Meta: 3 Types of RPF I Like Very Much, with Recs

[alixtii]

There's a metafandom-ed discussion here on the role of canon in RPF, and in the comments a lot of other thoughts about the nature of that fannish activity are discussed and considered. In particular, cathexys's point about the way in which popslash deals with identity construction of the boy band star, who is never not giving a performance--a point I've seen her make before--has gotten me thinking. Here she contrasts it with the way in which in "actorfic" (her term) we deal with people who often are not performing in the same way; when the camera turns off, they are totally unscripted and genuine, even when they are in front of fans. This is particularly true, she argues, for the "celebrities" which we fangirl (should I be using that phrase?), who objectively speaking aren't really that famous and thus aren't marketed and objectified the way an Angelina Jolie or Nicole Kidman are.

Now obviously there is a spectrum upon which this is true or not--when Joss and Nathan play around at a convention, that is a performance and not real, but at the same time there is something more honest and genuine going on (at least as I construct the author-function) than, say, when Madonna kisses Britney. And this is all on top of the theoretical point that all identity is performative, whether one is a celebrity or not. But some readers are squicked by the way which actorfic arguably is written about people who are in some way "realer" (less objectified, less performative) than popslash characters are.

Let me note here that I don't really get the squick against RPF-ing "real" people; I've femslashed wisdomeagle and she's pretty real to me, despite never having met her in person (although the fictionalized character based on her is a floating signifier, having no reality whatsoever, of course). My problem with "real" people isn't that 'shipping them is somehow wrong or immoral; in general, I just find it boring, because life by definition cannot be larger than itself.

But the RPF I read, and the RPF I've written, and the RPF I plan to write or imagine writing, and the RPF I'll never write but wished existed so I could read it--in all cases, fic about actors and writers--all of these manage to navigate these issues. If they don't, I resort to the trusty back-button. "Media fandom" (whatever that means) RPF is able to deal with issues of performance and identity just as well as any other brand.

In my experience, RPF can bring attention to its own inter/textuality in three main ways:

1. By being primarily concerned with the relationship of the characters to the production of other texts (than the fanfic in which they reside). My primary example of this sort of RPF is the Joss Whedon/Alexis Denisof stories of the ever brilliant wisdomeagle, especially Gone Hollywood. Since Joss is a writer and not an actor, the focus of any text in which he appears will always be other texts--be it his own, Buffy and Firefly, or orthers', such as Shakespeare and X-Men (which is now one of his too anyway)--and the way in which he is always caught up in these texts will draw attention to the way in which this Joss is also a character in a text.

Not all RPF about actors does this. of course (just as not all popslash is about identity, either). The major f/f RPF pairing, insofar as I can ascertain, is Idina Menzel/Kristen Chenoweth, but little of it (that I've read) focuses on Wicked at all. People are interested in femslashing these actors because they play characters with a homoerotic subtext, but their jobs as actors is simply used as a background for getting them together: they go out for drinks after a performance, and are completely capable of differentiating themselves from the characters they play. (And since I care about the characters rather than them, I stop caring and back-button.)

By the same token, a lot of the LotRips I've read (which isn't much, as I don't read much m/m) isn't primarily concerned with Lord of the Rings itself. It's concerned with the relationships between the actors who starred in those movies, often after the movies are made and with no further thought to their existence beyond the fact that a) these characters are "celebrities" (although perhaps in some cases obscurer ones) as a result of these movies, and b) they met each other while making it. These are not stories which interest me.

2. By crossing over with fictional universes. When vampires and wizards begin popping up, I don't think there is really that much doubt that what one is reading is fiction. annakovsky's crossovers between LotRips and BtVS and/or HP are my favorite example of this sort of RPF text, in particular her Critique of Pure Reason, which is Dominic Monaghan (sp?)/Xander Harris. (Of course with a title like that, I was predisposed to like it.) By mixing the "real" world and fictional universes, these sorts of crossovers serve to problematize the distinction itself.

Also, there's Life Imitates Art by fox1013, in which someone named Patrick Dempsey is a guest star on the Muppet Show, and everything that follows is just sort of natural and fits perfectly into Muppets canon (which always included a healthy dose of RPF anyway, being extremely metatextual in the way it constructed its "backstage"--it is a show about performing).

Personally, I really want to write Anna Popplewell/William Mosely/Dawn Summers.

ETA: And how did I forget wisdomeagle's Go-Round which crosses Baby Sitters' Club RPF with Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood in that BSC author Ann M. Martin meets and is flirted with by Lady Elaine Fairchild.

