the LDRCU. Is she supposed to be the girlfriend of a gang member, styled in heavy eyeliner and bandanas reminiscent of cholo culture? Or is she, as is inline with much of the rest of her videography, an upper-crust, Jackie-O-esque trophy wife with a listless stare? Neither are particularly good characters to play, relying on stereotypes and hazy filters to get the point across. 

But Lana has always had an issue with understanding the fundamental issues of her middle-distance gaze into American history. Yes, it’s cool Lana has A$AP Rocky play Kennedy, that’s pretty neat; but it’s also extremely uncool to do so while adopting a Cuban-sounding name while turning up the nostalgia factor on figures who, like Kennedy, did great harm to Cuban and Cuban-Americans. The conflict she creates within her own character is glossed over by her, and much of her audience. While critical pieces of Lana do exist, many fans--including myself at times!--get lost in her Venice Beach Baddie persona, and forget her self-awareness trends in the wrong direction. 

With the release of “Norman Fucking Rockwell” on the horizon (at the time of writing), though, we’re going to have to ask ourselves--is that a normal name for an album, or are we all having a collective fever dream? 

[oxfordeliterp]

CONGRATULATIONS, CANDICE!

You have been accepted to play the role of LAUREN HASTINGS with the faceclaim of BLAKE LIVELY. Please create your account and send it to the main in the next 24 hours. We were ready to split this role into three, we truly were, but since that exceeds our abilities, we had to settle for only one and after endless deliberations, we decided to give you, Candice, the role, for you gave your Lauren such a timid, but strong voice, assertive as it was quiet and delicate, and you clearly have a strong opinion on this character, which won us over straightaway. What had most effect wasn’t at all the length, albeit a masterpiece, but the shortest, most fragile interventions, such as my personal favorite ‘too polite, too practiced’. We could quote your application and express our deep appreciation for both your writing and your understanding forever, but wouldn’t it be better if we rendezvoused on the dashboard? We’re counting the seconds, very excited for your arrival.

OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION

Name and pronouns:

CANDICE.

Age:

EIGHTEEN.

Time-zone:

CST.

Activity level:

We understand that real life comes first, but it is important for us to know that you can be online as often as possible.

Triggers:

N/A.

IN CHARACTER INFORMATION

Desired character:

Lauren Labelle Hastings.

THE TRUTH IS THIS: Girls like Lauren would never realize that attempting to squeeze one’s self into a little box labeled ‘their expectations’ was nothing more than an elegant destruction as they destroyed themselves from the inside out, annihilating the fight from within before it had even blossomed for that is what they had been trained to do. And perhaps it was all right, because girls like Lauren had nothing to fight for aside from their image. Other’s perception of them, other’s hopes and dreams and aspirations for them. Girls like Lauren were nothing more than pretty little pawns, coiffed and curled and powdered to perfection, straightened and dressed and spoken for until there was no ounce of individuality left, until they were nothing more than a piece in their parents game. Mother and father’s darling little collectable dolls left to rot on a gilded shelf only to be brought out of hiding to smile pretty for the cameras. Girls like Lauren were either never enough or far too much.  Petite but not petite enough, poised but not poised enough, pretty but not pretty enough. And girls like Lauren lived their lives striving to achieve such high expectations, having standards in which they would never meet held above them. Standards in which they would willingly break every bone in their body in order to achieve. Girls like Lauren had been born to submit, to shave off extraneous skin, alter their personality entirely in order to perfectly fit the mold. Girls like Lauren lost and lost until they had nothing worth losing left to lose. Reputation, fake friends, material belongings, what did it matter to the girls whose hearts are clogged with flowers. Withering, writhing, flowers ( daffodils, peonies, lavenders, chrysanthemums, a beautiful amalgamation of fluctuating hues adorning their tarnished pearl and spider-webbed diamond enshrouded organs drooling ichor into their bloodstream ). Girls like Lauren were overflowing with rot, disintegrating from the inside out, but no one bothers to look past the perfect porcelain exteriors. But girls like Lauren didn’t mind. Because girls of their caliber, the affluent and influential who had been weaned on borrowed attention, had come to the premature realization that Jimmy Choos were far more attainable than a parent’s love and approval. And it had ruined them. Because girls like Lauren destroyed themselves time and time again to appease others, to make up for the affection they had never received as a young girl— but girls like Lauren are beautiful, stunning, every man’s wet dream and perhaps they are empty, perhaps they seem vapid, cold, cruel, but girls like Lauren would do anything asked of them, tear down anyone who threatened their position, for the remembrance, the admiration, their chance for the spot at the top. Reputation and appearances were everything to the girls who dusted their decaying organs with luminous shades of roseate and gold to veil the rot and ruin in the hopes of perhaps one day feeling as beautiful on the inside as they appeared externally.

