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dear limited theatrical release author
Jun. 20th, 2020 02:45 amTo be clear: these are meant as suggestions! If none of these prompts particularly speak to you, please feel free to just go with what you would find interesting to write.
All About Eve (1950)
Eve Harrington/Margo Channing; Miss Caswell
For Margo/Eve— anything goes, basically. I’m really into the uncomfortable intimacy of this relationship, especially in their brief period of domestic bliss early on, where Eve is quietly filling every available role in Margo’s life and Margo is barely acknowledging her own buried unease with the situation. I would enjoy an AU where Eve’s attempted seduction of Margo turns literal, whether or not she’s successful. There’s a lot of messy potential here, before and after Eve is unmasked. There are a few hints that Eve’s feigned devotion might be based on actual feeling, so far as Eve has actual feelings for other people: “I had to make her like me,” she tells Addison during her breakdown. A history of Eve/Gertrude’s crush, whether or not it’s ever requited, would also be interesting. Do the two of them ever end up on stage again, together?Outsider POV would be great here, as would a story told through a collection of Addison’s columns.
For Miss Caswell (or Casswell, according to Wikipedia), I’d like anything, pretty much— this is a tiny role, and Monroe makes such an impression, mixing the character’s dumb sweetness and earnestness with a world-weary resignation. (“Why do they always look like unhappy rabbits?”) What was life like at the Copacabana School of Dramatic Arts? Is Claudia Cas(s)well her real name, or has she been through a few? What’s it like trying to make it on television? I’d love fic pairing her with an OFC or OMC, or with any character in canon that you find interesting.
Citizen Kane (1941)
Mary Kane; Charles Foster Kane/Jed Leland; Jed Leland & Emily Norton Kane
Mary Kane— I’ve always been fascinated by this character, who has less than four minutes of screentime and sets in motion the plot of the entire movie. So much of her motivations are left tantalizingly unexplained. I’d love to read a story from her perspective, about her life story. In her brief appearance, Moorehead gives the character an icy exterior, and the hints of some kind of emotion buried very deep down. Her iron determination to get her son out of her husband’s house and out of Colorado— why? She could easily keep the family together, with the amount of money the family now has; she just chooses not to. I’d also love anything about her relationship with her son, either from his perspective or from another character’s outside POV. It would make sense for him to resent her, but the only source we have as to their relationship is Leland, who claims that she was the only person Charlie loved other than himself.
Kane/Leland— “Not that Charlie was ever brutal. He just did brutal things. Maybe I wasn’t his friend, but if I wasn’t, he never had one.” This relationship messes me up, honestly. Any period you want to write about in the friends-to-lover-to-enemies trajectory would be great— school friends, young idealists out to change the world, the long bitter dissolution of their partnership, and then the silence afterwards. I really like the idea of there being another great love in Kane’s life, one at least as emotionally disastrous as either of his marriage, but hidden just well enough that a reporter like Thompson would never bother trying to dig out the story. (Leland spends SO much of his interview resentfully talking about Kane’s inability to love. It's really striking!) Again, anything would be great here. A different, more surprising interview with Leland. The two of them getting together, or breaking up, or having sex, or stabbing each other in the back. Jedidiah’s reaction to Charlie’s marriage. Arguments about the Spanish-American war. Or the text of the letter Kane sent from Xanadu five years before he died, the one Leland never answered.
Leland & Emily — “I can tell you about Emily. I went to dancing school with Emily.” I find this relationship so interesting, though there isn’t much of it onscreen— they both start out loving Charlie, as a friend or a husband, and end up completely alienated from him. It’s the bitter, elderly Jed who gives the film its glimpse into the first Kane marriage— Emily and her son, of course, being long dead. Did the two of them commiserate in the aftermath of the Susan Alexander disaster? And what was their relationship prior to the divorce— Leland seems pretty shocked at the news of Kane’s marriage, and his portrait of it is pretty scathing. I could see some tension there, with both of them staking out ownership over two different halves of Kane’s life, and work inevitably winning out. Emily is honestly delightful to me— reading the Chronicle at the breakfast table! Her “flair for melodrama” in the matter of her husband’s infidelity!— so I’d love to see a story exploring her perspective, as well.
