Two Professors, No Waiting
Jul. 19th, 2014 11:57 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakThe announcement of a movie about the friendship between J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis reminded me again how inconvenient real life often operates when it comes to dramatizing, especially regarding giving a story climax and resolution. The last time C.S. Lewis was the subject of a biographical movie, Shadowlands, it was focused on a relationship of his as well, true, but the death of the other main character, his wife Joy, and Lewis struggling through the immediate aftermath provided a natural third act and resolution, so to speak. Even so, the script simplified and exised people a great deal (Joy went from having two sons from her first marriage to having only one, Lewis' friends - Tolkien, Williams et al. - were all represented, sort of, as one fictional character named Christopher, and absolutely no mention was made of Lewis' pre-Joy decades long relationship with a woman, "Mintho" Moore. (As I understand it the nature of the relationship - filial, romantic or a mixture of the two - is still under debate, but what's not under debate is that he lived with her for decades and she hadn't been dead that long when he met Joy.) Mentioning this isn't meant as a put-down on my part, by the way. All this exising of characters allows for a tighter focus, I found the film very moving and superbly acted by Anthony Hopkins and Debra Winger (one reason why I was so dissappointed when the film's scriptwriter recently was such an ass about his Mandela biopic flopping), and at any rate, Shadowlands isn't supposed to be about Lewis' entire life and never claimed to cover all the aspects.
Now, with Tolkien and Lewis, I wonder what kind of structure they'll go for. Act I: Our Heroes meet and hit it off between love for all things Norse and Tolkien converting Lewis to Christianity, leading to Inklings, Hobbit, Screwtape, Tolkien starting LotR, Lewis starting Narnia. Act II: Lewis dashes off Narnia books at top speed, happily mixing fauns and Father Christmas, and becomes a Christian Explainer To The Masses, both of which irritates Tolkien a lot for various reasons. However, "Fellowship" getting published and Lewis writing glowing reviews while suggesting Tolkien for the Nobel Prize papers over the cracks for a while, until the arrival of either Charles Williams or Joy Gresham or both (depending on whether the script wants to use both) in Lewis' life and Lewis insisting on Tolkien befriending them when he, Lewis, had previously refused to have anything to do with Edith Tolkien leads to serious enstrangement. Act II climaxes with a big argument. Act III: well, there's the problem. As far as I know, and I could be misremembering or not knowing in the first place, Tolkien and Lewis drifting apart wasn't, in fact, a dramatic series of arguments but more a slow and entirely undramatic series of contact lessening and terse remarks in letters to other people. It's not like either of them ever wrote a How Do You Sleep? about each other or attacked each other via the press. Why so restrained and dignified, English professors? I bet the script will go entirely fictional at that point, inventing both a dramatic face to face argument and (after some scenes of pining) an equally dramatic reconciliation (maybe after Joy's death), and it fades out with them sitting on a bench a la Bilbo and Gandalf early in the film version of Fellowship, two battered old friends together.
So far, so semi-serious speculation on my part. Now for some completely irreverent flippancy: fandom being what it is, if this movie will cast actors as Tolkien and Lewis who are in any way regarded as hot, there will be slash. Depending on how successful the movie is, it could be solely a tiny corner at Yuletide or the next Big Thing. If the later, I predict Joy and/or Edith bashing of the She Comes Between Them type as well. If Charles Williams exists in the movie, He Comes Between Them As Well, but that traditionally doesn't lead to bashing in a male character, it leads to rival ships. Williams could have a postmortem career as the next Castiel there, with Lewis/Williams the alternative to the big Lewis/Tolkien juggernaut, and a small but vocal minority writing Tolkien/Williams hate sex. Poor Mrs. Moore probably won't exist in this one at all, either, and definitely won't get played by Helen Mirren which as I seem to recall was A. N. Wilson's suggestion, but if I'm wrong and Mintho Moore makes it into the Tolkien/Lewis saga, and if there is even the smallest hint she's something other than a mother figure to Lewis, then she'll probably join Edith and Joy in the ranks of bashed female characters, and stories set in the early stages of the Tolkien and Lewis relationship will cast her as the villain trying to prevent it. Oh, if someone unearths Lewis' "Four Loves", to be specific, the essay praising (male) friendship and comparising favourably with male/female romance, then tumblr will go wild using photos from the movie with quotes.