Born unto the bestowment ( or rather curse ) of weighted fists of gold and a florid circlet resting heavy upon the flaxen ringlets of a babe, she had been brought unto the world a goddess of grecian proportions, fallen to her morality, with a gilded organ, lain upon the cavity in her hollowed and hallowed chest, bleeding ichor thick into her veins rather than blood. Lauren, the heiress, singular in quantity, had been entitled the luminescent crown jewel of the Hastings’ high flown diadem mere moment after her arrival into the world. For before the descension, her mother had wept thick, hot tears, not of creeping melancholia but of leaking euphoria, upon the wretched arrival of the heinous and handsome infant swaddled in frayed satin and gilded gluttony rather than baby pink cotton. And as she stared at the roses blooming a meadow across the plumped cheeks of her doe-eyed daughter, Diana Hastings had decided that this little girl would be golden indeed.. A shimmering, evanescent recollection of what once could have been, for the prepossessing newborn loosened her purring jaw and wailed damnable screams of discontempt upon discerning a mother’s expectant touch. A ceaseless howling so predatory one might reckon that that Hastings’s rouge had been born half feral. A velvet-tongued wolf in sheep’s innocuous attire. Still, the juvenile,but far from tenuous, girl coerced into coiling digits around the crown,wrought with years upon years of gilded patrimony and prestige, to place atop a willowy, infantile brow—  an array of gilded florets scattering a meadow across her head. The weight upon frangible shoulders was but a noble price to pay for decorum.

The girl was a dusted antiquated paperback, a tragedy read time and time again by a myriad of admirers yearning to learn of the sun. For she had been close in resemblance, a luminous entity dipped in liquid gold and seething poetic calamity beneath a hardened shell emblazoned with familial teachings, lessons to be learnt of what it meant to be the prodigal princess. Lauren Hastings, simply freckle-faced Lo at the ripe age of ten, had spent evenings sat perched upon the lap of her mother, all skin like honey spoilt from being left out in the sun and chiffon pressed flush against sweat slick skin, porcelain cracked open by gentle hands. A soft killing of the adolescent with florid buds and girlishness pressed flush against the concave of her chest. Yet she flashed pearly incisors for her mother to wedge charm and regality between the gaps in her teeth, allowed her to wrought a careful collection of mannerisms and traits into the knobs of her spine. There was not so much as a sigh lolled from her burgundy velvet tongue as a mother’s careful hands plucked the unfavorable florets from the space between her ribs. Not so much as a moan of discontempt elicited from the depths of her once pink throat as her mouth had been opened wide, melted gold gilding her insides, her ivory bones, what little had been left after the weeding. Little girl gold was a far more tragic tale than that of little boy blue, was it not? Her sun kissed flesh had been the parchment for mother dearest’s fingers like quills, the beauteous heiress had been written into a hybrid. Half a proper lady, half something else—  something feral. Her molten radiance and scrupulous nature a haunting blend of her mother’s perennial elegance and grace, her father’s igneous ambition and rampant aristocracy, and her own quiet rebellion.

This is what it’s like. To be a dream, to be a girl, to be a Hastings.

Marble statue lounged in father’s almost baroque styled armchair sloshed aged amber liquid into a tumbler. The prodigal Hastings princess reared for the gilded age assessing the throne that would never be hers for the taking. Her mother had fed her refined teaching into the spooling grey matter, it was her father’s turn to hum florid murmurs of greatness against the curve of an ear, press a wife’s obedience against an already velvet tongue— all pink tulle and blossoming roses entwined within braided strands of flaxen hair, gloved hands and perfect little smiles from behind a tall glass of strawberry tea, white satin and cream lace and a scintillating personality to perfectly suit her scintillating beauty. But she taught herself a politician’s careful craft. All dirtied ambition and sickly sweet charm, sipping glass after crystalline glass of scotch neat and not getting drunk. From gilded girl to a golden woman bedecked in freshwater pears and that Jackie Kennedy dress lined with a preened debauchery. Amongst her peers she had been deemed pure gold. The handsome little private school princes worshipped at her red-soled feet. The wolf pack of ravenous young women had leered canine in a display of pride as she vowed her sought after loyalty to a cult-like sisterhood of debauched teens. Freckled-faced Lo had shed girlishness like a second skin as she aged into a celestial being far more electric than those who had come before her.

Gender and pronouns of the character:

CIS-FEMALE. SHE, HER.

Changes:

Try as I might, I had begun writing my original application (that I hadn’t gotten around to completing until just now) with Blake Lively in mind. There is something about her that is just so very Lauren to me. However, I’d be more than happy to take another direction should you like. For a while I had tried to imagine her as Gigi Hadid and I do still believe she’d be a good fit!

Traits:

On the surface, their dynamic was picturesque. An exquisite matriarch, all but dripping in pearls, a respectable gentleman, far too handsome and worldly for his own good, and a porcelain doll daughter, delicate and dainty. a handsome girl who, from the very moment they had been conceived, had the entire town prepossessed, hanging onto her every jaded breath.