The Godfather (movies)
Connie Corleone & Mary Corleone
I’d love any exploration of how these two Corleone women relate to each other. Connie is in such an interesting place by the time of the third movie — Michael’s right hand, at the heart of power, in stark contrast to her marginalized position in the first two movies. Mary, on the other hand, is the beloved, sheltered daughter of the family, a little like Connie used to be. They grew up in the same family, but in very different generations. Is Connie affectionate towards her niece, or stern and disapproving? Or wistful? What’s her view on the Mary/Vincent relationship, considering her own painful relationship history and how close she was to Sonny? I have more prompts in relation to Connie than Mary, just because I have a stronger feeling for Connie as a character, but Mary is pretty fascinating in her own right. What’s her perspective on her aunt?
I’m fine with tragedy, so anything about Connie in the aftermath of Mary’s death would be painful and great. Or an AU, where Michael dies instead of his daughter, and Connie and Mary have to figure out what their lives will look like in the aftermath.
The Red Shoes (1948)
Julian Craster/Victoria Page & Boris Lermatov; Julian Craster & Boris Lermatov; Julian Craster/Boris Lermatov
I’m really into this movie as the story of Vicky’s impossible choice, as personified by two men who stand in for “romantic love” and “artistic achievement”; I’m also interested, fanfic-wise, in fic that explores Julian and Lermontov as people, trapped in a situation spiraling quickly into tragedy. Basically anything about this triangle would be really interesting. I’d love fic dealing with the awkwardness between the three of them while Vicky is alive. At what point do the two of them go from coworkers to rivals? Or else fic about Lermatov and Julian trying to deal in the aftermath of her death— do they blame each other, or do they ever reach a point where they can share a kind of civility? For Lermatov/Julian, I don’t think this would be a very happy relationship, necessarily, or a stable one, and I don’t think it works without both of them being more invested in Vicky’s ghost than they are in each other; I just think it would be compelling. A story told through a third party perspective— a background dancer, for example, or a reporter trying to interview both of them— would be very interesting. I really like the horror-infused fairy tale aspects the original, and would love to see that used in a story.
I should note that I’m fine with Vicky/Lermatov as an element of a story.
All About Eve (1950)
Eve Harrington/Margo Channing; Miss Caswell
For Margo/Eve— anything goes, basically. I’m really into the uncomfortable intimacy of this relationship, especially in their brief period of domestic bliss early on, where Eve is quietly filling every available role in Margo’s life and Margo is barely acknowledging her own buried unease with the situation. I would enjoy an AU where Eve’s attempted seduction of Margo turns literal, whether or not she’s successful. There’s a lot of messy potential here, before and after Eve is unmasked. There are a few hints that Eve’s feigned devotion might be based on actual feeling, so far as Eve has actual feelings for other people: “I had to make her like me,” she tells Addison during her breakdown. A history of Eve/Gertrude’s crush, whether or not it’s ever requited, would also be interesting. Do the two of them ever end up on stage again, together?Outsider POV would be great here, as would a story told through a collection of Addison’s columns.
For Miss Caswell (or Casswell, according to Wikipedia), I’d like anything, pretty much— this is a tiny role, and Monroe makes such an impression, mixing the character’s dumb sweetness and earnestness with a world-weary resignation. (“Why do they always look like unhappy rabbits?”) What was life like at the Copacabana School of Dramatic Arts? Is Claudia Cas(s)well her real name, or has she been through a few? What’s it like trying to make it on television? I’d love fic pairing her with an OFC or OMC, or with any character in canon that you find interesting.
Citizen Kane (1941)
Mary Kane; Charles Foster Kane/Jed Leland; Jed Leland & Emily Norton Kane
Mary Kane— I’ve always been fascinated by this character, who has less than four minutes of screentime and sets in motion the plot of the entire movie. So much of her motivations are left tantalizingly unexplained. I’d love to read a story from her perspective, about her life story. In her brief appearance, Moorehead gives the character an icy exterior, and the hints of some kind of emotion buried very deep down. Her iron determination to get her son out of her husband’s house and out of Colorado— why? She could easily keep the family together, with the amount of money the family now has; she just chooses not to. I’d also love anything about her relationship with her son, either from his perspective or from another character’s outside POV. It would make sense for him to resent her, but the only source we have as to their relationship is Leland, who claims that she was the only person Charlie loved other than himself.
