Y Kant Tori Rite Musicals

October 14, 2008 6:35 PM

"I don't want to be writing for a fuddy-duddy audience." Tori Amos follows up this year's Comic Book Tattoo (a graphic novel adaptation of 51 of her songs) with a musical version of George MacDonald's The Light Princess for the Royal National Theatre.
posted by crossoverman (13 comments total)

The Light Princess is wonderful, but my first reaction is: so not feminist! The article says she's getting rid of the villainous witch, but if I recall correctly, the plot hinges on a prince saving the princess's life and demanding that she, like, hand-feed him grapes.
posted by prefpara at 6:45 PM on October 14, 2008

I think one of the hardest challenges of feminism is allowing for the dynamic of dominant male-submissive female in a particular instance when its consensual and what both people desire. there is definitely something wrong with a society that believes all women should hand-feed grapes to all men, but there is nothing wrong with one woman desiring to hand-feed grapes to one man.
posted by supermedusa at 7:32 PM on October 14, 2008 [8 favorites]

also, great post title!
posted by supermedusa at 7:33 PM on October 14, 2008

Does it have the usual amount of crazy. Because I expect that, and I'll be disappointed if it's too lucid.
posted by rokusan at 7:38 PM on October 14, 2008

Wait, my comment was dumb. His hands are busy plugging the hole in the lake, so he can't feed himself. I misremembered. Sorry.

supermedusa, I agree. There's nothing anti-feminist about a heterosexual couple in which the male is dominant. However, if we're dealing with a fairy tale (a story about characters who are archetypes rather than realistic individuals), the analysis may not be so simple.
posted by prefpara at 8:12 PM on October 14, 2008

I cannot continue to read any article that begins with Tori Amos saying, "There's nothing wrong with Disney." Sssssssnark attack!
posted by nosila at 8:42 PM on October 14, 2008

"I don't want to be writing for a fuddy-duddy audience."

it's a little late in your career to say that, isn't it, tori?
posted by pyramid termite at 8:43 PM on October 14, 2008

Sure, Prefpara--Bring the dykes into it.
posted by applemeat at 8:43 PM on October 14, 2008

I'm impressed to see this on the blue, since as a long-time fan, I've been following the progress of this thing for a while. Seems like it's actually happening, though. Whether it will be another embarassment that makes me want to qualify my Tori appreciation, I do not yet know.
posted by limnrix at 10:02 PM on October 14, 2008

With albums as conceptually daring as 1991's apiary/gnostic gospels-informed The Beekeeper behind her one can see why Amos would need a fresh challenge

Wait, what? That album came out in 2005...

My own Tori fandom story is pretty standard: loved, loved, loved her in late 1993 when a friend played a bootleg of Little Earthquakes, I couldn't stop replaying it. Bought UtP the day it came out, tried (but failed) to see her in Seattle during the Dew Drop Inn tour, but gradually drifted away from "my favorite artist" to "she was good, back when". She allegedly left that awful techno/rock inspired bullshit with stuff like Scarlett's Walk and the Beekeeper, but the magic was lost. The way she could turn a musical phrase was gone; now it was bland and uninspired.

I happened to like the "girl and her piano" schtick, thank you very much, and not because of or in spite of her barely lucid lyrics. The real vulnerability in the notes themselves, and not the manufactured kind, was gone.
posted by hincandenza at 2:52 AM on October 15, 2008 [1 favorite]

I sort of drifted away from Tori, too. That said, her shows still rank of some of the best I've been lucky enough to have seen/heard/experienced.
posted by Thorzdad at 4:15 AM on October 15, 2008 [1 favorite]

I, for one, embrace my Tori fandom and only hope that the production would make its way stateside for me to see.
posted by zizzle at 10:08 AM on October 15, 2008

As Thorzdad says, she's pretty incredible live, yes. I did expect it, but there you go. She can channel Jerry Lee Lewis when she wants to.
posted by rokusan at 2:50 PM on October 15, 2008