Your chest called... it happens...
Feb. 5th, 2011 05:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lesmisloonyALRIGHTY THEN CHILDREN.
Let's talk about LILLE.
I don't know when I'm going to tell the story of my last night at the Palais des Sports... but the Lille stories MUST be told. IMMEDIATELY. Because omg just awesome.
Things didn't start off super well, though. Laurel's plane was delayed an hour and I ended up sitting alone in the métro where we were supposed to meet from 11pm to about 1:30am... I was starting to worry that she would miss the last métro and, with no way to call me, I would never hear from her again. But she came in on what I'm thinking was the absolute last train of the night and we rejoiced all the way back to the house. Laurel, having just come in from a trip to Italy, was full of information about Italian people... apparently they all wear puffy jackets or furry hats and she actually heard someone yell Mamma mia. Now I kind of want to go to Italy. As we were turning in she looked at my poster of Mikele and Flo, the one where Mikele looks kind of scared and Flo looks like he's trying to be intimidating, and she commented that Mikele looked like a middle-aged Italian housewife taking his rebellious teenage son to the supermarket. And that is how we discovered that Mikele is Flo's mother. Which also explains why the manlove can never be. It would be incestuous.
We got up in the morning and went into Paris with our heavy heavy freaking luggage. I brought a bag with no shoulder strap because I'm really smart, and when I carried it my Eiffel Tower keychain would bang against the back of my knee. It got really annoying and it hurt a lot AND I was wearing tights, so I was worried it was going to rip them. But we went into town and I printed out some pictures to make the best members of the Troupe sign. Then we went to the wrong train station and, since Laurel was out of métro tickets, WALKED to the correct one. Ow ow ow ow my leg. The nice sncf lady told us that if we waited thirty minutes for a later train we would basically pay half price, so we did that. We ate some French fries and crêpes at this little train station café, and once we got on the train we wandered up and down the whole thing trying to figure out where our seats were, only to finally finally find them taken by a bunch of guys in business suits. So we sat nearby with a young hoodlum and an old lady. We mumbled lines from the show to each other and started singing badly translated lyrics under our breath just for the flolz. Laurel started it by singing "Divine, candid libertine, tonight I am going to invite myself into your BED!" The worst was "Tattoo me on your BOOBS / Do it wi-ith my mou-outh!" See, we have a running joke about those crappy English demos they posted on youtube (Flo once explained in an interview that those were called "yaourt" and now thanks to the girls at Beautiflo Mikelomanie I basically think of them as "the Floghurt lyrics") especially the Quand le rideau tombe one, which they have as "When you get alone / and the music gets so strong / it feels like LEEEMMMMOOOONNN / everbody dance around! You're my angel." (YES I KNOW it's supposed to be "heaven" instead of "lemon" but stfu.) Just imagine Solal singing "Everybody dance around."
Anyway, we pulled up at Lille and it was back to the dragging of my mothereffing bag. And um... Lille is basically the UGLIEST city I've ever seen. The buildings were all in unnecessary shapes and covered in horrible materials... one of them, which Laurel decided was Mikele's house, is basically plated in copper for no reason. It's so shiny it actually hurts to look at. And there was another one that was black with random boxes of bright colours around the windows. It's kind of like a queer Atlanta, Georgia. Basically, I've spent a lot of time in Paris in the past few months, so this was some kind of cranky culture shock all over again. We were making derogatory jokes about Lille when suddenly our path to the hotel took us through the most ridiculous excuse for a park ever. There were some trees and there was a pile of rocks and there were ugly metal benches with grass growing up through them. Then there were two teenagers just standing side by side at the far end of the park, facing us and not moving. We were hoping they wouldn't bother us or try to sell us drugs... somehow we started saying how funny it would be if one was Nuno, who is now apparently a Lillois drug dealer. I don't know. We also figured that this park must be where Solal sleeps, since he can't sleep indoors.
And then all of a sudden we were at a hotel. And it was our hotel! We got our key from the guy and he sent us down this hall to our room... and the further we went down the hall, the darker it got. By the time we got to our door we were standing in pitch blackness. It was so ridiculous we just put down our bags and laughed. Like, the doubled-over, falling to your knees laughter. WHAT IS THIS. Lille is the buttcrack of France. I had to get out my sonic screwdriver to see if we were even at the right door and to figure out how to fit the key in the lock. And then the door sticks, so it took both of us falling onto it to get it open.
And here's our room!
Hahahahaha my laptop.
This picture makes it look a lot brighter and cheerier than it is. It's actually quite dingy and I can see outlines on the walls of where things like fire safety instructions and a phone used to be hanging. Classsss. Still, it's clean and the room is sixty euros a night, so hey, I'm content.
And then I discovered that all my whining about that keychain sticking me was TOTALLY VALID.
I literally SPILLED MY OWN BLOOD to see Mozart l'Opéra Rock.
Well, then we started getting ready for the show. I put on my whore-iest fake eyelashes and as much other makeup as I could make my face contain because IT'S FUN. While we took turns using the mirror in the bathroom (it's too dark in the rest of the room to see your reflection) we conspired and wrote notes for our two favourite cast members.
We basically told Maktav that Da Ponte is the BEST and he's always right even though nobody listens to him and he's loyal to Mozart and we like it when he helps that lady up after Salieri pushes her down during Victime de ma victoire. And we said we heard him singing on youtube and he's good and we wish he sang in the show.
And for Nuno we were like WHAAAAT you are good at playing ALL THE ROLES YOU PLAY and also Mozart and also the clown so basically we think you should do a one-man show called Nuno l'Opéra Rock because it would be the best. Seriously, we told him we thought he could even play Aloysia. And we said we saw his Mozart on youtube and cried over his Je dors sur des roses. We didn't mention his naked outdoor guitar playing, though.
Remember that curtain call video I have where someone hands Patrice Maktav a note and without ever considering it might be for him he's like Who do I give this to? I decided that THE ONLY WAY I could correct the pain that moment causes my soul is by giving Patrice Maktav a note FOR HIM at curtain call. And then we thought it would be HILARIOUS if we handed the Nuno note to Mikele and were like NO NOT FOR YOU. PLEASE PASS IT ALONG. So that was our plan.
