Diary of an RA Fan — Part 20 My Kingdom for a Plastic Horse

See Diary Part 19 here, or to access all entries, hit “The Diary” tab above.

Entry — Still Fall, 2008:

I joined the Armitage Army forum today. The lure of it was too much to resist any longer. My desperation to talk to others about Richard Armitage and Stanislavski and identities and art simply overcame any hesitance I had about looking like a fangurl with exploding ovaries. I want to wallow in a discussion about what I’m discovering, and IMDb is not enough. What I’ve read on the Army site has given me tons to check out, but it’s a little daunting knowing where to start.

A couple of weeks later:

I didn’t get very far. I became distracted by a discussion that may have cured me of my fascination with Richard Armitage. Me, the cheapskate, has totally had my purse strings loosened by this guy, so once again I had to buy something that had several posters atwitter. It’s amazing to me what I’ve bought in the last several months. Thankfully, this item wasn’t very expensive, but I did have it sent express mail, which costs a young fortune, and now I’m the owner of one of these.

My only problem is that I can’t let this thing see the light of day. I mean I don’t even know where to put it. I’m not quite ready to take a page out of the book of the ladies who went on about theirs. Several of them said they used their kids for cover. The little SOs would not let me do that. They would call bull on me so fast, it would make my head spin. I don’t have that luxury, so I’m stuck with this thing crammed, er, lovingly placed at the back of my lingerie drawer. I CANNOT BELIEVE I’m writing this. What’s really sad is that I’m bummed I didn’t get what I really wanted — one of these.

So much for art.

Present day:

I hid that doll so well I couldn’t find it to take a picture for this post. I moved it from the lingerie drawer so it wouldn’t be discovered there and given a significance that it doesn’t hold. Now I’m wondering where it will emerge, and what my explanation, if any, will be. LOL!

See Diary Part 21 here.

August 25, 2010
Categories: Fandom, Robin Hood . Tags: , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 21 Comments

Diary of an RA Fan — Part 19 “the important thing is that you play truly.”

See Diary Part 18 here, or to access all entries, hit “The Diary” tab above.

Entry — Fall, 2008

Autumn is finally here in earnest, and its beauty usually makes me pensive. But this year I feel rushed. There is so much I’ve wanted to do, and I’ve done almost nothing. Dad’s gone and Mom’s not in great health, but that doesn’t seem to stop her from talking about England. That’s all she ever talks about, and I know full well the chance we’ll go there is almost nil. She is simply not up to it, and I can’t be gone for another month. The world would stop around here if I were gone for a month as I was last summer. Then again, maybe that would be a good thing. LOL!

I was driving over to see Mimi the other day. I love to drive to Mimi’s. It takes me on one of my favorite routes. The trees are close to the road and seem to glow as if they’re lighting the way to somewhere sublime. I swear they’re backlit by something other than the sun. Even though I love visiting Mimi, I wanted to just sit in the woods. It was a gorgeous day, truly a halcyon day — sunny but cool and barely a cloud in the sky. Just enough clouds to make the sky seem painted. Yeah, sometimes it’s so blue it doesn’t look real. I’m blessed to live here.

But I’m not satisfied. I wonder what that really feels like. Maybe I experienced it when SO and I were coming to know each other or when we had the little SOs. I certainly love them all more than I can express, but feeling satisfied is so fleeting, I’m not sure I’ve experienced it. Maybe it’s not supposed to last long. I don’t know. So much I don’t know, and there’ s not much time to figure it out.

I haven’t watched any Richard Armitage for a couple of weeks, and I’m feeling some withdrawal. That simply can’t happen. It’s an inexpensive thrill for me even if I do have several hundred dollars invested, and I’m going to continue. And whom does it hurt? I watch when I have time! ROFLOL!! Yeah, I’ve made time for it, but I’ve got to have some outlet or I’ll go nuts, and I don’t want to go nuts again. I’d rather re-immerse myself in Robin Hood even though the frustration lingers about its ending and my silly urge to blame someone hasn’t gone away. Dominic Minghella, the chief writer, is apparently the guilty party. Must find out more about him because I need to understand how someone could develop those characters and then use them like that? Or maybe it was just over my head.

