The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
4 — Wednesday, March 30, 2022
IN THIS WORLD of expectations, schedules,
meticulously crafted five-year plans and a deep
underlying pressure to have everything figured
out, a surprise can be refreshing, terrifying, the
absolute worst or the one thing you needed all
along. Surprises have been the key to my life, simul-
taneously adding the sprinkles of delight I need to
get through the ceaseless repetition of existence
while also ripping any semblance of control out
from under me like an amateur magician pulling
a tablecloth from under fine china (and leaving me
to pick up the pieces). Simply put, I wouldn’t be the
person I am today without the surprises I’ve expe-
rienced along the way. So of course, I wanted to
hear about what surprises mean to the thoughtful,
lovely and sometimes delightfully unhinged writ-
ers here at the Arts section of The Michigan Daily.
As I gave them a false pitch for this B-Side (The
Taylor Swift B-Side) before revealing the true
theme, watching their faces morph from disgust
to relief to betrayal, I knew they wouldn’t skip the
https://files.slack.com/files-pri/T01S9SM6UAV-
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I AVOIDED DOWNLOADING TikTok for
as long as I could. I watched as friends got
drawn in, downloading it from the App Store
and ending up glued to their phone for hours,
as the app scrolled through short-length vid-
eos automatically. I never had Vine or Musi-
cal.ly, never cared about that side of Gen Z’s
pop culture. I never saw the appeal of the
short video format. Who could effectively
tell stories in so brief a time? What mean-
ingful ideas and thoughts could come from
it? I decided as it grew in popularity that I
would not download TikTok and waste my
time watching mindlessly humorous videos
of people I didn’t know.
I finally caved in to the social pressure in
January 2020 when a friend convinced me to
get the app on the way back from a Broadway
performance. Normally after seeing a show,
I would spend hours examining the details
from scenic transitions to the melody of a
single lyric. That night I only spent a brief
amount of time discussing the show, the
musical “Jagged Little Pill,” with my friend.
Once we got back to where we were staying
on the trip, I sunk into the couch, sucked in
by the TikTok pull.
So isn’t it ironic that the very app that
pulled me away from thinking about theatre
two years ago has ended up being a huge
force in theatre’s development since the start
of the COVID-19 pandemic? Somehow an app
with only a 60-second (and since July 2021,
three-minute) video time limit has become
a force in the development of theatre works.
On Aug. 10, 2021, this development began
with the post of a video by Emily Jacobsen.
Jacobsen created an original audio for the
app of herself singing a self-deemed “love
ballad” to the rat Remy, the leading character
in the 2007 fan-favorite Disney movie “Rata-
touille.” As of March 22, 2022, this video has
1.2 million views and 160.5 thousand likes.
But the story didn’t stop after just one video.
On Oct. 19 of that year, Daniel Mertzlufft
added onto Jacobsen’s original tune in a new
video. By turning it into what he imagined
as an Act Two finale song for a Disney-style
Broadway musical, theatremakers began to
see this as a project they could piece togeth-
er note by note, costume sketch by costume
sketch.
Disney Theatrical Group, the producing
agency wing of the Walt Disney Company, is
responsible for live performances, plays and
musicals. To this day they have produced
over 15 productions, including incredibly
successful adaptations of animated movies
such as “Beauty and the Beast,” “The Lion
King” and “Aladdin.” The rise of Disney on
Broadway brought about some amazing art
and important steps forward in the Broad-
way industry, particularly through “The
Lion King.” Known for its use of innovative
puppetry to portray the animal characters,
the broadway adaptation took home six Tony
Awards the year it opened in 1997. Director
Julie Taymor became the first woman in the
history of the award show to win in the Best
Direction of a Musical category. The musical
still plays to Broadway audiences today, with
over 9,000 performances under its belt.