Here we are failing at making sexy faces in all our glam makeup!
AND THEN WE WERE OFF TO THE ZÉNITH.
Of course, Lille is the sketchiest city in France apparently and we had to walk in our whore makeup in the cold in the dark, so that sucked. We're pretty close to the stadium thing, but we still had to go under a scary bridge where a bunch of cars were weirdly parked and past this really tall fence behind which were a whole bunch of CAMPERS for some reason, then over a million train tracks and around a corner and FINALLY we saw a giant MOR poster. It was really creepy. We kept going "OH LILLE YOU ARE SUCH A BEAUTIFUL TOWN" and such. And we were singing "Elles ont choisi Mozart! Elles ont choisi Mozart!" because it's fun.
We got to the stadium and wandered around outside for a while, hoping to spot the hotel I'd been informed of. And while we were wandering, we randomly passed YAMIN. We both stopped and stared at him stupidly for a while but he was talking to some other fans and seemed rushed, so then we were like Uhhh let's keep walking. And then we started going YAMIN IT WAS YAMIN THIS IS REAL IT'S REALLY HAPPENING WE'RE HERE WE'RE BACK IT'S MOZARRRRRT and such.
At the door some security people looked in our bags and asked us if we had periscopes. We stared at them so blankly and they asked ten more times and finally they gestured with their hands and said CAMERAS and we were like OH! Uhhh no? and they let us through. Periscopes??? We looked it up and yes, that is still the thing from a submarine. So then I wondered how many people bring periscopes in to see MOR...
Inside the Zénith there were a bunch of people selling all kinds of food, so we bought some Nutella gauffres and OM NOM NOM SO GOOD. We were pretty early, so we wandered back and forth a lot.
We decided to go to our seat. Perhaps you remember this...
Yep, we were the red dot.
Well, that was the weirdest thing I've ever seen. We had to go up a flight of stairs in the lobby, then another flight of stairs across the balcony, and then the highest flight to get to our seats. The usher was like, "Okay, you'll see row z... you're in the row BEHIND THAT."
I think they constructed this whole balcony just for MOR, too, because for some reason that I will never be okay with IT WAS CROOKED. Like, it was on a slope. The STAIRS were sloped down on the left. It was like trying to escape the Titanic getting to those seats. Like in a nightmare where everything is a leeettle bit off. I have never been so disoriented.
So I was like Laurel, we are going to find seats closer up, my friend.
We started scouring the room, checking for two seats together that were empty. We knew there wasn't much hope given that the tickets had all sold out for that performance, but still. We saw a few seats on the aisle on the floor level but after a few minutes they filled up.
And then I saw two empty seats on the very front row, off to the left where Diane sings Ah vous dirai-je maman. I stared obsessively at them and started praying to God that they stayed open.
And they did.
Laurel and I started desperately discussing how quickly we could run down these crooked steps and then the other two flights of stairs during curtain call. Because you KNOW other people would eying those seats all over the room. When Jean Michel Meunier came out to do the intro thing he even pointed at the seats with his bow and clearly asked someone in the front row why they were empty. I couldn't handle it. I spent all of Penser l'Impossible staring at those seats. I knew act one was going to be HELLLLL if I just sat there watching two empty seats, fidgeting and panicking that someone would get there first.
So as the Innkeeper's Song started up I looked at Laurel and said "I'm gonna try to get down there. If you see me make it, you come too." She looked incredibly uncomfortable, but I was like THIS IS HAPPENING NOW. I got up and started down the crooked staircase and by the time I was at the lower balcony level Laurel was right behind me. We went down the third staircase in the lobby and then we just strutted through the lower doors and past the ushers like we knew what we were doing. By the time Le Trublion started up, we were in the front row.
WE WERE IN THE FRONT ROW. The lady next to us grinned and said something about how good the seats were and I was like YAH. I was so ecstatic my hands were shaking. THE FRONT ROW HAS ALWAYS BEEN MY DREAM. MY DREAAAAM. THE GOOD LORD REWARDS PATIENT FANATICISM.
So Le Trublion was going and I had the HUGEST smile on my face. The guy who I always call That Guy, the one who's Solal's understudy and plays Stephanie when Nuno is being a clown and sometimes does the opening violin part, saw us and did a big silly grin at our expressions. It was amazing. Oh my gosh it was amazing.
Now, Laurel loves Diane almost as much as I love Flo, so I last-minute decided to tape her Ah vous dirai-je maman. They had said not to bring cameras and periscopes into the theatre, but the moment the show started every single person pulled out a camera, so obviously no one actually cared once you got past security.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Ah vous dirai-je maman
LOOK HOW CLOSE. I love her sweet expressions here, but I don't think her character is onstage enough for us to understand a transition between her little shrug at the end of this song and her pine-y-ness in Si je défaille. I guess she plays it as really young at the beginning?
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Six pieds sous terre
I just wanted some Diane to get me by till the next time I see the show. I've been stuck with hunchy ol Claire on the DVD for way too long.
I love both Diane and Mélissa, and oooh the harmony during the bridge is nice!
My early videos are kinda shaky because I was still settling down into the OMG FRONT ROW that was screaming in my brain.
And then I was like IF I HAVE TO GET A FACEFUL OF EVIL CLOWN THEN SO DO YOU
MOR Lille Fev 3 - J'accuse mon père
LOLLL I PANICKED WHEN HE POPPED THE FIRST BALLOON. And about 35 seconds in I laughed at Mikele's acting. Gahhh I love the riffs Solal does during this song now. I remembered them from Paris and I miss them when I hear the CD. OH GOD THE CLOWN WHISPERS SOMETHING IN MIKELE'S EARS WHAT DID HE SAY
And then I just settled in and watched the show for a while.
I did take a picture so I could document THE CLOSENESS.
Omg yay.
OH AND. Mikele flubbed his lines a lot, but overall he was still doing pretty well. Laurel and I did a lot of punching each other and laughing at his acting, especially during Bim Bam Boum. Oh Mikele, I love you so much but I hope you don't mind being a rock star and not a big movie star.