Hailing from the merry old heart of the Upper East Side, Lauren Hastings had entered the world with only one measly burden resting upon her fragile shoulders: upholding propriety. With little to no reluctance during the early stages of her youth, Lauren was more than willing to oblige to her mother’s inexplicable demands. Cross your legs. Shoulders back, chin up. A young lady is never to be caught slouching, dear. Platinum curls meticulously fixed up with headbands, strings of pearls coiled around the child’s frail neck. Blush. Powder. Polish. Coif and curl. A mere infant coerced into posing as a beacon of maturity. Yet sustaining such exemplary behavior had derived such an admiration towards the adolescent from onlookers, fabricating an undeniable yearning to be held at the highest esteem within the doll-like girl. Praises were kissed into her milky skin, acclimations sung  to her beauty. But in a world so smothering, undisclosed lives were easily exposed and secrets had a talent for reaching every ear. But glamour and splendor in the otherwise tedious city had a certain way of persuasion.

An upbringing in a threshold as inhospitable as the Hastings’s had never been enough to nourish Lauren’s need for endearment and attention,  a falsified sense alleviation when within otherwise bleak environments had been instilled amongst the young girl from a childhood in a frigid residency. A tragic story told twice over featuring an infant incapable of garnering the desired adoration from her mother and father. Incarcerated within a cage she had built for herself from the childish greed that had begun to grow within her damaged soul. Thick and fat, terminal even. Thus, the origins of Lauren Hastings’s less than ladylike habits came to light as she strived, in multiple precarious endeavors, to attain the much coveted scrutiny she had been deprived of from a young age. All attention had been deemed good attention in Lauren’s mind, as long as people noticed her, talked about her, looked at her, she didn’t care about the technicalities. The adolescent had coined an undeniable proficiency when it came to breaking the rules, yet she sustained unabating. For mother seemed to notice when she dealt with little Richard’s boyish insults and dirt smeared hands by allowing her knuckles to meet his cheek. And father had left work to attend a parent teacher meeting when his darling, daughter  It had become an incessant game of cat and mouse, her struggle to obtain the approval of the one she admired most. Until the game had ended.

Beneath the derailed innocence and the swish of hiked up skirts, a voracious monster, famished and deprived, from fourteen years of divinity, lurked within seemingly innocuous hues. The incarnation of a hedonist had taken on a new form, one of the most dangerous kind. A teenage girl, both childish and alluring with cerulean hues and pillowed lips. A dangerous soul, a desperate mind who craved nothing more than approval yet acutely aware of how she had lost it. A tragedy in its truest form, featuring an angel, fallen from grace thriving off the false affections she derived. Wanted for her lost inhibitions, her captivating looks, the intrigue she now possessed. Welcomed into the midst of adoration’s titillating embrace for her ruined innocence. A criminal of sorts in her father’s mind. A lethal teenage girl who had grown bored with the mundanity of it all and resorted to the ruination of herself, of the person she had once been. one forged note and joint at a time never granting anyone the opportunity to learn of what had so trivially plagued her in the past. A ghastly mother unable to conjure up appraisals for anyone but her own self from the depths of her massacred soul, an absent step-father finding more solace seated at his mahogany than with his daughter, and a fatal boredom that had developed from the mere age of nine — From the joy she found in popping plastic heads off plastic bodies to the comfort she found in swallowing toxins to reduce unwarranted flaws to the sinister appeal of wreaking havoc upon her city with her very own Jamie Heather.

Lauren Hastings, reinvented had walked the puerile halls with a dismissive smirk, the girl and her flaxen curls flouncing off into another classroom, perhaps she had always been her parent’s feral nightmare, ravenous and ruthless in her girlishness. An unconventional beauty, the anti-heroine the cruel, cruel world had swallowed whole and spat back out, a pat atop the head offered in exchange for the tarnishing of what had once been picturesque. No love from mommy, no love from daddy. It’s a man eats man world, fend for yourself, pretty girl. A passing streak of brilliance, of pure radiance, untainted innocence now far from reach. No longer the proper societal darling, no longer her father’s Jacqueline Kennedy of a daughter, reality had hit harsh. Yet the puerile laugh, bellowing, and honeyed, remained, echoing throughout the chambers of harsh beings, blurred faces, all dismissed with a venomous flick of her tongue, a girl equipped with a mouth shaped like two sardonic commas as she mocks every semblance of your being. The newfound epitome of disobedience, her mother’s doting purloined, her father’s absence apparent, it had all done little to curb the young girl’s appetite for revolt. A twisted morph of life’s humor. Until Lauren found herself on a one way plane to Paris, France to complete her last year of high school and relearn the lesson of sophistication her mother had once imbued within her thick veins.