Kane/Leland— “Not that Charlie was ever brutal. He just did brutal things. Maybe I wasn’t his friend, but if I wasn’t, he never had one.” This relationship messes me up, honestly. Any period you want to write about in the friends-to-lover-to-enemies trajectory would be great— school friends, young idealists out to change the world, the long bitter dissolution of their partnership, and then the silence afterwards. I really like the idea of there being another great love in Kane’s life, one at least as emotionally disastrous as either of his marriage, but hidden just well enough that a reporter like Thompson would never bother trying to dig out the story. (Leland spends SO much of his interview resentfully talking about Kane’s inability to love. It's really striking!) Again, anything would be great here. A different, more surprising interview with Leland. The two of them getting together, or breaking up, or having sex, or stabbing each other in the back. Jedidiah’s reaction to Charlie’s marriage. Arguments about the Spanish-American war. Or the text of the letter Kane sent from Xanadu five years before he died, the one Leland never answered.
Leland & Emily — “I can tell you about Emily. I went to dancing school with Emily.” I find this relationship so interesting, though there isn’t much of it onscreen— they both start out loving Charlie, as a friend or a husband, and end up completely alienated from him. It’s the bitter, elderly Jed who gives the film its glimpse into the first Kane marriage— Emily and her son, of course, being long dead. Did the two of them commiserate in the aftermath of the Susan Alexander disaster? And what was their relationship prior to the divorce— Leland seems pretty shocked at the news of Kane’s marriage, and his portrait of it is pretty scathing. I could see some tension there, with both of them staking out ownership over two different halves of Kane’s life, and work inevitably winning out. Emily is honestly delightful to me— reading the Chronicle at the breakfast table! Her “flair for melodrama” in the matter of her husband’s infidelity!— so I’d love to see a story exploring her perspective, as well.
The Godfather (movies)
Connie Corleone & Mary Corleone
I’d love any exploration of how these two Corleone women relate to each other. Connie is in such an interesting place by the time of the third movie — Michael’s right hand, at the heart of power, in stark contrast to her marginalized position in the first two movies. Mary, on the other hand, is the beloved, sheltered daughter of the family, a little like Connie used to be. They grew up in the same family, but in very different generations. Is Connie affectionate towards her niece, or stern and disapproving? Or wistful? What’s her view on the Mary/Vincent relationship, considering her own painful relationship history and how close she was to Sonny? I have more prompts in relation to Connie than Mary, just because I have a stronger feeling for Connie as a character, but Mary is pretty fascinating in her own right. What’s her perspective on her aunt?
I’m fine with tragedy, so anything about Connie in the aftermath of Mary’s death would be painful and great. Or an AU, where Michael dies instead of his daughter, and Connie and Mary have to figure out what their lives will look like in the aftermath.
The Red Shoes (1948)
Julian Craster/Victoria Page & Boris Lermatov; Julian Craster & Boris Lermatov; Julian Craster/Boris Lermatov
I’m really into this movie as the story of Vicky’s impossible choice, as personified by two men who stand in for “romantic love” and “artistic achievement”; I’m also interested, fanfic-wise, in fic that explores Julian and Lermontov as people, trapped in a situation spiraling quickly into tragedy. Basically anything about this triangle would be really interesting. I’d love fic dealing with the awkwardness between the three of them while Vicky is alive. At what point do the two of them go from coworkers to rivals? Or else fic about Lermatov and Julian trying to deal in the aftermath of her death— do they blame each other, or do they ever reach a point where they can share a kind of civility? For Lermatov/Julian, I don’t think this would be a very happy relationship, necessarily, or a stable one, and I don’t think it works without both of them being more invested in Vicky’s ghost than they are in each other; I just think it would be compelling. A story told through a third party perspective— a background dancer, for example, or a reporter trying to interview both of them— would be very interesting. I really like the horror-infused fairy tale aspects the original, and would love to see that used in a story.
I should note that I’m fine with Vicky/Lermatov as an element of a story.