The extras were a lot of fun to watch this close, too. I especially love the guys rejecting Mozart's music during Tatoue-moi. They're so ANNOYED by him and disgusted by his music and it delights me. And then during La Mascarade we spent a lot of time laughing at the weird stuff the dancers were getting up to. AND I was looking at Merwan!death in terror as he walked by, and he saw me and stopped a little and started, like, pretending he was coming out into the audience. NO MERWAN YOU STAY PUT YOU SCARY MAN.
Anywhere, during Je dors sur des roses Mikele REALLY stepped it up. It was pretty freaking amazing. As I say at the end of this video.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Je dors sur des roses
Haha, you can't actually see ANYTHING at the end. But you can hear my elation and that's what matters.
So during intermission I just sat there like :DDDDDD because OMG FRONT ROW AND FLO WOULD BE COMING OUT SOON AND IT WOULD BE THE BEST
Little did I know IT ACTUALLY DID TURN OUT TO BE THE BEST.
I took a few more pictures just to make it clear to the world that my view was SO GOOD.
Ana said this looks like Solal is pretending to drive a car.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Il a choisi Mozart
I have a lot of trouble deciding whether I want to film Flo or the plot when I'm this close. Also lolll there is no reason for Yamin to sing Bad Romance in this scene now, but I don't mind that he does.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Répétition
Nuno's faces are SO FUNNY. Also, Flo's slow clap thing. Also, I love this scene but Mikele flubs his lines a little near the beginning.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Le Bien qui fait mal & Promesse de mariage
So yeah, this is good and all, but just you wait. The longer he was onstage, the more AMAZING Flo became. I have seen this show A LOT okay, and this performance was just something else. Anyway so I took my Bien qui fait mal video and then I was so entranced by the promesse de mariage scene that I just kept filming. So here, have some promesse de mariage scene! You can tell my all the giggling that I was having a fantastic time. Also, Mikele's acting, though still incredibly Mikele-y, is so much better now than it was on the DVD. Give MOR a few more years and he'll be Oscar-worthy!
And by a few more years I mean a few more decades. Oh Mikele you precious lil Italian moflo.
Anyway, then halfway through Les Solos sous les draps I was like, You know what? I want a video of this song.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Les Solos sous les draps
OH BUH you can barely see it in this video, but omg right when Mikele throws the promesse de mariage off the stage Laurel threw herself out of her chair and crawled down to grab it. Mikele was sitting right above her and he smiled and shook his head like, What a ridiculous fan that is. It was awesome. You can kinda see his expression while the camera is flailing back and forth between Laurel's scampering and Mikele sitting cross-legged. And then when the dancer grabs him and Mikele shrieks he actually seemed caught off-guard. And LOOK AT THE THING MERWAN IS DOING AT THE END. It is so funny.
AND THEN.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Rosenbeeeeerg
Hahahaha that is a REALLY GOOD ONE. This is about the time when Flo really just started tearing it up. Oh my gosh so good. And apparently the Shakespeare/Corneille/Racine thing is just part of the show now. Aw-riiiight. MOST IMPORTANTLY, I love the way Flo looks slightly shocked when Yamin says Je coupe le son.
AND LOOK WHO JOINS THE SHOW. It's my dear love Da Ponte.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Da Ponte
I spent most of this scene being vastly amused because I kept thinking of that video of me re-enacting it with those dolls. Haha wowww. And I'm thinking Mikele flubs a few lines in here as well, but you know. It's also fun to see Maman Weber push Josepha at Da Ponte. I love her scheming ways.
And in the next scene... we got to see some fous rires!
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Figaro and a broken chair
It took me forever to figure out what was going on, but finally I got it. When the Emperor got up, his little chair thing broke. No one noticed apart from Yamin, who then spent the rest of the scene giggling instead of delivering his lines, which tickled everybody else too. Toward the end Yamin is like Well I'm obviously not going to sit on this... but other than that no one seemed to know why he was laughing. I think you hear the moment where I finally clue in...
And then. Omg I have never seen such a good Assasymphonie. I am obsessed with the way you see Flo kind of totally crack after the YEEOOWWwwWWWww now. It's REALLY GOOD ACTING.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - L'Assasymphonie
I'm reasonably sure that the last sound of this video is my voice going "HOLY SHHHH" because WOW. I spent most of it just GAWPING from behind my camera. MY GOD.
So then I took a lil video break for a bit, but a minute later I couldn't resist another Da Ponte moment.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Don Juan
You can't even see that crazy hat that comes in through the trap door because of the fog...
AND THEN.
THIS WAS SO GOOD.
THIS VICTIME DE MA VICTOIRE.
IT WAS SO GOOD.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Victime de ma victoire
"LOOK AT FLO'S SHIRT. (maniacal laughter) OH MY GOSH."
HE BROUGHT BACK THE PRINCE INCONGRU BOOGIE but I was laughing with such excitement that the camera went blurry BUT IT'S THERE.
AND THEN WOMEN START PLAYING WITH THE FLONYTAIL.
And then that lady drinks her wine so he can't get it and Flo is like CLING.
THE THING HE DID AT "POURQUOI TRIOMPHER" WAS INEXPLICABLE AND AWESOME.
Basically this is legit the most excellent performance I have ever seen from this talented talented man.
The energy in the room was SO HIGH after that that these women a few rows behind me were like chatting about it in regular speaking voices. It was ridic and unacceptable because Mikele was trying so hard to act and they were like "LE LOL ZAT WAS SO OW YOU SAY FUNNY" and I was like TAISEZ VOUS WTF but it took them a long time and a LOT of dirty looks over my shoulder before they finally crammed it. And by that point Mikele was mostly dead anyway.
I took a bit of video from Vivre à en crever, but you remember we had important work to do with those notes so it was VERY important we get into the mosh pit.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Vivre à en crever
And everybody who's been stuck with the terrible shove-off of Constance from the DVD can see that IT'S NOT LIKE THAT NOW DON'T WORRY.
I also like how Flo doesn't even wait to get offstage before he yanks those things out of his ears. He must REALLY hate those, cos he's jerking them out during curtain call all the time. lol me and Laurel loudly planning our curtain call stragery.
