Saturday 2 August 2008

Day Fifteen - Breaking Dawn

Well, for those lucky ones in the US of A, Breaking Dawn was released at midnight last night. So a good lot have you have probably finished it already.
Well, lucky for some. Us lot on this side of the pond are doomed to wait until Monday, but it's okay, because we have our musical plotting to distract us!

This post is mainly to announce our new livejournal, run by our lovely "Esme". Take a look (if you're also waiting until Monday or can tear yourself away from those new white pages)

http://community.livejournal.com/twilightmusical

I won't be posting again until Tuesday, so to all on both sides of the pond, happy reading!

Laura

Thursday 31 July 2008

Day Thirteen - What's In A Name?

Oooh, unlucky number thirteen. Perhaps predictably, where I am now, I can see rain lashing down outside from the window.
Though, there's not really anything special about that. It never really stops raining here, hence why we think it would be a good Forks.
So, in the last almost-fornight, we've got... practically nothing done. It's shameful, I know, and we probably do need to put some more work into it - but on the upside, we have written plot summaries, and interview questions for us cast lot.
Not that we have the entire cast sorted out, of course.
At the minute, I'm thinking of clothes and costumes. It's a funny thing to be thinking on, at this stage, but seeing as at the minute most of/the entire cast is made up of girls (at the minute, I've been billed as Edward - which is strange because the only characteristics I share with Edward are that I'm pale and a bit stubborn, but the casting process was a little... unorthodox), and so there's going to be a bit of gender confusion. Therefore, the girls playing guys need to dress reasonably like guys.
But aside from that, I know that clothes give off impressions to other people, so I started thinking on colour symbology, and what colours (and clothes) would suit each character.
It may be obvious, but for Rosalie, I like the colour red. Red is the colour of passion, love, life, aggression - and it increases the heart rate of those who see it.
Just like Rosalie =]
Or for Alice, purple. Purple for mystery, scrying, creativity, and delicacy. Says it all, really.

One of the other things I've been looking into are the symbology behind the names of the characters. (I know, I have too much time on my hands and no life). I could excuse this as trying to understand the characters more, but that's a lie. I just like names. My friends have had detailed descriptions of what their names (both fore- and surnames) mean (the ones who asked, anyway). I could give you reams of information on your name, if you asked. But from the first time I read Twilight, a very long time ago, I noticed the characters names, and some little things about them...
So, I thought I'd put my "findings" here (*repeats* Yeah, I have too much time on my hands, but maybe some people will find it interesting)...

Isabella (Bella) Marie Swan - This one is quite obvious to anyone who has studied a Romance language (French, Italian, etc). Bella, as its own name, means "beautiful" in Italian and Spanish. I think that this fits Bella because even though, she sees herself as plain - well, Edward definitely thinks she's beautiful. Isabella itself is the Italian for Elizabeth - both meaning "God is my oath". Doesn't really help much in Bella's case. I've never heard her mention an affinity for Christianity.
Marie is the French for "Mary", which means "sea of bitterness". Bit depressing, really, but hey, again, this kind of doesn't apply. Bella isn't usually bitter, whatever else she may be.
Her surname is Swan, which I found quite an amusing bit of irony. You've all heard the phrase "as graceful as a swan". As anyone who has read the book knows, Bella's ... grace in movement is definitely up for debate.

Edward Anthony Masen Cullen - Okay, kind of a long name. But still, some of it works. Edward, an English name, means "wealthy guardian". Now, we all know about the wealth of the Cullens, but the bit that really interested me was "guardian". In a way, Edward is Bella's guardian - not legally, obviously, but he definitely looks after her, as has been shown on many occasions (not least the famous "car accident", which is only one of many examples I could name). He keeps her safe - the way a guardian should.
According to nearly all of the sources I use for name meanings, there is no known meaning for Anthony. If anyone wants to, they can create a meaning for it, lol.
Masen means "stone worker". Relating this to Edward is kind of difficult, unless you go for the obvious (and frequent) comparisons to Edward's skin/body being compared to marble, or granite. Or other such.
Cullen is a Gaelic surname, and it means "holly". Again, not really much use.

Jacob Black - This fits in with both colour and name symbology! This was the name that jumped out at me on first reading and prompted me to think about the other characters' names. Jacob comes from the Latin Jacobus, which means "supplanter". Jacob has been described as Edward's 'foil' or 'enemy' or any other various words, but in my mind, Jacob is the potential supplanter of Edward. Well, so he tries to be. I can't see him replacing Edward in Bella's affections any time soon (and I am of the Team Jacob school of thought), but he is definitely trying to supplant Edward - and for a while, in New Moon, he almost suceeded. So Jacob is in both name and deed, a supplanter.
Black can mean lots of things. As a surname, it came from a name used for people with - guess it - black hair. I don't think I need to point out how this relates to Jacob. But as a colour, black means many things. Absence (see the end of Eclipse and first chapter of Breaking Dawn), power (Bella's broken fist), evil (ask any Team Edward member, lol!), sadness (well, he causes Bella a lot of it, doesn't he?) and anarcism (he does try his best to cause chaos for Bella and Edward, doesn't he?).