...or the movie could sink without a trace in either fandom or critical attention. Or never get made. But where'd be the fun in that?
Now, with Tolkien and Lewis, I wonder what kind of structure they'll go for. Act I: Our Heroes meet and hit it off between love for all things Norse and Tolkien converting Lewis to Christianity, leading to Inklings, Hobbit, Screwtape, Tolkien starting LotR, Lewis starting Narnia. Act II: Lewis dashes off Narnia books at top speed, happily mixing fauns and Father Christmas, and becomes a Christian Explainer To The Masses, both of which irritates Tolkien a lot for various reasons. However, "Fellowship" getting published and Lewis writing glowing reviews while suggesting Tolkien for the Nobel Prize papers over the cracks for a while, until the arrival of either Charles Williams or Joy Gresham or both (depending on whether the script wants to use both) in Lewis' life and Lewis insisting on Tolkien befriending them when he, Lewis, had previously refused to have anything to do with Edith Tolkien leads to serious enstrangement. Act II climaxes with a big argument. Act III: well, there's the problem. As far as I know, and I could be misremembering or not knowing in the first place, Tolkien and Lewis drifting apart wasn't, in fact, a dramatic series of arguments but more a slow and entirely undramatic series of contact lessening and terse remarks in letters to other people. It's not like either of them ever wrote a How Do You Sleep? about each other or attacked each other via the press. Why so restrained and dignified, English professors? I bet the script will go entirely fictional at that point, inventing both a dramatic face to face argument and (after some scenes of pining) an equally dramatic reconciliation (maybe after Joy's death), and it fades out with them sitting on a bench a la Bilbo and Gandalf early in the film version of Fellowship, two battered old friends together.
So far, so semi-serious speculation on my part. Now for some completely irreverent flippancy: fandom being what it is, if this movie will cast actors as Tolkien and Lewis who are in any way regarded as hot, there will be slash. Depending on how successful the movie is, it could be solely a tiny corner at Yuletide or the next Big Thing. If the later, I predict Joy and/or Edith bashing of the She Comes Between Them type as well. If Charles Williams exists in the movie, He Comes Between Them As Well, but that traditionally doesn't lead to bashing in a male character, it leads to rival ships. Williams could have a postmortem career as the next Castiel there, with Lewis/Williams the alternative to the big Lewis/Tolkien juggernaut, and a small but vocal minority writing Tolkien/Williams hate sex. Poor Mrs. Moore probably won't exist in this one at all, either, and definitely won't get played by Helen Mirren which as I seem to recall was A. N. Wilson's suggestion, but if I'm wrong and Mintho Moore makes it into the Tolkien/Lewis saga, and if there is even the smallest hint she's something other than a mother figure to Lewis, then she'll probably join Edith and Joy in the ranks of bashed female characters, and stories set in the early stages of the Tolkien and Lewis relationship will cast her as the villain trying to prevent it. Oh, if someone unearths Lewis' "Four Loves", to be specific, the essay praising (male) friendship and comparising favourably with male/female romance, then tumblr will go wild using photos from the movie with quotes.
...or the movie could sink without a trace in either fandom or critical attention. Or never get made. But where'd be the fun in that?
no subject
Date: 2014-07-19 10:44 am (UTC)(I'm hardwired to find these two very cute. Try living with my roommate and don't; the Tolkiens are the closest she gets to shipping actual people.)
no subject
Date: 2014-07-19 11:31 am (UTC)...at least they had many years together before that, though neither was a longlived man of Numenor, or an elf.
no subject
Date: 2014-07-19 12:06 pm (UTC)It is very sweet, and tries hard to rattle the cynicism I have about love and relationships and all that jazz. And I'm sure it wasn't always easy, since they seemed to be pretty different in type, but I've never seen him express doubt that she was the one, anywhere (and if she had doubts, I don't think she would have shared them). And that's a very rare thing indeed.
no subject
Date: 2014-07-19 01:12 pm (UTC)Yes - unless it's focused on one particular event, it's tough to build in a soaring climax and happy ending.
Tolkien/Lewis as you describe them seems to bear a similarity to Melville/Hawthorne, which is also a tempting story because famous people being friends! With homoerotic overtones! But that also trails off, as many friendships do.
no subject
Date: 2014-07-19 03:17 pm (UTC)