The Surprise B-Side
Musical theatre magic happens on a screen too,
not just onstage
Why I hate classic
rom-com endings
ROM-COMS ARE THE film
equivalent of comfort foods. They
may not be everyone’s cup of tea,
but their predictable nature and
formulaic plots lend themselves
well to staying within the bounds
of audience expectations. At the
end of the day you’ll laugh, cry and
sit with the heart-warming feeling
of a love story turning out precisely
as it should. Now I’m not really a
huge fan of the romantic comedy
genre, but I’ve begun to realize that
it’s not so much the romance that
I’m averse to, but the predictabil-
ity. Nearly all of the great romantic
comedies that have stayed with me
are the ones that defy these sorts
of expectations, wherein the film’s
final moments, they simply don’t
end up together.
To clarify, I’m not here to rant
about the failings of the modern-
day rom-com or shame cheesy
romance movie lovers, because
I promise you I get the appeal.
I understand the familiarity of
watching a movie you know like the
back of your hand, of drifting off on
the couch and waking up an hour
later without having missed all
that much. Evidently, the romance
genre excels in this domain of
expected endings; most of us have
experienced crying our hearts out
and sitting with a warm contented
feeling in our chest at the sight of
the quintessential climactic airport
scene or something as wholeheart-
edly profound as “a girl standing
in front of a boy asking him to love
her.”
There’s something inherently
special to me when a rom-com
strays from this path and actively
subverts the age-old, tried and
true formula. It’s a bold move, one
that the writers must recognize
as being instinctually upsetting
to much of its audience. But when
it’s a well-thought-out decision, it
almost always feels right, one that
I would argue pulls at your heart-
strings even more than the cop-out
of a last-second death or uncharac-
teristic proclamation of love. After
watching and reading romance
after romance that trains you to put
your full faith in the inevitable fate
of the Hollywood ending and the
way things were supposed to turn
out, I find myself drawn to the ones
that wreak havoc on nearly all of
those preconceived notions and let
our sorely misplaced projections of
romance down.
Some of my earliest movie
memories originate from watching
Audrey Hepburn (“My Fair Lady”)
gracefully glide across the screen,
singing about how “the rain in
Spain stays mainly in the plain.” In
the ’50s classic “Roman Holiday,”
Hepburn as Princess Ann plays
hooky for the day with an Ameri-
can reporter running around the
city of Rome. As a kid, I could never
fully appreciate the final scene,
the bittersweet longing apparent
in her fleeting remark of “Rome,
by all means Rome” as she locks
eyes with Gregory Peck (“To Kill a
Mockingbird”) in the crowd.
At this moment, we’re thrust
back into reality as there’s simply no
feasible way for it to work out. She’s
European royalty, he’s an American
journalist, but the omnipotent cin-
ematic hand guiding their encoun-
ters innocently kindles that inkling
of hope that it could possibly turn
out any other way. To this day I still
can’t quite shake the resolve of the
film’s ending shot of Peck walking
away, a sense of finality seeping
into the echoes of his very foot-
steps. It’s a perfect ending to a per-
fect movie and more importantly,
it’s befitting to the fleeting nature
of their relationship and gives Ann
the capacity to exist outside of the
confines of their love story.
With “Roman Holiday,” the end-
ing is tinged with sadness, but is
ultimately pragmatic. I cannot say
the same for the rollercoaster that
is “The Philadelphia Story.” Anoth-
er early blueprint in the rom-com
field, Tracy Lord (Katherine Hep-
burn, “Bringing Up Baby”) spends
the day before her wedding with
undercover reporter Mike (James
Stewart, “It’s a Wonderful Life”).
All the signs point to a Mike and
Tracy endgame, yet in quite liter-
ally the last 30 seconds of the film
she not only jilts her fiancé at the
altar, but turns down runner-up
Mike too. In a surprise upset by all
accounts, she remarries her ex-hus-
band Dexter (Cary Grant, “North
by Northwest”) and so concludes
a jaw-dropping resolution to a love
quadrilateral the audience wasn’t
even aware of.
Beyond the shock factor, the end-
ing works so brilliantly because it
not only leaves viewers in a state of
laughable bewilderment, but aligns
with Tracy’s character and flighty
nature. Who she marries ultimately
matters very little. What does mat-
ter is her desire to not be placed
upon a pedestal and perceived as a
goddess or a queen, which comes to
fruition in those final moments as
she proclaims to feel “like a human
being!” The ending scene preserves
rather than detracts from the con-
sistency of her characterization
and establishes the significance of
having agency over her own love
life, charismatic Jimmy Stewart be
damned.