Wretched little Lauren Hastings had been born unto the curse of fire seething within her pretty little anti-heroine self, ignited amongst the depths of her bones. Perhaps it had been instilled within her from the very start, an inferno burning beneath her eyelids as luxurious women clothed in lavish blouses and adorned in dripping pearls were paraded in and out of the Hastings’s threshold, rotting beneath her bed as she cleansed the residue of decaying girlishness it had left behind. Concealment coursed roughly through her veins, at least that much was true. With knowledge shuttling through the intricate entanglement of coils incarcerated within the gray matter beneath her skull and vices spooled deep within the cavernous depths of her darkened hues, Lauren had perfected the art of optical manipulation. A darling little darling, reticent in disposition, poised in nature, mother’s little angel swathed in elegance as the two sat perched at Sunday brunch.. But it wouldn’t be long before it would come to light that there had been a sense of darkness, pure rebellion in its dirtiest form that inhibited her chest, nestled amongst that cavity where frivolous fantasies should have been lain. Thick, fat, and tangible. A volatile yearning to be something larger than life seething beneath the glacial elegance she now showed the world.

( + calculating, sophisticated, passionate,magnetic )

( -disobedient, empty, malleable,vapid )

Extras:

HISTORY OF ART ; She looked like alabaster innocence. No, Lauren Hastings looked more like decadent devastation, like obsidian ruination as a poised, polite girl, as a shell of a person haunted by a collection of hand-selected personality traits. More chiseled, marble sculpture than girl, as she stands amongst a murder of tepid bodies, amongst a room full of art. The exhibit’s prepossession paling terribly in comparison to her allure — all long, lithe limbs for days, pursed lips and big, dead and fluttering eyes, spilled wine over white silk like soiled delicacy hidden beneath the strategic placing of a mink coat. She too looked like art, like a piece painted to perfect imperfection before being mounted upon a wall. A masterpiece sentenced to an eternity of holding her grandiose pose behind burgundy velvet ropes. Look to your hearts content, but don’t touch.

Perhaps that had been the appeal. The artist’s beguiling, beauteous muse drawn to the history of art, drawn to the history of herself. For perhaps, once upon a sweet, little time, something magic, something untouchable and without spoil had thrived there, once.

“Lo, dah-ling, you’ve decided not to pursue ballet. Why?” barked the figurehead of the wolf pack, the cult of pretty, perfect private school princesses. Feral and poised, draped in grandeur, dripping diamonds and sloshing champagne as they walked in sync, teetering on the precarious precipice of sobriety. How embarrassing, how terribly high school,  she had thought, ignoring the fact that once upon a time she too stood with them. Their harsh crown jewel, all bark, all bite. But that was then.

“Yes , indeed,” too polite , too practiced.“ Simply because Paris changed me.”

Whimsical fantasies —  frivolous and childish, her mother had decided, of executing grandiose pirouettes, elegant arabesque jumps beneath shining lights, of snowy roses in her arms, at her feet, fallen away. Purloined from her frangible grasp the moment she had been sent away to be dealt with.

“My year abroad made me realize that it’s time to mature, is it not?” A low, but albeit, classy blow . “Ballet was a hobby, not an occupation nor passion. And art? I simply can’t get enough. Each piece reads like a storybook, don’t you agree?”

You can also find a few posts that had reminded me of Lauren here!

PARA SAMPLE

“The golden girl of Oxford,”

A rather exaggerated gesture, foolish in nature as a rather boyish man with charcoal hair fluttering against a curtain of lashes shouted from his perch on the hood of her polished town car. Darkened hues, rosebud lips, trench coat coiled tight around the frail figurine of a girl, a darling, darling, that much was true. Head cants, a simper cracking open the porcelain of a doll that had been placed on a shelf for far too long. His gaze flickers as a honeyed “Yes?“ slips from parted lips.

“You’re just as radiant as expected. What’s a gentleman got to do for an autograph?“ perhaps mocking, the grandeur tone and teasing expressions had been noted. Or perhaps a more serious request. She had decided to go with the latter. A hoax.

She licked her plump bottom lip, mayoral and elegant in her stance opposite him, “have you got a pen?“ shoulders squared, perhaps mimicking the stance of one seeking to intimidate, a veined hand veiled by milky flesh extended, expecting, willing to oblige should he like, poised to retract the offer should her instincts be correct.

Fleeting, a cursory glance fixated upon the fissured concrete beneath ballet slippered feet, before a ballpoint pen had been presented without hesitation. Eyebrows raised in genuine surprise, lithe fingers plucking the ink from his calloused fingertips. a sun kissed palm, colossal in comparison, had been proffered, an eccentric grin spreading across handsome features .

