Technical Difficulties

Sorry guys, I posted my fanfiction piece last night, but it seems that "Jameson" is not showing up on the general search. I want to make sure that it's searchable, so I took down all the chapters except chapter 1. I'll wait a bit, and see if it posts successfully, then post the rest. Keep your fingers crossed!

Going Live!

ok, I've finally posted my fiction piece on the fanfiction website. I definitely had fun writing. Let me know what you think!

Oh, and here's a direct link to my piece.  Enjoy!

New "Teaser Content" video

... This one is actually under 90 seconds. Sweet!

Iago vs. Hamlet animation

As for the repurposed content, a.k.a. my fanfiction piece, I'm working on it! I just got a bunch of good feedback on it, and I want to make the revisions before I post it on the website. I'll let you know when it's up!

Love's Labours Lost at BYU

Setting the play "Love's Labour's Lost" in wartime is an exciting idea, invoking the jazz club scenery and atmosphere where song and dance could break out at any time. We Americans seem to like the theme as a backdrop for movies, especially romances (i.e. "The Notebook," "Captain America," "Australia"... ), probably because of the easily recognizable costuming and nostalgic familiarity. It also helped us distinguish the men on separate levels, as they were all dressed according to rank. Although I couldn't figure out why Biron was dressed as a lower rank than the other three lover-boys. It's like it set him apart as the center character that he is, without allowing him those extra lines that make him an obvious focus in Shakespeare's original. In fact, after I'd read the play, I could have sworn that Biron was the main 'hero' of the play, but the presentation seemed to downplay that by dressing him down, I suppose.
I think the wartime theme meshed especially well with the resolution of Shakespeare's storyline, as the women could assign the men to service in the military as proof of their love, rather than to isolation in the mountains as hermits. The set up with Moth and Don Armado throwing jokes back and forth really worked well also. It is full of Shakespeare jargon that normally doesn't make a ton of sense, but my friend Ashley, who hadn't read the play, laughed at all the right times, probably also with the help of the cue cards. I think the pacing of this scene was really smart, because the whole play ran pretty evenly, until this scene, which made it seem much more like a battle of wits, and you could tell it was funny even if you didn't understand it. The other time I noticed the pace speed up a little was when the women were gossiping, which I think was very fitting for a vanity mirror scene with a bunch of girls talking a mile a minute.
I thought I had missed something important when I missed the first scene, because all the men were dancing with women, and I thought the story was supposed to be set in a women-free zone. This is what made Costard being caught with a woman so confusing, and there were also a few other things that added to that confusion, including the additional characters that shared some of the women's lines, making it hard to tell which girls were the lovers.
I was also a little disappointed because I think some of Biron's speeches were cut out, including his monologue on love, which is kind of funny. And some of Don Armado's lines were cut short too. Those were just the ones I noticed, so there might have been more. But I think it was probably necessary with the addition of the musical numbers, because the play ended up taking about two and a half hours! I think I actually like the stylistic choice of adding in the musical numbers, because it added to the atmosphere of a night club in that time period. Though I think if the dancing was added in for this purpose, it probably wasn't worth it, considering the confusion it caused. 
However iconic the scenery and costuming, the production probably desired a little more thought towards the application of an older text that had not anticipated this era, but I'm sure it started out with something brilliant!

Prototype "Teaser Content" Video

I'll probably have to figure out how to make this video a bit shorter! I think maybe for my second attempt I'll do a Prezi or a Powerpoint just because the camera makes me somewhat uncomfortable. But, here it is.

As for my market study, I'm thinking the readers of fanfiction are a pretty well-defined group. But beyond that, Dr. Burton said that teachers may be interested in this sort of media as a teaching tool, and psychologists may also be interested in Hamlet as a psychological specimen of homicidal mania. I figure the best way to get this sort of content out to teachers would be through lesson plans, but I'm not totally sure yet how to bring this sort of material to the attention of this group. I'll keep you updated!

The English Symposium

     I attended the section on fairytales, as well as the one titled, "The bard, and the man." Professor Bruce Young, who was moderating the event section, mentioned that Shakespeare was never called "the bard" in his time, which I thought was kind of interesting. I wonder why people really call him that, as I've always thought it was kind of a weird name. Anyway, the first girl's paper discussed how the many interpretations of Othello have inspired filmmakers to present Othello in ways that highlight certain aspects of the character, mostly discussing the lighting in Orson Wells' film production of Othello. She also points out that Othello refers to himself as a changed man in the end when he says, "That's he that was Othello, Here I am." She uses it to support her thesis that there is a difference between the Othello who loved his wife, the Othello who became jealous, and the Othello who regrets his deeds.
     Then the next person presented on "The Tempest" and how Shakespeare was critiquing humankind, which has a tendency to "play god," like Prospero, and is punished for it. Prospero learns his lesson, and gives up his powers because he cannot control the power of God, being human. The third paper was about emasculated male characters in "Peter and Wendy," and I didn't exactly see the connection between the three, besides maybe the theme of "what it means to be a man." :)

My Intro

Here's a copy of the intro to my whole piece. Let me know if you have suggestions!
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1o_TzX3itDQgTHvf8wHGZ5jB8U1M_xFo1BaThiNbmCk8/edit

I'm going to keep adding onto it, so you might see me in the middle of my writing process!