UNFORTUNATELY it was basically all for naught because the most giant crowd was like trampling the security guard moments later and EVEN THOUGH WE HAD BEEN IN ROW ONE we didn't quite get our spot by the stairs. AND a fifteen-foot-tall girl was right in front of me, that mothereffer.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Curtain call
AROUND LIKE 1:50ish WHEN ESTELLE MOVES FORWARD. Flo looks at me, grins, and shakes his head. Hahaha YOU LOVE ME YOU SEXY FRENCH ROCK STAR. DON'T TRY TO DENY IT.
The milion-foot-tall girl in front of me had a sign that said something about SEE YOU AT BERCY GUYS or whatever... idk. That's a really stupid sign. I judge it. PLUS it was in my effing way. The video gets wonky then, because around 4:15 I was handing my note to MAKTAV. You see his hand come at me. He took the note and stuck it down the front of his pants... because his costume doesn't have a pocket, but still FOREVER LOL. And then at 5:30 Laurel tries to give the Nuno note to Mikele, but he WOULDN'T LOOK AT US so Estelle took it. Then we felt bad for having nothing for Estelle... alas.
LOOK AT ESTELLE AND MAEVA ROCKING OUT. SO CUTE. And then MAKTAV was playing with his cravat like it was a streamer. I LOVE THIS TROUPE. Laurel said she saw Nuno unfolding our note and reading it before the curtain even closed. AWESOME.
Then we went out into the lobby, and hilariously they had emptied out a concession stand for the Troupe to come do the dédicaces. And it was CROWDED and people were PUSHY and I did not like it. We waited for a rather long time, but finally Diane came out, followed by Merwan, and then my beloved Flo.
I... I took some VERY SPECIFIC pictures.
A RED plaid shirt and a really cute bun! Plus that mole from the Vivre à en crever video.
The weird light on his eye is because he was leaning over some beer taps to sign stuff. Laurel was joking that we should try to order a sandwich from him.
I AM FROM THE SAME CULTURE AS THE PAPARAZZI SO I FIND MY BEHAVIOUR TOTALLY NORMAL.
Anyway, then he was in my general vicinity so I decided to make a video. But it was SO CROWDED so you just get to see him smiling SUPER WONDERFULLY and writing me a little note. Which says something like "Hey there, thx again, Flow <3" I think. I assumed he's "Flow" and not "Florent Mothe" now because we're bff.
He also smiled pityingly at Laurel, who was being bludgeoned upside the head by some fool's souvenir book, so she reports that when he signed the book he put a very aggressive period after his name and when he signed Laurel's train ticket to Lille he drew her a heart as well.
At :55 is when he sees me and takes my lil ticket.
Laurel: I didn't even notice Mikele coming up behind him!
Me: Who CARES??
Idk my bff Florent Mothe
And then I just started taking more pictures. HOW COULD I NOT.
lol whoops Heyyyyyy Flo. Yep, I'm taking ANOTHER picture.
Hot dang this is gorgeous.
But then Mikele was being SO upgraded Latino. He was kissing babies and singing to himself in Italian and just being really presh. As he was passing us someone gave him a note and he started talking about how much he loves getting letters. Then he started saying, like, something about his girlfriend always nagging him and he did a really irritating falsetto girly-voice to impersonate her. I stifled my urge to say "That's a TERRIBLE impression of Flo!" Once Mikele got to those beer taps he said "Alors, qui veut du bière?" and grinned all gappily at his own joke. And then he said it again because HE JUST THOUGHT IT WAS THAT FUNNY. I love Mikelangelo Loconte. But I don't think he's a real person. I think he's a cartoon. A really glittery, slightly manic-depressive Italian cartoon.
Anyway, then I tried to capture how nice Mikele was being on film.
Upgraded Latino Mikele
But he didn't do anything super cute. So then I took another video in which he was pretty cute and then some man slammed the concession stand shut on us. So we just gloated over our autographs for a while.
Us being stupid
And then we decided we were hyped up enough on how GREAT the show was that we would wander a bit and see if we could determine which was their hotel.
Well, that took all of FOUR MINUTES because the first giant hotel we passed near the theatre was completely mobbed by fangirls. It was basically the PdS stagedoor without the barrier. So we waited with them for a while.
We saw quite a few people come by, but we were basically just smiling ridiculously at them. MAKTAV came by and I stopped to ask for an autograph. He was like Ohhh you gave me that note and I was like SURE DID and he was like That was REALLY nice and I was like WE LOVE YOU and so he asked for my name before he did my autograph... he wrote "Pour Erin, Amicallement Patrice Maktav" which is slightly less amazing than last time when he wrote "Friendly." I REALLY LOVE DA PONTE and Patrice Maktav is just awesome. By the by, he was hand in hand with one of the dancers--I'm pretty sure it's the one who played Salieri in Mozart Est Là--so that's a thing that's happening.
We also saw Estelle come by, and as she passed the crowd of French fans one went "Qu'est-ce que c'est?" Well, little Estelle spun right around and came back out the doors and said Um okay, first off, it's 'Qui c'est' because I'm a person and second, "c'est la chanteuse d'opéra du spectacle." And she basically all but did a SNAP SNAP before she stomped off. Omg Estelle's wrath is terrifying.
Anyway, Laurel and I were basically dancing around singing TATTOO ME ON YOUR BOOOOBS and making up a secret handshake and doing a lot of reprises of When you get alone and the music gets so strong it feels like LEEEEMMMMOOOOONNNNNN, everbody dance around! and stuff. We saw most everybody come back through, but I think Laurel was too cold and tired and wouldn't let me stay past 1:30ish in the hopes of seeing Mikelangeflo, so we went back to the hotel and I spammed all the websites I could with capslock screaming about how good the show was and then we crashed.
ANYWAY IT IS NOW FRIDAY AND I JUST GOT BACK FROM HOTELDOORING AND GIVING OUT THE DOLLS AND THAT WAS AWESOME TOO BUT IT'S 6AM AND I HAVE TO WAKE UP IN THREE HOURS SO GOOD NIGHT INTERNET.
Let's talk about LILLE.