But Tracy’s capricious tenden-
cies have got nothing on the icon
that is Holly Golightly (Audrey
Hepburn, “My Fair Lady”) of
“Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” If you’ve
seen it, you’re probably shaking
your head at the thought of the
movie’s ending being surprising
in the slightest, because it’s pretty
much your standard heartfelt pro-
fession of love and a proposal, fol-
lowed by a dramatic kiss in the rain
(they weren’t exactly reinventing
the wheel here). The film is adapted
from Truman Capote’s short story
of the same name, of which there
are some minor variations that
attest to a far from G-rated inter-
pretation of Holly. Yet the main
difference is in the story’s close, in
which Holly leaves her cat behind,
flies off to South America and is
never seen by the protagonist again.
Now hear me out: that is how the
film should have ended. The forced
Hollywood ending manifested a
romance where there wasn’t one
and wholly disregarded Holly as a
character. Even in the ending taxi
scene, her dialogue is line-for-line
from the original text as she repeat-
edly states her desire to not be caged
in by a life of personal attachments.
But in the film, the protagonist’s
response twists her words, caus-
ing the audience to read her, albeit
unpredictable and careless, actions
as a cry for help; as if love was a void
in her heart in need of fixing, that
she was somehow in need of fixing.
Capote’s Holly is an undoubtedly
damaged and self-centered per-
son; confining the magnificence
that is Hepburn’s performance of a
woman of her own devices to that of
a helpless heroine is why we sit and
watch rom-coms earnestly expect-
ing the female lead to compromise
herself, her sense of independence
and agency, for the sake of a love
story that renders her second-class
to the male protagonist’s newfound
attachment to her.
I’ll always love “Breakfast at
Tiffany’s,” but I’ll never be able to
content myself with its unchar-
acteristically
over-romanticized
ending. Even if it was done purely
as an appeal to mass audiences at
the time, it’s a dishonor to Capote’s
work: an examination of a spectac-
ularly selfish female character that
loves and cares for no one but her-
self. And sure, even in the original
we’re delimited to viewing Holly
through the lens of a male narra-
tor’s platonic love for her, but for
all the iconic kiss in the rain does to
Holly, she might as well have been
hit by that taxi. It’s the effective
death of her character and all that
she stands for. Because in terms of
the romantic female lead’s worth,
that’s all the viewers care about,
right? Married or dead?
A similar line of thought mani-
fests in the holy grail of indie rom-
coms, “(500) Days of Summer.”
It’s questionable as to whether the
ending can even be considered a
“surprise,” as it is made abundant-
ly clear from the start that “This
is not a love story.” When I first
watched this I thought it was the
greatest thing I’d ever seen (what
16-year-old didn’t, honestly), but
I retrospectively and quite gen-
erously view it as a take on the
fragile “manic pixie dream girl”
fantasy too often projected upon
female love interests. It’s hard not
to align yourself with Tom (Joseph
Gordon-Levitt,
“Inception”),
to
feel your heart shatter as he visu-
ally plays out his expectations, or
rather our expectations of how
their interactions should play out.
The intricately anachronistic time-
line also aids in Tom’s faulty mem-
ory of events that culminate in the
genuine shock of Summer (Zooey
Deschanel, “New Girl”) marrying
someone else.
Design by Francie Ahrens
SARAH RAHMAN
Senior Arts Editor
SERENA IRANI
Daily Arts Writer
puzzle by sudokusnydictation.com
By Seth Bisen-Hersh
©2022 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
03/30/22
Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle
Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis
03/30/22
ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:
Release Date: Wednesday, March 30, 2022
ACROSS
1 Yoga aid that
helps prevent
slipping
4 Weather report
stats
8 Recipe amts.
13 In the past
14 Sale rack abbr.
“Blue __”
17 “Misery” co-star
19 Like most tennis
shots
20 In full view
21 “My turn to bat”
23 Cruise with a big
price tag
24 Equine control
25 Merged comm.
giant
26 On
28 Versatile award-
winning Indian
film star known
by his initials
“SRK”
33 Starting gun
36 Move slightly ...
like a mouse?