“Lucas,“ a cursory pause, “Lucas Lockwood.“

“I know who you are,.“ her timbre lilts and thrills, the facade of tasteful refinement, strict stipulation, exchanged for a rather girlish gaiety. a fleeting flutter against the hollows of a frigid cavity, “an autograph,“ black ink gliding across skin, hand clasped around a sinewy wrist, she finished with a certain flourish, “to you, from yours truly. My first, as a matter of fact.“

“Surprising. I thought a girl like you would get all sorts of admirers.“

“A girl like me?“ recoiling, a gelid veneer masking the waning warmth, “Enlighten me.“

“Beautiful, brilliant, gilded in every way imaginable—a girl like you. no way to really answer that wholly and  properly, is there?” An infuriating dismissal, an airy chuckle, palm wrenched from her grasp as he examined her handiwork. Her fingertips burned where they had touched his skin, oh so victorian in their sinuous movements.

She yearned for an answer far more profound than the one provided, but a beat, a cursory moment of hesitation, and the yearning had dematerialized. A deep exhale emanates from her lungs, baby-pink stained mouth bequeathing the promise of deliverance, softened hues howling of her tainted innocence, “Lucas Lockwood,“ she murmured again, “Lucas,“ a simper, sweeter than the last, “If I were to call you Luke, how would you take to that?“ she said with a fond giggle, “and if I were to ask, who are you, how would you respond to that?“ an innocuous question paired with an innocent smile, one that had perhaps lacked substance, nothing more than a mere request. ‘which do you prefer?’ but she hadn’t ever been one to speak with the absence of significance, the quiet “truly?“ added in addition to the previous statement a testimony to that .

“You decide,“ a smirk, broad shoulders shrugging .

“Is that meant to entice me, Lucas?“

Tone teetering on the precipice of mocking, lacking in the sickly sweetness that had been apparent before. Though without reluctance, Lauren, overcome with a sensation she hadn’t allowed herself to truly feel, reclaimed his hand and scrawled a neat eight-digit number beneath the cursive name ( an action she would one day come to regret ).

“Decide for me.“

A gaggle of adolescents, lacking in elegance, sear adoration against the pallor of her cheek, an unopposed talent. Benign whimpers of appraisal and discontent whispered behind a back, prematurely muscled. The harsh sting of bitterness remedied by satisfaction, Lauren tucks in her bottom lip, a feigned pout as brightened hues take in the glaring flaws each of her peers possessed.

Their saving grace? Cordelia Canfield. A joke, a hot mess, an unwarranted guest infringing on Lauren’s safe haven.

Docile lashes bat, doe - eyes glancing at the onyx-haired nuisance beneath thickly coated lashes, “Oops, sorry sweetie.” She suppresses a giggle, presses the porcelain veneer of a veined palm against babydoll lips, slick and lacquered with the cotton candy pink lipgloss she religiously applied to infantile lips. “I’m afraid your mother’s dropped you off at the wrong address. Look around,” a sharp-toothed leer, the carmine of flushed hot cheeks blossoming from the second-hand embarrassment, “this workshop is strictly for ballerinas.”

“I know, what other reason would I have to be here?“ an exuberant laugh emitted, curls a mess in what Lauren deemed the absolute worst bun she had ever laid her eyes upon. “The name’s Cordelia, by the way.”

“Fascinating,” she relied, blunt, curt, categorizing Cordelia as yet another talentless being plaguing her studio.

“And you are?”

A lacquered fingernail placed daintily upon the bow of her lip, “Shh. Please,” a quick cant of her head, a flicker of gilded eyes, then she pursed her pillowed lips, “No time for small talk. According to the clock, we haven’t got much time before the lesson begins,”

Perhaps she felt bad. Pitied the girl, even. Until she saw the sinuous fluidity of her movements, the natural agility the seemingly graceless adolescent possessed. And suddenly, all traces of sympathy had been sapped from the very core of her being and replaced with an envious rage.

A lissome frame stops, Lauren pausing, pursing lips, mirth fleeting, flickering, features once coiled into a innocent veneer of childish amusement shatters. A quaint hum slipping past parted lips, assessing. How could such awkward, gauche mannerisms prove capable of such exquisite movements. Fawn - like limbs tense, crooked teeth gnawing on the inside of her cheek.

Jealousy.

Cordelia Canfield had proven capable of provoking a grotesque jealousy within pretty little Lauren Hastings.  

“—Lauren, “ she had said at day’s end, fawn eyes batting, “ …I don’t believe I formally introduced myself earlier. It’s a pleasure.” A simper lilted babydoll lips, “See you tomorrow, Claudia.“ A purposeful mistake, perhaps it had been due to the envy blossoming within, but before she had received the chance to correct her, Lauren had left without looking back, head held high as if she hadn’t been surpassed at her very own game.

[perry-tannenbaum]

Review: The Jewish Plays Project

By:  Perry Tannenbaum

The Jewish Plays Project, currently in its ninth season, seeks to recognize and develop new plays that freshly address contemporary Jewish life. In their annual Jewish Playwriting Contest, plays that peddle stock Jewish humor or deal directly with the Shoah are graciously discouraged. Like other playwriting contests, it solicits scripts that haven’t received professional productions and welcomes playwrights of all ethnicities. Of course, an expert panel is part of the selection process, but unlike the Pulitzers, the Tonys, or the Steinberg Awards, the JPP panel only screens the hundreds of entries and winnows them down to a group of finalists.