I don't know when I'm going to tell the story of my last night at the Palais des Sports... but the Lille stories MUST be told. IMMEDIATELY. Because omg just awesome.
Things didn't start off super well, though. Laurel's plane was delayed an hour and I ended up sitting alone in the métro where we were supposed to meet from 11pm to about 1:30am... I was starting to worry that she would miss the last métro and, with no way to call me, I would never hear from her again. But she came in on what I'm thinking was the absolute last train of the night and we rejoiced all the way back to the house. Laurel, having just come in from a trip to Italy, was full of information about Italian people... apparently they all wear puffy jackets or furry hats and she actually heard someone yell Mamma mia. Now I kind of want to go to Italy. As we were turning in she looked at my poster of Mikele and Flo, the one where Mikele looks kind of scared and Flo looks like he's trying to be intimidating, and she commented that Mikele looked like a middle-aged Italian housewife taking his rebellious teenage son to the supermarket. And that is how we discovered that Mikele is Flo's mother. Which also explains why the manlove can never be. It would be incestuous.
We got up in the morning and went into Paris with our heavy heavy freaking luggage. I brought a bag with no shoulder strap because I'm really smart, and when I carried it my Eiffel Tower keychain would bang against the back of my knee. It got really annoying and it hurt a lot AND I was wearing tights, so I was worried it was going to rip them. But we went into town and I printed out some pictures to make the best members of the Troupe sign. Then we went to the wrong train station and, since Laurel was out of métro tickets, WALKED to the correct one. Ow ow ow ow my leg. The nice sncf lady told us that if we waited thirty minutes for a later train we would basically pay half price, so we did that. We ate some French fries and crêpes at this little train station café, and once we got on the train we wandered up and down the whole thing trying to figure out where our seats were, only to finally finally find them taken by a bunch of guys in business suits. So we sat nearby with a young hoodlum and an old lady. We mumbled lines from the show to each other and started singing badly translated lyrics under our breath just for the flolz. Laurel started it by singing "Divine, candid libertine, tonight I am going to invite myself into your BED!" The worst was "Tattoo me on your BOOBS / Do it wi-ith my mou-outh!" See, we have a running joke about those crappy English demos they posted on youtube (Flo once explained in an interview that those were called "yaourt" and now thanks to the girls at Beautiflo Mikelomanie I basically think of them as "the Floghurt lyrics") especially the Quand le rideau tombe one, which they have as "When you get alone / and the music gets so strong / it feels like LEEEMMMMOOOONNN / everbody dance around! You're my angel." (YES I KNOW it's supposed to be "heaven" instead of "lemon" but stfu.) Just imagine Solal singing "Everybody dance around."
Anyway, we pulled up at Lille and it was back to the dragging of my mothereffing bag. And um... Lille is basically the UGLIEST city I've ever seen. The buildings were all in unnecessary shapes and covered in horrible materials... one of them, which Laurel decided was Mikele's house, is basically plated in copper for no reason. It's so shiny it actually hurts to look at. And there was another one that was black with random boxes of bright colours around the windows. It's kind of like a queer Atlanta, Georgia. Basically, I've spent a lot of time in Paris in the past few months, so this was some kind of cranky culture shock all over again. We were making derogatory jokes about Lille when suddenly our path to the hotel took us through the most ridiculous excuse for a park ever. There were some trees and there was a pile of rocks and there were ugly metal benches with grass growing up through them. Then there were two teenagers just standing side by side at the far end of the park, facing us and not moving. We were hoping they wouldn't bother us or try to sell us drugs... somehow we started saying how funny it would be if one was Nuno, who is now apparently a Lillois drug dealer. I don't know. We also figured that this park must be where Solal sleeps, since he can't sleep indoors.
And then all of a sudden we were at a hotel. And it was our hotel! We got our key from the guy and he sent us down this hall to our room... and the further we went down the hall, the darker it got. By the time we got to our door we were standing in pitch blackness. It was so ridiculous we just put down our bags and laughed. Like, the doubled-over, falling to your knees laughter. WHAT IS THIS. Lille is the buttcrack of France. I had to get out my sonic screwdriver to see if we were even at the right door and to figure out how to fit the key in the lock. And then the door sticks, so it took both of us falling onto it to get it open.
And here's our room!
Hahahahaha my laptop.
This picture makes it look a lot brighter and cheerier than it is. It's actually quite dingy and I can see outlines on the walls of where things like fire safety instructions and a phone used to be hanging. Classsss. Still, it's clean and the room is sixty euros a night, so hey, I'm content.
And then I discovered that all my whining about that keychain sticking me was TOTALLY VALID.
I literally SPILLED MY OWN BLOOD to see Mozart l'Opéra Rock.
Well, then we started getting ready for the show. I put on my whore-iest fake eyelashes and as much other makeup as I could make my face contain because IT'S FUN. While we took turns using the mirror in the bathroom (it's too dark in the rest of the room to see your reflection) we conspired and wrote notes for our two favourite cast members.
We basically told Maktav that Da Ponte is the BEST and he's always right even though nobody listens to him and he's loyal to Mozart and we like it when he helps that lady up after Salieri pushes her down during Victime de ma victoire. And we said we heard him singing on youtube and he's good and we wish he sang in the show.
And for Nuno we were like WHAAAAT you are good at playing ALL THE ROLES YOU PLAY and also Mozart and also the clown so basically we think you should do a one-man show called Nuno l'Opéra Rock because it would be the best. Seriously, we told him we thought he could even play Aloysia. And we said we saw his Mozart on youtube and cried over his Je dors sur des roses. We didn't mention his naked outdoor guitar playing, though.
Remember that curtain call video I have where someone hands Patrice Maktav a note and without ever considering it might be for him he's like Who do I give this to? I decided that THE ONLY WAY I could correct the pain that moment causes my soul is by giving Patrice Maktav a note FOR HIM at curtain call. And then we thought it would be HILARIOUS if we handed the Nuno note to Mikele and were like NO NOT FOR YOU. PLEASE PASS IT ALONG. So that was our plan.
Here we are failing at making sexy faces in all our glam makeup!
AND THEN WE WERE OFF TO THE ZÉNITH.