I’ve got to put all of that aside. At least long enough to rewatch the show; otherwise, it will be a constant specter, and I’ll never figure out what fascinates me so much about a character who’s a thug, and of course I realize he wants redemption. Redemption stories are almost always powerful, but I’ve never had quite this reaction to such a minor character.

I could dismiss it as mere objectification of Richard Armitage. Damn. No! But oh his movements are beautiful. Even his seemingly languid movements are rife with something begging to be explored. His movements in total are imbued with something I just can’t name. I would love to describe what it is, but words fail. They always fail. I guess I’m lazy. If it’s not easy to say, I drop it and move on. I’ve always had a problem expressing myself about anything that moves me deeply except to sometimes fob it off with a crack. But something truly fitting for what I feel never comes. My words never sound as I want them to sound. They’re prosaic, and I cringe at them.

A few days later:

I started reading Stanislavski. That’s something I’ve wanted to do ever since I was a teen and became fascinated with Brando and James Dean. Richard Armitage reminds me of those two more than any other actors. In my mind he’s those two fused. When I was a kid, Mom referenced the Actors Studio where Brando and Dean studied. She also spoke some of Stella Adler. From there it wasn’t too many steps to pique my interest in Stanislavski. I should have read him years ago. Only a few pages into his book and I was intrigued. He is speaking of things I’ve thought but didn’t feel free to pursue. To pursue them would be playing mind games, but heck, I’ve done that anyway. I wonder how much better I could have expressed myself if I had let my mind unfocus and tap into my subconscious. What I’m loving is that I have finally figured out what Richard Armitage is doing that has sucked me in so thoroughly!

This explains a lot and contains a description of what happens to me when I watch Richard:

The fundamental aim of our art is the creation of this inner life of a human spirit, and its expression in an artistic form… Our experience has led to a firm belief that only our kind of art, soaked as it is in the living experiences of human beings, can artistically reproduce the impalpable shadings and depths of life. Only such art can completely absorb the spectator and make both understand and also inwardly experience the happenings on the stage, enriching his inner life, and leaving impressions which will not fade with time. — Spoken by Director Tortsov from An Actor Prepares

The inner man he’s created, the inner life is playing out, and the truth of it is so beautiful I can’t get enough. There’s a sanity to it that I’ve seldom seen in an actor. Maybe I’ve never seen it.

“Impalpable shadings and depths of life.” What a way to describe it. Perfect really. John Thornton drinking tea at the Hale’s, nodding his head but unable to look at or speak to his mother after his rejection from Margaret, agonizing at the train station before Margaret comes back to him with her portmanteau. John Standring having his mouth full of sausage, being frustrated at his body’s impatience in an intimate moment with Carol, grinning at Carol as he tries on a suit. And Guy. Guy awkwardly holding the Sheriff’s bird, lighting up when he realizes the nun is a fake, looking intently at Marian when he sees she’s not wearing her betrothal ring, beaming when he comes to tell her the king is returning, rushing up like a little boy to her before the wedding. The ring of truth in these moments completely submerges Richard Armitage and the person he’s fashioned is there thinking and feeling and drawing me into his story.

“Will not fade with time.” Certainly I will remember John Thornton’s sweet eyes looking at Margaret as she explains her business proposition or Guy saying to his servant Thornton that the thing is to be understood.

[note: imagine my grin a year later when I read RA’s crack in this article. There will be more about all of this. It’s too much for one post. Oh, and I went on to read more Stanislavski and some Grotowski and Vakhtangov. Phew.]

Quote in the title from Mikhail Shchepkin.

See Diary Part 20 here.

August 17, 2010
Categories: Interviews, North and South, Robin Hood, SO . Tags: , , , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 12 Comments

Yorkshire Wench

NOTE: if you’re looking for Yorkshire Wench’s videos, they are no longer accessible online. Go here for more information.

Man, that name conjures all sorts of things. Of course John Thornton and his proximity to Yorkshire, and as a good little RA fan I know RA has ties to Yorkshire as well, and not only due to his interest in Richard III. Then there is my own experience with the place. I was simply overwhelmed by Yorkshire and really bummed I didn’t get to spend more time there. I love history and having read about the War of the Roses, I really wanted to see Yorkshire as I got to see Lancashire. Plus, my camera was having a problem when I drove through there, so I didn’t get one picture! Perhaps this means I have to go back to the U.K. and rectify that? Oh yeah, that’s what it means. LOL!