Cunningly, JPP invites theatre communities around the country to engage with the scripts, winnow them down to a Top 3, perform the Top 3 publicly in abbreviated staged readings, and have the live audience vote for their winner. In the 2019 cycle, Charlotte is the first of seven cities to complete its participation in the process, so the ultimate winner won’t be announced until after the Palo Alto readings on May 1 – moving on to a full production in New York this September.

The seven finalist scripts were emailed to us back in November, and I can proudly say that our reading panel in Charlotte had the most listed members, edging out Houston and New York, sharing the honor for the most populous panel with Chicago. Our panelists met at the Levine Jewish Center for a dinner powwow during the last week in January. After spirited discussions of each script, we wound up choosing In Every Generation by Ali Viterbi, The Shabbos Goy by Cary Gitter, and Dox Modern Middle by Megan Pope for the public event at Gorelick Hall, the J’s theater facility.

Last year’s national winner, Summer Night with Unicorn by David Rush, had been produced by the Levine Cultural Arts department’s JStage at the Gorelick in November, so there were people in the audience – and onstage – who had experienced last year’s playoffs and/or seen its fruit. This was the third year that Charlotte had participated in the annual contest, my second year of participating on the community panel, and my first time at the competitive readings. I was a bit taken aback by the robust turnout. Word has gotten around.

Unlike the staged reading festivals presented in the past by Actor’s Theatre of Charlotte and the defunct Charlotte Rep, the Levine’s Jewish Playwriting Contest maintained its professionalism without stuffiness or excessive formality. If you were an actor, you weren’t warned against the impropriety of wearing a color or dressing for your part, but you did lay your script on a lectern as you performed. If you bought a ticket, you could grab a free nosh at the back of the hall and schmooze with your fellow cognoscenti before David Winitsky, the founder and director of JPP, moved up front to issue welcomes and thanks. Then he explained the JPP and the Contest before testing the technology that would be used for the individual playwright intros and the voting. Directing all three entries, he also read the stage directions during the readings.

Old schoolers could vote on paper ballots as God intended, or if you had a smart phone, you could text your vote to a prescribed number. My first two test votes, before and after the first play reading, were for macaroons and Bernie (who lost to Midge). While writing this review, I texted “LEAVE” to the number we had been given and received an answer, my first real assurance that my votes had counted. So the technology worked, the format for the evening had been exhilarating, and theoretically, my vote may have been decisive. Yet I did not drive home feeling that the format had been completely fair.

Gitter’s The Shabbos Goy led off the readings, probably the easiest of the three to summarize. Seth, a divorced Orthodox Jew, has a crisis of faith because he has fallen in love with Angie, an Italian-American art gallery curator who recently moved into an apartment down the hall. Not knowing she had moved in, Seth had knocked on her door, thinking he would call on his Shabbos goy to do something for him that Orthodox Jews are forbidden to do on the Sabbath – like turning on a lamp or an oven. Angie readily agrees to help this nerdy knish maker. He’s such an unlikely candidate for her affections that, when he asks her out, she doesn’t immediately grasp what he’s doing, by which time he’s apologizing.

Seth’s sister Rachel, his partner in the Lower East Side knish store, is more devoutly opposed to her brother’s wishes – she’s not Jewish! – but Sophia, Angie’s folksy grandmother, has an open mind. In the scenes excerpted for the reading, Seth (Jordan Ellis) told Angie (Karina Caporino) about his spiritual crisis. His confession went better than Fitzwilliam Darcy’s, acting as an aphrodisiac. Afterwards, Angie had a couple of heart-to-hearts with Sophia (Jackie Fishman) and Rachel (Susan Cherin Gundersheim).

  If the allusion strikes home, you’ll already know that Viterbi’s In Every Generation has something to do with Passover. Not only is the Passover seder the instrument of fulfilling the biblical commandment of telling your children about the exodus from slavery in Egypt, it is the gateway for fulfilling man’s obligation “to see himself as if he personally went out of Egypt.” Viterbi divides her play into four parts, a very apt number for Passover, and links three generations of a family across three seders, beginning with 2018 in LA, then flashing back 65 years to 1953, and then zipping forward to 2048. After three seders with this family, Viterbi thinks we’re ready to visualize her family in 1416 BCE after leaving Egypt, celebrating Passover and yearning for the Promised Land.

In the first excerpted scene, we saw all three generations gathered at the 2018 seder. Drawing most of our attention were two squabbling siblings, Yael Katz (Caporino) and her adopted Chinese older sister, Devorah (Vivian Howell Tong), who is studying to be a rabbi. It is she, therefore, who expounded on the number four in the Passover Haggadah. Their mom, Valeria (Stephanie DiPaolo), tried to keep order, but her difficulties were compounded by her octogenarian parents, Davide Levi (David Catenazzo), who coukd no longer speak due to ALS, and Paola (Fishman), who kept lapsing into Italian. Our second excerpt took us to 1953, shortly after Davide and Paola had immigrated to America. Davide could talk at that seder – smoothly enough to convince Paola that Passover might be a great time to start their squabbling unborn family.