3. By being larger-than-life even for Hollywood. This is sort of the same mechanism as #2, only with original characters, which means that other elements of the universe need to be more self-evidently fictional. Since all RPF is fictional, by definition all of it should use the mechanisms of storytelling, but partially because part of the conceit of RPF is that we'll revealing these people's real lives, and partially because plot is sometimes suddenly sidelined, we don't as often have the actors' journeys being exactly Campbellian. But on occasion we have stories which are just so epic that their seams are showing, and then it's not so difficult to just jump into the fic and enjoy it. My favorite example is The Liberation of Katie Holmes by buffyx and missdeviant. By appropriating the tropes of the action-adventure film (there's even this this trailer) and mixing it with a quasi-cracked out premise (Tom Cruise is an alien and Kristen Bell and Jason Dohring have to save Katie) they create a fantasy which is stylized and fun even as it is ostensibly about "real" people.

Of course, these three metatextual techniques aren't mutually exclusive.

The other conclusion to draw from this thought process is that there isn't any femslash RPF that I like (not counting my own "Dear My Ideal Audience). Which saddens me, really. Recs are very much welcome (and not just femslash, but also gen and het as well, or really anything that you think is likely to fall under the above three categories).

Comments

[wisdomeagle]

There is Paul Tillich + Karl Barth RPF (not S) in the back of my systematics text and it makes me very gleeful.

It's probably self-evident that I agree with you about #1. I have probably read more LotRiPS than you have, and there is... some... that deals more with the production of LotR than others, I've found. In my experience, my favorite kinds of post-production fic are the ones in which the actors are attempting to recapture the magic of the filming. I think this has less to do with "Lord of the Rings is magical," proper -- less to do with Tolkein, or with hobbits -- than with the way production becomes a moment outside of time, a radical disconnect from ordinary life. And OTPing is one way of attempting to recapture the magic of those months.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

In my experience, my favorite kinds of post-production fic are the ones in which the actors are attempting to recapture the magic of the filming. I think this has less to do with "Lord of the Rings is magical," proper -- less to do with Tolkein, or with hobbits -- than with the way production becomes a moment outside of time, a radical disconnect from ordinary life. And OTPing is one way of attempting to recapture the magic of those months.

This is exactly the appeal of William Mosely/Anna Popplewell for me, although I do think that the magic of Middle-Earth/Narnia and the magic of Narnia do (or at least can, and perhaps even should) bleed together. And with Will/Anna there is the magic of childhood thrown in there, which they are slowly losing as they grow up (which is an arc that parallels Peter and Susan's, obviously). You take that away--as a lot of the more recent Narnia RPF has done--and it mostly becomes about their bodies, which yeah, is sortof squicky, if for no other reason than their youth.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

although I do think that the magic of Middle-Earth/Narnia and the magic of Narnia

should be, "...the magic of Middle-Earth/Narnia and the magic of filming"

Ack.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

And I'd forgotten that you've written #2 as well--femslash, no less. (I've edited the OP to reflect that.)

[frogfarm]

"Dear My Ideal Audience" is my one and only RPF. Otherwise, the closest I've ever come to liking the genre wasn't even R, it was "just a crossover". But Evil Kira vs. Vamp Willow: Battle of the Leather-Clad Vixens just screams RPF in title alone, let alone in content.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure I quite follow you. Care to elaborate?

[frogfarm]

I doubt I could put it into words, so the Kira/Willow story will either explain itself or fail completely. As to your own work, it's just the only RPF whose summary/header made me at all curious to read it, and my limited exposure to other examples of the genre since has so far failed to strike a similar chord.

mHDYaCHuvrHmWtc

[(Anonymous)]

Your website has to be the elcertonic Swiss army knife for this topic.

[shaychana.livejournal.com]

Nothing very brainy here to add, but I just had to comment to tell you how much I appreciate this post. I'm finishing up a Supernatural RPS epic and thoughts about the function and performance of RPF have been eating at me because of it for months now. Your post helped clarify some of my nebulous instincts about the genre, and YES! SQUEE! like you, RPF for me is all about the meta, of artifice and identity construction.

In conclusion, thank you. :">

[coneyislandbaby]

As a long term RPF writer, who even writes f/f on occasion (mostly Liv Tyler/Alicia Silverstone plus some RP (as in roleplay) pairings) I think that #1 is what I most don't want to see in RPF. I don't want it to be about the characters the actors play, I don't want RPF to exist because the characters were slashy. I want it to exist because the actors are slashy. Case in point, I've written my share of Matt Damon/Ben Affleck slash. But in character I only see them as really slashy in one of their movies together - Dogma, in which they don't have sexual equipment. Or there's Joaquin Phoenix/Casey Affleck who in their one movie together To Die For have no homoerotic vibe in character (there's an interpretable moment in the book). I wouldn't want to read Lucy Lawless/Renee O'Connor because Xena and Gabrielle are slashy/have an almost text relationship or Alyson Hannigan/Amber Benson because Willow and Tara were together. For me that's not the point of RPF - it's not about characters. It's about the actors.