I wanted to embed this wonderful picture of the Yorkshire Dales, but WP is being a bully, so I’ve uploaded it, Do me a favor and click on the photo to see its original, and hey, you should probably vote for this picture on that site as well.

But all of that is not what this post is about. This is about someone who has supplied many RA fans with countless hours of pleasure in viewing videos and screencaps. YorkshireWench was one of the first to make fanvideos of RA’s works, and I have several. They are some of the first RA videos I obtained, and I still have them in online storage and some on my iPod. I think I’ve thanked her for those on LiveJournal on several occasions (but not as RAFrenzy). However, I’m going to thank her again because she’s shutting down her website, and I’m taking the occasion to tell her again how grateful I am for her work, which is really all I know of her except that I think her name is Claire and she’s a Pisces like me.

If you’re new to RA, then you have probably never seen these videos, since they are not on YouTube. Here is the link to her website [link disabled; see edit below] where you can get links to her videos on Vimeo. You will have to get the links on her site since all of these videos are private and therefore will not come up in search results on Vimeo. To access them you will need a password, which is listed on the homepage of her site. You can also download the videos in various formats. I recommend downloading because the quality is so much better than Vimeo.

Some of my favorites:

Any Other Name (Robin Hood)

Requiem for a Dream (Robin Hood)

Upside Down (The Impressionists)

Adagio for Strings (North and South)

What If (North and South)

Enough about that; go take a look, and if you’re offended by some slash, you might not want to look. I’ll tell you plainly that I’m not a fan of slash, but there are plenty of others to like, and I do. Just so you know, “Any Other Name” is one of my all time favorite Guy videos, I just couldn’t upload it or easily link to it for my top ten fanvids.

edit: since I wrote this piece, Yorkshire Wench has shut down her site, but I have obtained links to all of her Richard Armitage videos on Vimeo, which you can find here. If you want links to all of her videos, you can find them here. But if you go directly to Vimeo, the password is butterfly.

August 13, 2010
Categories: Fanvids, North and South, Robin Hood, The Impressionists, Vidders to Watch . Tags: , , , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 24 Comments

Who the Hell is Richard Armitage?

[NOTE: I now have a permanent page (“Who is Richard Armitage?”), and it has more video clips.]

This post is for all of you who have recently been introduced to Richard Armitage, the actor, via some poll or celebrity site where he popped up as perhaps the number two or even the number one contender in a contest. But you have never seen him animated and are completely perplexed by his fans’ love. Somewhere, sometime, some of you have uttered that question. I used to ask it myself! Hopefully when you are done with this post, you will begin to understand what his fans see. I’m not going to waste time trotting out his bio. You can read that on IMDb.

I want to gush and draw you the perfect picture of him with my words. To somehow convince you that he deserves the respect his fans give him. But I know it is probably wasted because I’ve been where you are, and no words were going to do it for me. I had seen stills of Richard Armitage before I saw him act, and I was profoundly unmoved and even put off. He just can’t be appreciated from a few pictures. The chameleon quality he brings to his acting helps to make him one of the finest actors, but it sometimes puts him at odds with stills. Seeing him moving and speaking is the key to understanding. If you have never done that, then you don't get it. But you’re in for a treat if you watch him. Not only is he extremely masculine, he is sensitive as well, and the superb mingling of these makes him an utterly beautiful man to behold. As gushy as I am, this post has been very difficult to write. I want to gush a lot more, but I’ll refrain and let him speak for himself.

John Thornton:

Guy of Gisborne:

Harry Kennedy:

Claude Monet:

John Standring, one of my favorite characters:

Lucas North:

Ricky Deeming:

John Porter:

edit:

Thorin Oakenshield, his latest portrayal:

August 4, 2010
Categories: Fandom, Miscellaneous works, Movies, North and South, Robin Hood, Sparkhouse, Spooks, Strike Back, The Hobbit, Vicar of Dibley . Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 23 Comments

By Popular Demand

Okay, so I don’t know who all loves a certain video, but a few do if my email is any indication, and I think I’ve made it clear how much I love it. :D I will say again that its name fits — “Guy-Supermassive….”

Oh, and the shot above is from one of the best parts of the video — when the song’s bridge is playing. LOVE IT! Perfect clip!