Reduced to a bare-bones 20-minute sampling, In Every Generation had to shed its last two parts – and the English subtitles that are supposed to help us understand Paola’s Italian when she arrived in LA back in 1953. Shabbos Goy suffered to a lesser extent from Winitsky’s radical abridgement, losing one of its characters, a dashing young artist whose work Angie would love to display at her gallery. Young and sexy Blake, Angie’s arrogant quarry, expected to combine business with pleasure. Pope’s Dox Modern Middle was perhaps the most disadvantaged by Winitsky’s excerpting. It would have been helpful, for starters, if the playwright, the director, or the reading had explained what the title meant.

Amid some healing chanting and a spectral appearance of Fathermother, representing her parents and her Orthodox Jewish heritage, the excerpt began with 17-year-old Raphaela (Arella Flur) arriving in Israel. She was greeted by her Aunt Caroline (DiPaolo), a longtime Israeli who knew more about Raphaela than the girl thought. Caroline already knew, for instance, that her upfront 16-year-old neighbor Gil (Rixey Terry) would be the perfect companion to show Raphaela around – because he is gay, she is lesbian, and that’s why she was sent away from Brooklyn by her “Dox” parents. In later excerpts, we learned that there’s an LGBTQ nightclub in Jerusalem that will welcome both Gil and Raphaela, with queerness to burn. A quartet of glittery queens emerged from the audience, voguing and preening. More seriously, the club’s bartender, Pop Tart Girl, took an interest in Raphi, evoking memories of Ani (Caporino in both roles), her previous paramour back in Brooklyn.

When the votes were tallied, Winitsky announced that The Shabbos Goy had been our audience favorite. Audience members who have become attached to Seth and Angie, rooting for their romance, can go to JewishPlaysProject.org and see how Gitter’s romantic comedy is doing in the standings. With the two points that Shabbos Goy earned at the Charlotte playoffs, it is now tied with In Every Generation for first place. Next in the standings, trailing the leaders by two points, is Dox Modern Middle. As exciting as the contest was, I’d be more comfortable if the readings were extended to 40-45 minutes each. Lacking that, audiences should get a full summary of each contestant. That’s what I’m voting for.

Jewish Playwriting Contest Dramatically Involves Charlotte Audience in Selecting a New Play for a New York Production Review: The Jewish Plays Project By:  Perry Tannenbaum The Jewish Plays Project, currently in its ninth season, seeks to recognize and develop new plays that…

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Best Films of 2016

The basis of my annual list is simple, these are the films that were, for me, mesmerizing and memorable. These were the cinematic experiences that either provoked a depth of emotion and/or provided a whole lot to talk about. These are the films that I could not forget and I cannot wait to see again. After you read this year’s list, you can also find last year’s list here. 

1. Jackie 

Jackie is a painful and mesmerizing masterpiece, and it was for me, the most meaningful experience of the year. It's impossible to imagine any other actress portraying this role so perfectly; carrying the weight of a story about the inhumanity of celebrity, the chaos of grief, and the uncertainty of one's legacy. If Natalie Portman doesn't win the Oscar, she certainly deserves it. In addition to the performances, Pablo Larrain's direction, with its unrelenting close-ups, places us in the middle of our protagonist's pain; and never before has a film's musical score been so important and affective. Then if that weren't enough, to top it all off, the priestly wisdom of John Hurt's performance towards the end of the film is bittersweet but nonetheless timely and entirely appropriate. On Digital now and on DVD March 7. 

 2. Arrival 

Arrival is also a serious contender for the best film of the year. Director Denis Villeneuve (Sicario, Prisoners, Incendies) is quickly becoming one of the greatest living directors, and Amy Adams' performance is Oscar worthy. This stunning work explores the universal experience of being bound by time and yet yearning for an existence that transcends time in meaning and purpose. Even when we know how it will end we can still savour the journey. For rent and on DVD. 

3. Moonlight 

Moonlight is one of those rare films that washes over you with its truth and beauty; a cinematic experience that expands your love, understanding and empathy for others, which is no small feat. With remarkable performances across three generations, and award worthy direction and cinematography, this is one of the most moving films of the year. For rent now and on DVD February 28. 

4. Blue Jay 

What a delightful surprise! Blue Jay is nearly perfect, and one of my absolute favourite films of the year. This is a wonderful way to spend 80 minutes, with two incredible actors reuniting as high school sweethearts, rediscovering all of their shared joy and regrets. There are very few films that have ever portrayed such genuine friendship, conversation and chemistry on screen. An absolutely beautiful film. On Netflix and on DVD. 