Of course, Lille is the sketchiest city in France apparently and we had to walk in our whore makeup in the cold in the dark, so that sucked. We're pretty close to the stadium thing, but we still had to go under a scary bridge where a bunch of cars were weirdly parked and past this really tall fence behind which were a whole bunch of CAMPERS for some reason, then over a million train tracks and around a corner and FINALLY we saw a giant MOR poster. It was really creepy. We kept going "OH LILLE YOU ARE SUCH A BEAUTIFUL TOWN" and such. And we were singing "Elles ont choisi Mozart! Elles ont choisi Mozart!" because it's fun.
We got to the stadium and wandered around outside for a while, hoping to spot the hotel I'd been informed of. And while we were wandering, we randomly passed YAMIN. We both stopped and stared at him stupidly for a while but he was talking to some other fans and seemed rushed, so then we were like Uhhh let's keep walking. And then we started going YAMIN IT WAS YAMIN THIS IS REAL IT'S REALLY HAPPENING WE'RE HERE WE'RE BACK IT'S MOZARRRRRT and such.
At the door some security people looked in our bags and asked us if we had periscopes. We stared at them so blankly and they asked ten more times and finally they gestured with their hands and said CAMERAS and we were like OH! Uhhh no? and they let us through. Periscopes??? We looked it up and yes, that is still the thing from a submarine. So then I wondered how many people bring periscopes in to see MOR...
Inside the Zénith there were a bunch of people selling all kinds of food, so we bought some Nutella gauffres and OM NOM NOM SO GOOD. We were pretty early, so we wandered back and forth a lot.
We decided to go to our seat. Perhaps you remember this...
Yep, we were the red dot.
Well, that was the weirdest thing I've ever seen. We had to go up a flight of stairs in the lobby, then another flight of stairs across the balcony, and then the highest flight to get to our seats. The usher was like, "Okay, you'll see row z... you're in the row BEHIND THAT."
I think they constructed this whole balcony just for MOR, too, because for some reason that I will never be okay with IT WAS CROOKED. Like, it was on a slope. The STAIRS were sloped down on the left. It was like trying to escape the Titanic getting to those seats. Like in a nightmare where everything is a leeettle bit off. I have never been so disoriented.
So I was like Laurel, we are going to find seats closer up, my friend.
We started scouring the room, checking for two seats together that were empty. We knew there wasn't much hope given that the tickets had all sold out for that performance, but still. We saw a few seats on the aisle on the floor level but after a few minutes they filled up.
And then I saw two empty seats on the very front row, off to the left where Diane sings Ah vous dirai-je maman. I stared obsessively at them and started praying to God that they stayed open.
And they did.
Laurel and I started desperately discussing how quickly we could run down these crooked steps and then the other two flights of stairs during curtain call. Because you KNOW other people would eying those seats all over the room. When Jean Michel Meunier came out to do the intro thing he even pointed at the seats with his bow and clearly asked someone in the front row why they were empty. I couldn't handle it. I spent all of Penser l'Impossible staring at those seats. I knew act one was going to be HELLLLL if I just sat there watching two empty seats, fidgeting and panicking that someone would get there first.
So as the Innkeeper's Song started up I looked at Laurel and said "I'm gonna try to get down there. If you see me make it, you come too." She looked incredibly uncomfortable, but I was like THIS IS HAPPENING NOW. I got up and started down the crooked staircase and by the time I was at the lower balcony level Laurel was right behind me. We went down the third staircase in the lobby and then we just strutted through the lower doors and past the ushers like we knew what we were doing. By the time Le Trublion started up, we were in the front row.
WE WERE IN THE FRONT ROW. The lady next to us grinned and said something about how good the seats were and I was like YAH. I was so ecstatic my hands were shaking. THE FRONT ROW HAS ALWAYS BEEN MY DREAM. MY DREAAAAM. THE GOOD LORD REWARDS PATIENT FANATICISM.
So Le Trublion was going and I had the HUGEST smile on my face. The guy who I always call That Guy, the one who's Solal's understudy and plays Stephanie when Nuno is being a clown and sometimes does the opening violin part, saw us and did a big silly grin at our expressions. It was amazing. Oh my gosh it was amazing.
Now, Laurel loves Diane almost as much as I love Flo, so I last-minute decided to tape her Ah vous dirai-je maman. They had said not to bring cameras and periscopes into the theatre, but the moment the show started every single person pulled out a camera, so obviously no one actually cared once you got past security.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Ah vous dirai-je maman
LOOK HOW CLOSE. I love her sweet expressions here, but I don't think her character is onstage enough for us to understand a transition between her little shrug at the end of this song and her pine-y-ness in Si je défaille. I guess she plays it as really young at the beginning?
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Six pieds sous terre
I just wanted some Diane to get me by till the next time I see the show. I've been stuck with hunchy ol Claire on the DVD for way too long.
I love both Diane and Mélissa, and oooh the harmony during the bridge is nice!
My early videos are kinda shaky because I was still settling down into the OMG FRONT ROW that was screaming in my brain.
And then I was like IF I HAVE TO GET A FACEFUL OF EVIL CLOWN THEN SO DO YOU
MOR Lille Fev 3 - J'accuse mon père
LOLLL I PANICKED WHEN HE POPPED THE FIRST BALLOON. And about 35 seconds in I laughed at Mikele's acting. Gahhh I love the riffs Solal does during this song now. I remembered them from Paris and I miss them when I hear the CD. OH GOD THE CLOWN WHISPERS SOMETHING IN MIKELE'S EARS WHAT DID HE SAY
And then I just settled in and watched the show for a while.
I did take a picture so I could document THE CLOSENESS.
Omg yay.
OH AND. Mikele flubbed his lines a lot, but overall he was still doing pretty well. Laurel and I did a lot of punching each other and laughing at his acting, especially during Bim Bam Boum. Oh Mikele, I love you so much but I hope you don't mind being a rock star and not a big movie star.
The extras were a lot of fun to watch this close, too. I especially love the guys rejecting Mozart's music during Tatoue-moi. They're so ANNOYED by him and disgusted by his music and it delights me. And then during La Mascarade we spent a lot of time laughing at the weird stuff the dancers were getting up to. AND I was looking at Merwan!death in terror as he walked by, and he saw me and stopped a little and started, like, pretending he was coming out into the audience. NO MERWAN YOU STAY PUT YOU SCARY MAN.