I’m excited Elvira, per Joana’s enthusiastic consent, has now put it up on her site RAfanvids, and in several formats. If you’ve had trouble viewing from your phone, perhaps this will help. Check it out.

Enjoy!

edit:

Thanks to Elvira I’ve uploaded a better copy of the video to YouTube and disabled the older copy.

July 29, 2010
Categories: Fanvids, Robin Hood . Tags: , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 4 Comments

Google Can Be Such a Tease

Those alerts can really mess with my head if I let them. Thankfully, I’m a skeptic so I mostly don’t fall for it. But sometimes I miss out because what I’m reading might be true. This morning (for those who don’t already know) there was an alert about Strike Back. Supposedly it’s been renewed for a second series. I will love that if it happens, but for now I’m reserving my hysteria happiness until someone can confirm for my jaded ass that it’s true.

Somehow The Mirror reporting it isn’t enough. Can’t remember what they burned me on, but it was something or I would be giddy by now. Plus, the lack of detail in that piece makes me want to stay away. Or is this just my cynical self running amok?

In the meantime, a picture of RA’s character being put upon:

Oh! Freudian slip. This is the one I meant:

Screencaps courtesy of RichardArmitageCentral.com and RichardArmitageNet.Com

July 28, 2010
Categories: Robin Hood, Rumors, Strike Back . Tags: , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 6 Comments

The King May Have Been Dethroned

Or maybe a serious coup attempted.

I love this picture:

and I think it is the best picture of RA. King in my mind. I mean who could look at that and not have some reaction to it even if they have never seen him in any roles? Oh, someone dead? Yeah, that’s about it.

But I may have seen the one that can give it serious competition, and I wish someone who has something to do with the “Captain America” movie read my piddly blog. They could see how good RA looks in the picture below. Since the movie is being made by Hollywood, of course looks are the primary consideration. We know RA can act in anything, but does he have the look for a part in that movie? Oh, baby, yes!

A big thanks to Kaprekar for this photo. I was going to just add it to another post, but it deserves its own:

I need a new tag: PHWOAR!2

second edit: and I forgot to mark the jawline tag for this entry! Yes, you can click on that tag and look at all of the lovely profile shots in this blog, or most of them anyway. That’s my public service gene at work, so I just can’t help but think of these things for the edification of all of us. ;-) Thanks, fitzg for reminding me.

By the way, that second picture is an edit of a Robin Hood promo picture found on RichardArmitageNet.Com

July 23, 2010
Categories: Captain America, Miscellaneous works, Movies, PHWOAR!, Robin Hood, Rumors . Tags: , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 14 Comments

Some Days I’m More Perfect Than Others

Sometimes I’m just on, and I can’t be stopped. If I ever let you meet SO, you can ask him if I’m telling you the truth. He has sometimes referred to me as “hell on wheels,” and he means that in a good way — I think. My eyes really are blue, er, I mean green.*

But today, I’m not on, or I would have had the perfect picture before I posted my last entry. HOW COULD I NOT THINK OF THIS PICTURE?!! Before you scroll down to see it, let me just say that I’m rethinking this Union Jack thing. When I look at this picture immediately below, it makes me think of all kinds of possibilities:

I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and that’s why I’m miffed at myself for not thinking of the perfect picture in the last post. Of course, RA would be perfect as Union Jack. Look at the legs on that Union Jack guy, and then of course, we know RA can pull off the “fabric.

The Perfect Picture:

A couple more perfect pictures if you’re not convinced:

The last one is so you can see how good he looks in a mask.

Screencaps courtesy of RichardArmitageNet and my stash.

*major, major bs in this post. This comment is for the action fans. ;-)

July 22, 2010
Categories: Captain America, Miscellaneous works, Movies, PHWOAR!, Rumors, SO . Tags: , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 14 Comments

Diary of an RA Fan — Part 18 Oh, That’s Nothing

See Diary Part 17 here, or to access all entries, hit “The Diary” tab above.

Entry — Early Fall, 2008:

The Cleopatra debacle put a damper on my obsession with watching Richard Armitage. For a couple of days anyway. But when I don’t know what to watch, I do what I always do — go back to YouTube. One of these days I might get my hands on Between the Sheets, but until then, I guess my Guy of Gisborne obsession will have to be indulged. I was hoping to salve my conscience by staying away from that silly show. But I can’t stay away from Guy fan videos. I can’t stay away from YouTube. The seduction is not only Guy but the shortness of the videos. They’re no more than ten minutes and most of them are three minutes. How bad can that be? 10 minutes x 50? Surely not. 3 minutes x 50? If I’m honest.