5. Manchester by the Sea 

Manchester by the Sea is such an intricate and delicate story that it almost seems as if it was engineered for perfection. This is a sad and deeply affecting film, no doubt, but it is also filled with very funny moments, in only the way honest and true relationships can be. So rarely have we seen the experience of grief and the process of closing the book on a loved one's life on screen, but with Kenneth Lonergan's intricate and precise screenplay it is indeed done to perfection. In addition to giving us Casey Affleck's best performance to date. For rent and on DVD. 

6. Kubo and the Two Strings 

A hand crafted, animated masterpiece. A powerful story about loss and legacy, the fact that every story needs an ending. To pull all of this off in a visually stunning story for children of all ages, and with lots of laughs, is a pretty remarkable achievement! For rent and on DVD. 

7. La La Land 

Pure joy; an homage, original, and entirely necessary. Classically beautiful and infused with a chemistry, via the stars, sights and sounds, that just keeps getting better every time you watch it. In Theatres.��

8. Midnight Special 

Midnight Special might be director Jeff Nichols' masterpiece and is definitely one of the best films of the year! Mysterious, thrilling, and ripe with meaning and spiritual analogy; this family-drama-religious-sci-fi (if I can call it that) treats its audience with respect and intelligence as it allows us to fill in the gaps and find our meaning there. Complete with perfect performances, beautiful cinematography and a great musical score. For rent and on DVD. 

9. Hell or High Water 

A beautiful, perfectly paced, unpredictable, yet familiar contemporary western. A story that holds at its heart a true humanity; people and places living their lives in the real world with real economics and real relationships. A true gem and one of the best films of 2016. For rent and on DVD. 

10. The Invitation 

A masterfully crafted thriller that is creepy (in the best sense) and perfectly paced, keeping you in suspense the whole time. The performances are perfect, the cinematography is stunning, and the story is surprisingly thoughtful; all of this and an ending to remember. This was a film I could not forget and had to watch twice. On Netflix and on DVD. 

   Honourable Mentions (alphabetically):

10 Cloverfield Lane: This was the most thrilling and unpredictable film of 2016! At the center of it is John Goodman's best performance to date, a way we've never seen him before; but it's the sheer brilliance of how the film manages its mystery that makes it an unforgettable experience. On Netflix and on DVD. 

13 Hours: It's been at least eleven years (if not more) since Michael Bay has made a decent movie, so it's nice to know that with a limited budget and a story that requires restraint, he can actually still pull it off. On Netflix and on DVD. 

Deepwater Horizon: This is a film that must be seen and experienced! A powerful and humbling story of survival; revealing the sacrifice and suffering required of human heroics. For rent and on DVD. 

Fences: A devastatingly beautiful film, not because of its visuals but because of it's words. This is a talky through and through but with the performances of Denzel, Viola and their supporting cast, Fences is a story that carries a weight of reality rarely seen. Whether we're taking our turn as recipients or perpetuating our family's legacy (curses, blessings and all), when we take our turn wrestling with death we will not escape the equality of judgment/grace that awaits us all. On Digital now and on DVD March 14.

Hacksaw Ridge: Although there are many captivating images throughout this film, none of them glorify the horrors of war. These are scenes of hell, the very worst of our humanity, and yet in the midst of them, rather than heroics, a humility is evoked. A humble and tested truth that, your faith need not be complicated to have an everlasting impact on the world. Almost every other great war film elevates the power of the human spirit, our ability to sacrifice ourselves for others, but this film keeps the motivations of this man's actions in focus. Rather than pacifism being an intellectual debate of hypotheticals this story perfectly incarnates the conviction of non-violence many followers of Jesus Christ hold. For rent and on DVD.

Hidden Figures: A classically structured story that is immeasurably effective due to its powerhouse performances and timeliness. Though Octavia Spencer is always deserving of award recognition, I wish Taraji P. Henson had also been nominated for an Oscar. Nevertheless, this is an important true story and I am grateful to have shared it with my two daughters. In Theatres and on DVD April 11.

Indignation: Based on the sharp and subtle provocation of Philip Roth’s book, this incredible film carries with it Oscar worthy performances and some of the best screenwriting of the year. For rent and on DVD.  

The Meddler: An absolutely beautiful and endearing film about family, grief and loss. There are lots of laughs in this movie but it's not a comedy, because Susan Sarandon's performance is so deeply authentic and heartfelt. In fact the whole cast is rather remarkable (especially Rose Byrne as the daughter), but it's the happy and heartbreaking moments that make this film so meaningful. On Netflix and on DVD. 

Sing Street: One of the most beloved cinematic experiences of the last decade. This is an absolutely beautiful and joyous film. Incredible music and performances, all from the mind of John Carney, director of Once and Begin Again. On Netflix and on DVD. 

Sleeping Giant: This is a remarkable Canadian film that has been overlooked by many. Most stories about youth are nostalgic commentaries but Sleeping Giant is authentic, honest and incarnational. For rent and on DVD.