Anywhere, during Je dors sur des roses Mikele REALLY stepped it up. It was pretty freaking amazing. As I say at the end of this video.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Je dors sur des roses
Haha, you can't actually see ANYTHING at the end. But you can hear my elation and that's what matters.
So during intermission I just sat there like :DDDDDD because OMG FRONT ROW AND FLO WOULD BE COMING OUT SOON AND IT WOULD BE THE BEST
Little did I know IT ACTUALLY DID TURN OUT TO BE THE BEST.
I took a few more pictures just to make it clear to the world that my view was SO GOOD.
Ana said this looks like Solal is pretending to drive a car.
Nuno during this song is my new favourite thing. I am usually quite uncomfortable when I am near the clown, but with Nuno out there I spent most of this song laughing delightedly.
During Place je passe Laurel pointed out that one of the dancers had extraordinarily happy facial expressions, so I had a really good time watching him. But I was distracted because of what was coming next.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Il a choisi Mozart
I have a lot of trouble deciding whether I want to film Flo or the plot when I'm this close. Also lolll there is no reason for Yamin to sing Bad Romance in this scene now, but I don't mind that he does.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Répétition
Nuno's faces are SO FUNNY. Also, Flo's slow clap thing. Also, I love this scene but Mikele flubs his lines a little near the beginning.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Le Bien qui fait mal & Promesse de mariage
So yeah, this is good and all, but just you wait. The longer he was onstage, the more AMAZING Flo became. I have seen this show A LOT okay, and this performance was just something else. Anyway so I took my Bien qui fait mal video and then I was so entranced by the promesse de mariage scene that I just kept filming. So here, have some promesse de mariage scene! You can tell my all the giggling that I was having a fantastic time. Also, Mikele's acting, though still incredibly Mikele-y, is so much better now than it was on the DVD. Give MOR a few more years and he'll be Oscar-worthy!
And by a few more years I mean a few more decades. Oh Mikele you precious lil Italian moflo.
Anyway, then halfway through Les Solos sous les draps I was like, You know what? I want a video of this song.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Les Solos sous les draps
OH BUH you can barely see it in this video, but omg right when Mikele throws the promesse de mariage off the stage Laurel threw herself out of her chair and crawled down to grab it. Mikele was sitting right above her and he smiled and shook his head like, What a ridiculous fan that is. It was awesome. You can kinda see his expression while the camera is flailing back and forth between Laurel's scampering and Mikele sitting cross-legged. And then when the dancer grabs him and Mikele shrieks he actually seemed caught off-guard. And LOOK AT THE THING MERWAN IS DOING AT THE END. It is so funny.
AND THEN.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Rosenbeeeeerg
Hahahaha that is a REALLY GOOD ONE. This is about the time when Flo really just started tearing it up. Oh my gosh so good. And apparently the Shakespeare/Corneille/Racine thing is just part of the show now. Aw-riiiight. MOST IMPORTANTLY, I love the way Flo looks slightly shocked when Yamin says Je coupe le son.
AND LOOK WHO JOINS THE SHOW. It's my dear love Da Ponte.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Da Ponte
I spent most of this scene being vastly amused because I kept thinking of that video of me re-enacting it with those dolls. Haha wowww. And I'm thinking Mikele flubs a few lines in here as well, but you know. It's also fun to see Maman Weber push Josepha at Da Ponte. I love her scheming ways.
And in the next scene... we got to see some fous rires!
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Figaro and a broken chair
It took me forever to figure out what was going on, but finally I got it. When the Emperor got up, his little chair thing broke. No one noticed apart from Yamin, who then spent the rest of the scene giggling instead of delivering his lines, which tickled everybody else too. Toward the end Yamin is like Well I'm obviously not going to sit on this... but other than that no one seemed to know why he was laughing. I think you hear the moment where I finally clue in...
And then. Omg I have never seen such a good Assasymphonie. I am obsessed with the way you see Flo kind of totally crack after the YEEOOWWwwWWWww now. It's REALLY GOOD ACTING.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - L'Assasymphonie
I'm reasonably sure that the last sound of this video is my voice going "HOLY SHHHH" because WOW. I spent most of it just GAWPING from behind my camera. MY GOD.
So then I took a lil video break for a bit, but a minute later I couldn't resist another Da Ponte moment.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Don Juan
You can't even see that crazy hat that comes in through the trap door because of the fog...
AND THEN.
THIS WAS SO GOOD.
THIS VICTIME DE MA VICTOIRE.
IT WAS SO GOOD.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Victime de ma victoire
"LOOK AT FLO'S SHIRT. (maniacal laughter) OH MY GOSH."
HE BROUGHT BACK THE PRINCE INCONGRU BOOGIE but I was laughing with such excitement that the camera went blurry BUT IT'S THERE.
AND THEN WOMEN START PLAYING WITH THE FLONYTAIL.
And then that lady drinks her wine so he can't get it and Flo is like CLING.
THE THING HE DID AT "POURQUOI TRIOMPHER" WAS INEXPLICABLE AND AWESOME.
Basically this is legit the most excellent performance I have ever seen from this talented talented man.
The energy in the room was SO HIGH after that that these women a few rows behind me were like chatting about it in regular speaking voices. It was ridic and unacceptable because Mikele was trying so hard to act and they were like "LE LOL ZAT WAS SO OW YOU SAY FUNNY" and I was like TAISEZ VOUS WTF but it took them a long time and a LOT of dirty looks over my shoulder before they finally crammed it. And by that point Mikele was mostly dead anyway.
I took a bit of video from Vivre à en crever, but you remember we had important work to do with those notes so it was VERY important we get into the mosh pit.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Vivre à en crever
And everybody who's been stuck with the terrible shove-off of Constance from the DVD can see that IT'S NOT LIKE THAT NOW DON'T WORRY.
I also like how Flo doesn't even wait to get offstage before he yanks those things out of his ears. He must REALLY hate those, cos he's jerking them out during curtain call all the time. lol me and Laurel loudly planning our curtain call stragery.