All of this makes me afraid to know the number of videos I’ve watched. Dang! if YouTube isn’t so “kind” to count them for me. I can’t stand looking at that number. Maybe there’s an easy way to erase the counter. Is this why I went to college? Is this why I know all the crap I know? So I can reset my counter on YouTube? Ohmygod! I’ve become that consumer I always railed against — the big open mouth. Just shove it in! No! But I can’t stop gorging myself on these videos. They’re too good!! I actually feel myself getting withdrawal when I don’t watch them for a few days and can almost feel my brain being rewired while I watch. When I’m done, I’m in a kind of stupor. Not quite slack jawed but definitely a glaze over my eyes.

But is it really hurting anyone for me to watch them? 10,000+ and counting. What is wrong with me? I mean Guy is a terribly interesting character, and Richard Armitage is definitely sexy, but this is absurd. And I’ve even toyed with doing a video myself. Noooooooo! I must stop this!

Just one more:

[Big time rationalization coming up]

Oh dear Lord, I think I passed out. I have to put this on my Facebook wall!

A little while later:

LOL! I got several comments about the Guy video. From “I want to watch what you’re watching!” to “Who is that?!!!” I love it. But I really loved saying, “Oh, that’s nothing. Wait ’til you hear him talk.” When I hear him speak, it dredges up all kinds of long dead possibilities. But I’ll never tell my friends that. They can figure it out for themselves, and actually I don’t want to talk about it.

For now this is an even better way to get Richard Armitage converts than having them watch Vicar of Dibley although Vicar of Dibley was a better way than North and South. People just don’t want to watch a four hour mini-series, and especially not when it’s a period drama. At least my friends don’t seem to like the idea — even if they do read. As one put it to me, “I’d rather read the book.” But put up a video of Guy in action? Yeah, it’s like a secret weapon even the loftiest mind can’t withstand. Maybe YouTube isn’t so bad.

See Diary Part 19 here.

Video courtesy of JoanaMafalda87. If you like it, give her some love on her YouTube channel. I just hope Joana doesn’t mind my nonsense. :D

July 15, 2010
Categories: Fanvids, PHWOAR!, Robin Hood . Tags: , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 26 Comments

Forgetting Guy — Spoilers

Last year at this time it was days after Guy’s death, and I could still feel tears welling up in my eyes when I thought of it and would shake my head at the absurdity of grieving the death of a fictional character. Just now I felt them start again. Amazing.

Certainly I’ve read books and watched movies that had tragedy and loss and was profoundly moved by the events to the point I shed tears as I was reading or watching. Sometimes I’ve thought about the events for days or weeks later and in some cases months or years later. But my later thinking has always had more to do with intrigue about the human condition and certainly examining it in a kind of detached way. This wasn’t the case with Guy. With him it was personal and a grieving process, and it stunned me. I’ve had to grieve lots of deaths but never someone who’s not real. Honestly, this made me think I really was going nuts, and so my analytical side stepped up to ask why and try to make sense of it and preserve my dignity.

I’ve had a year to think about it, and I’m not sure I’ve completely made sense of it. But I understand much better what’s happened. I’ll be posting more diary entries about this process, and perhaps I’ll find I have CWS. But if I do, it’s not of Richard Armitage but rather this fantastic character he helped to create.

Now you know the real reason I’m anonymous. LOL!

When I was drafting my first post for this blog, I thought about hitting this subject right up front but knew it would not be as satisfying (at least for me) to go right to the issue I’ve wanted most to address. I really did want to have some fun along the way in my self-analysis. Could I have bored you with all sorts of psychoanalytical terms? Oh yeah, I could have. Believe me I know enough of them after up close and personal acquaintance with some psychiatrists. But you don’t want to hear all of that shit, and I really don’t want to type it.

Screencap courtesy of RichardArmitageNet.Com

June 29, 2010
Categories: Robin Hood, Spoilers . Tags: , , , , , , , . Author: RAFrenzy . Comments: 8 Comments

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