37 Hullabaloo
38 Cut (off)
39 Water source
41 Pachuca
pronoun
42 URL ender
43 Cycle starter
44 Red letters in a
dark theater
46 Fly over Africa
48 Oscar-nominated
actress for “Paper
Moon” and
“Blazing Saddles”
51 Ultimatum word
52 Big noise
53 “Cornflake Girl”
singer Tori
57 Obama __
58 Spoken
60 Food recall cause
61 Cop to
63 Swindler ... or,
phonetically, what
each of three
puzzle answers
is?
instrument
66 Celebrity chef
Eddie
67 Yellow or Red
follower
69 Places to relax
70 Explosive letters
DOWN
2 Tequila source
3 “My Cousin
Vinny” Oscar
winner Marisa
4 Suffix with craigs
5 “LOTR” menace
6 Eerie apparition
7 Two-__: fastballs
named for the
grip used to
throw them
8 Undetermined:
Abbr.
Castle”
composer Béla
10 Toady
11 Dickinson work
12 South of France?
15 Animal that
sounds fresh
18 Dadaist Max
22 India neighbor
25 Star systems
27 Wallop
29 Monopoly
miniatures
30 Sport-__: off-road
vehicle
31 Fruit drinks
32 A or E, but not I,
O or U
surprise
34 New Rochelle
college
35 Doctor Octopus
foe
45 Boring
47 Sign into law
49 Friend of Jerry
and George
50 Abduct
54 Damp
55 Elizabeth of
“WandaVision”
56 Occupy, as a
table
57 Actress Falco
59 German gripe
60 Bits of work
61 Fitting
62 Two-year-old,
say
scoreboards
SUDOKU
WHISPER
“No more rain.”
WHISPER
By Tim D’Alfonso
©2022 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
03/23/22
Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle
Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis
03/23/22
ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:
Release Date: Wednesday, March 23, 2022
ACROSS
1 Alaskan islander
6 Bar flier
10 Early garden spot
14 Like the yolk in
Eggs Benedict
15 MLB Triple
Crown category
16 Govern
17 42-U.S.-gallon
containers
20 “Try this”
21 Flying geese
formation
22 Hall partner
23 Tries to make a
point?
25 Tilt
27 Cocktail with a
splash of olive
juice
32 Sierra Nevada
resort
35 Places for hoops,
maybe
36 Crime boss
37 Eagerly excited
38 “The Martian” star
Matt
40 Word with print
or note
41 Word of dissent
42 Late NBA legend,
familiarly
43 Mopey states
44 “Maus” is the
only one to win
a Pulitzer Prize
(1992)
48 Caps, e.g.
area
52 Corrective
surgery acronym
55 Took a load off
“__ Leaving
Home”
58 Music industry
advisory ... and
a warning that
may result from
misinterpreting
theme?
62 Doorstep
delivery, at
times?
63 October
birthstone
64 Main line
brothers
67 Fishing tool
DOWN
1 Principal
2 Fishing gear
3 Habituate
4 Expected loser
5 Sheridan of
“Ready Player
One”
6 Most arid
7 Fit
8 Bone in the torso
9 Screeners at
LAX
10 Not on target
11 Daft Punk, for
one
12 Fashion
magazine since
1945
13 Condition suffix
18 One more time
19 Stadium sounds
24 Contend
25 ROFL cousin
26 Bring in
28 Coastal Arab
country
29 One on a fan
site
30 Cozy spot
32 Little kick
33 Petri dish filler
34 Georgetown
athlete
38 “Just __!”
39 Basics
42 Bold-sounding
trouser material
43 Coral __
45 City famous for
cheesesteaks,
informally
46 Soothsayer
47 Kill, as a bill
50 “Voilà!”
51 Gossip
spreader
52 “Master of
None” Emmy-
winning writer
Waithe
53 Nerve cell part
54 Hustled
55 Guess
57 Common flag
feature
59 Corn throwaway
60 Pub pick
Grammy-winning
rapper
MALLORY EDGELL
Daily Arts Writer
Read more at MichiganDaily.com
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