UNFORTUNATELY it was basically all for naught because the most giant crowd was like trampling the security guard moments later and EVEN THOUGH WE HAD BEEN IN ROW ONE we didn't quite get our spot by the stairs. AND a fifteen-foot-tall girl was right in front of me, that mothereffer.
MOR Lille Fev 3 - Curtain call
AROUND LIKE 1:50ish WHEN ESTELLE MOVES FORWARD. Flo looks at me, grins, and shakes his head. Hahaha YOU LOVE ME YOU SEXY FRENCH ROCK STAR. DON'T TRY TO DENY IT.
The milion-foot-tall girl in front of me had a sign that said something about SEE YOU AT BERCY GUYS or whatever... idk. That's a really stupid sign. I judge it. PLUS it was in my effing way. The video gets wonky then, because around 4:15 I was handing my note to MAKTAV. You see his hand come at me. He took the note and stuck it down the front of his pants... because his costume doesn't have a pocket, but still FOREVER LOL. And then at 5:30 Laurel tries to give the Nuno note to Mikele, but he WOULDN'T LOOK AT US so Estelle took it. Then we felt bad for having nothing for Estelle... alas.
LOOK AT ESTELLE AND MAEVA ROCKING OUT. SO CUTE. And then MAKTAV was playing with his cravat like it was a streamer. I LOVE THIS TROUPE. Laurel said she saw Nuno unfolding our note and reading it before the curtain even closed. AWESOME.
Then we went out into the lobby, and hilariously they had emptied out a concession stand for the Troupe to come do the dédicaces. And it was CROWDED and people were PUSHY and I did not like it. We waited for a rather long time, but finally Diane came out, followed by Merwan, and then my beloved Flo.
I... I took some VERY SPECIFIC pictures.
A RED plaid shirt and a really cute bun! Plus that mole from the Vivre à en crever video.
The weird light on his eye is because he was leaning over some beer taps to sign stuff. Laurel was joking that we should try to order a sandwich from him.
I AM FROM THE SAME CULTURE AS THE PAPARAZZI SO I FIND MY BEHAVIOUR TOTALLY NORMAL.
Anyway, then he was in my general vicinity so I decided to make a video. But it was SO CROWDED so you just get to see him smiling SUPER WONDERFULLY and writing me a little note. Which says something like "Hey there, thx again, Flow <3" I think. I assumed he's "Flow" and not "Florent Mothe" now because we're bff.
He also smiled pityingly at Laurel, who was being bludgeoned upside the head by some fool's souvenir book, so she reports that when he signed the book he put a very aggressive period after his name and when he signed Laurel's train ticket to Lille he drew her a heart as well.
At :55 is when he sees me and takes my lil ticket.
Laurel: I didn't even notice Mikele coming up behind him!
Me: Who CARES??
Idk my bff Florent Mothe
And then I just started taking more pictures. HOW COULD I NOT.
lol whoops Heyyyyyy Flo. Yep, I'm taking ANOTHER picture.
Hot dang this is gorgeous.
But then Mikele was being SO upgraded Latino. He was kissing babies and singing to himself in Italian and just being really presh. As he was passing us someone gave him a note and he started talking about how much he loves getting letters. Then he started saying, like, something about his girlfriend always nagging him and he did a really irritating falsetto girly-voice to impersonate her. I stifled my urge to say "That's a TERRIBLE impression of Flo!" Once Mikele got to those beer taps he said "Alors, qui veut du bière?" and grinned all gappily at his own joke. And then he said it again because HE JUST THOUGHT IT WAS THAT FUNNY. I love Mikelangelo Loconte. But I don't think he's a real person. I think he's a cartoon. A really glittery, slightly manic-depressive Italian cartoon.
Anyway, then I tried to capture how nice Mikele was being on film.
Upgraded Latino Mikele
But he didn't do anything super cute. So then I took another video in which he was pretty cute and then some man slammed the concession stand shut on us. So we just gloated over our autographs for a while.
Us being stupid
And then we decided we were hyped up enough on how GREAT the show was that we would wander a bit and see if we could determine which was their hotel.
Well, that took all of FOUR MINUTES because the first giant hotel we passed near the theatre was completely mobbed by fangirls. It was basically the PdS stagedoor without the barrier. So we waited with them for a while.
We saw quite a few people come by, but we were basically just smiling ridiculously at them. MAKTAV came by and I stopped to ask for an autograph. He was like Ohhh you gave me that note and I was like SURE DID and he was like That was REALLY nice and I was like WE LOVE YOU and so he asked for my name before he did my autograph... he wrote "Pour Erin, Amicallement Patrice Maktav" which is slightly less amazing than last time when he wrote "Friendly." I REALLY LOVE DA PONTE and Patrice Maktav is just awesome. By the by, he was hand in hand with one of the dancers--I'm pretty sure it's the one who played Salieri in Mozart Est Là--so that's a thing that's happening.
We also saw Estelle come by, and as she passed the crowd of French fans one went "Qu'est-ce que c'est?" Well, little Estelle spun right around and came back out the doors and said Um okay, first off, it's 'Qui c'est' because I'm a person and second, "c'est la chanteuse d'opéra du spectacle." And she basically all but did a SNAP SNAP before she stomped off. Omg Estelle's wrath is terrifying.
Anyway, Laurel and I were basically dancing around singing TATTOO ME ON YOUR BOOOOBS and making up a secret handshake and doing a lot of reprises of When you get alone and the music gets so strong it feels like LEEEEMMMMOOOOONNNNNN, everbody dance around! and stuff. We saw most everybody come back through, but I think Laurel was too cold and tired and wouldn't let me stay past 1:30ish in the hopes of seeing Mikelangeflo, so we went back to the hotel and I spammed all the websites I could with capslock screaming about how good the show was and then we crashed.
ANYWAY IT IS NOW FRIDAY AND I JUST GOT BACK FROM HOTELDOORING AND GIVING OUT THE DOLLS AND THAT WAS AWESOME TOO BUT IT'S 6AM AND I HAVE TO WAKE UP IN THREE HOURS SO GOOD NIGHT INTERNET.