Mary Alice (Alice) Brandon Cullen - again, another long name, but this is a difficult one to relate the name to the character. Mary, as stated before, means "sea of bitterness" - and to my mind, Alice is a remarkably non-bitter person. Alice means "of noble kin" - and even without taking it in a literal sense, that's also quite difficult. As is "Brandon" - "of the gorse hill." Any suggestions?

Carlisle Cullen - not much interesting behind-the-name meaning here. Carlisle can mean two things, "fort" (from something in Welsh), or "city of Lugovalos" (a Roman city; meaning of Scottish origin). I can't really make much of that, lol. Same with the surname.

Esme Cullen - Esme comes from the French for "loved". In the book (and in real life), everyone seems to love Esme. She's a very beloved figure; the motherly one. I think this suits her quite well.

Emmett Cullen - Emmett can mean one of several things, but the meaning I liked for Emmett - although it's hideously obvious - is "powerful", from the old German. One that made me laugh is "ant", from Old English. Imagine it. An ant with Kellan Lutz's head. I'd make a picture if my photoshop wasn't broken.

Rosalie Lillian Hale - Rosalie means - obviously - "rose". I liked this because Rosalie is said to be an extremely beautiful person, and of course roses are extremely beautiful flowers. And often red (see above =]). Lillian means "lily". Very floral girl, this one.
Hale means "moor". It's kind of hard to relate that one, too.

Jasper Hale - Jasper means "treasurer". Nothing at all to do with the character, but it's such a nice name.

Okay, so now that I've proved myself as a complete and utter freak with no life, onto the musical news.

Our bebo is up and running, and fast attracting members from all over the world - http://twilightmusical.bebo.com/. Take a look, if you're interested. We'll also soon be getting a livejournal, so watch this space...

Laura xo

P.S. Thanks to Jay for the better post name =)

Friday 18 July 2008

Day One - The Beginning.

Okay, so this is the start of it all. Today, Jay and I are attempting to summarise the chapters for this. I think I have to stress the attempting part of this. It may take a while - although we are up to Chapter 10 (Interrogations) already, thanks to the lovely Jay. We still need to get the rest of the... ahem... "cast" to veto everything.

A few months ago, at our local bus station, we were (as Twilight readers often do) discussing the books, and songs that (as music lovers often do) we had listened to and thought of while reading. Things spiralled... a lot, and by the time the buses came, we'd hit on the idea of making a musical.
That's something you should know. If there's one thing we can all agree on, it's that we love musicals (e.g. at this minute, RENT is playing while I'm writing).
Of course, the chances of Twilight being made into a musical are really slim. I doubt very many people would agree to it; judging from some of the fansites that I've checked in the past few days, it's not a very popular idea.
But we thought that it might good fun - and that was really the basis of it. We would have a laugh while putting songs to the book.
Then...
Things spiralled once again. Characters were allotted, songs were decided, settings picked, we started this blog... it all went from there. So now, we're trying to script a musical. It's not a big production - we're not writing our own songs, and it is purely a parody. We have a camera, a group of friends - Twilight lovers, haters and have indifferent-ers - and a laptop - and now a blog and a bebo (http://bebo.com/twilightmusical).

As we do more work on this (script-writing, shooting), we'll post updates, clips, bloopers (and there will be a lot of them), pictures and that sort of thing - even though it is only impromptu, we figured we may as well have as much fun as possible, and if people are interested in it and enjoy it - well, that's a brilliant bonus.

And by the way - this is not going to be accurate. Please don't stone us with copies of the book for leaving this out, or leaving that out. It's just a parody, just a bit of fun, and as much as we'd love them to, our magical powers won't let us do everything...

So - the first post. And I still haven't done my share of the summarising. I'd better get on with this, if we're going to get this finished before next year...

Laura

P.S. In case this has been missed, I'm going to repost the disclaimer at the side of the page in this post -

Disclaimer: We do not own Twilight, or any of the songs that are to be used. We are in no way affliated with the Twilight Series, Stephenie Meyer, or her publishers - or with the writers or performers of any of the songs we will be using. This is purely a parody; a bit of fun between friends that we think other people might enjoy. =]