Fandom 50 (5/50): Étoile
Jun. 13th, 2025 09:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yelpIt's the ballet show by the creator of "Gilmore Girls" and "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel"! If you've watched them all (like I have) then you kind of know what you're in for. Vibrant set design and costuming, witty fast-talking, fun and flawed characters blitzing through their lives and struggles and relationships at a rapid clip. With every successive show, the creator seems to bring more of the same to a bigger and brighter stage—except this time she also added a M/M ship that, sigh, I was predictably and embarrassingly taken in by.
Before we get there, a few other things I liked. Ballet has always freaked me out, and I appreciate that the show doesn't shy away from the sweat and sacrifice that goes into it behind the scenes, the toil, the... the feet. But it's also lovely to watch the extended ballet scenes, with the emotional payoff that it's dancers you've gotten to know, so it actually means something that they're getting this performance. I love that the show is set half in New York and half in Paris. There's this fun contrast of jumping between the modern museum-like theater in NYC to the opulent, chandelier-hung palace they use as a practice studio for their barre work over in Paris. The smooth switching between languages is a treat, the accents, the French across its range of social classes. Cheyenne, the best dancer in the world, ballet like an angel, a national treasure, etc etc, I love how harsh her French accent makes her English, how it adds to her terrifying persona as she charges around in her combat boots, fighting climate change and donors and anyone she doesn't approve of in between her graceful arabesques. And Geneviève, director of Le Ballet National, jetsetting to and fro, and just how scraggledy of a creature she is, sitting on the floor, carrying her heels rather than wearing them at every opportunity, I love that for her.
And now, okay, this freaking ship. Tobias is some genius choreographer brought to Paris on loan, the infuriating visionary who's unbelievably particular about every single detail of dance yet can barely tie his shoelaces (exaggeration) (barely). Honestly the insufferable genius trope would have been insufferable for us too, if it weren't for Gabin, the ballet dancer who's danced background roles with the company for so long and lays instant claim to Tobias on their first meeting, because he's desperate for this new choreographer to make him a star.
They are both so arrogant in different ways. Tobias because he's always been allowed to be, because everyone, dancer and director, wants his choreography, so no one dares stop him when he walks off mid-sentence or dances in traffic or just pulls his headphones on and plops down onto the ground. For Gabin, on the other hand, it's because he's been an underdog his whole life. Growing up in the rough outskirts of the city doesn't exactly make it easy to pursue the very masculine career of ballet, and the only way he knows to get some respect is to fight for it. I love that contrast in him, the swagger and the vulnerability. The posturing, the bravado, and the graceful pirouettes and jetés on stage.
Because Gabin wants the part, he needs Tobias. He comes in all blustering to the studio but it's to invite Tobias to size him up, take the measure of him, fit him to his design. Anything Tobias tells him to do, he does without question. He finally gets his sprain seen to, because Tobias can tell at a glance his stride is off. In the studio, he moves where and how Tobias instructs, and when Tobias devolves to nonverbal grunts and cues, learns to read them, and more. He learns all the little things that irritates Tobias, and seems able to recite them on demand, like he's been taking great pains to avoid them. "I know you hate that," when he comes in mid-rant. He moves with a strut but his facial expressions can get so tentative.
To become a star, he needs Tobias. Yet outside the theater, Tobias is so weirdly helpless, and completely needs Gabin back. (Well, needs someone who actually knows the basics of how to function as a human being, at least.) When a rat in his apartment completely debilitates him, it's Gabin who marches over, not taking no for an answer, and smoothly and competently takes care of matters, while Tobias is still standing out in the hallway with his headphones on.
Tobias: No one's done anything like that for me before.
Gabin: I expect I'll be doing it again.
What a response. Because Tobias is hopeless? Because the two of them are tied? Whatever it is, I desperately want more of this.
Before we get there, a few other things I liked. Ballet has always freaked me out, and I appreciate that the show doesn't shy away from the sweat and sacrifice that goes into it behind the scenes, the toil, the... the feet. But it's also lovely to watch the extended ballet scenes, with the emotional payoff that it's dancers you've gotten to know, so it actually means something that they're getting this performance. I love that the show is set half in New York and half in Paris. There's this fun contrast of jumping between the modern museum-like theater in NYC to the opulent, chandelier-hung palace they use as a practice studio for their barre work over in Paris. The smooth switching between languages is a treat, the accents, the French across its range of social classes. Cheyenne, the best dancer in the world, ballet like an angel, a national treasure, etc etc, I love how harsh her French accent makes her English, how it adds to her terrifying persona as she charges around in her combat boots, fighting climate change and donors and anyone she doesn't approve of in between her graceful arabesques. And Geneviève, director of Le Ballet National, jetsetting to and fro, and just how scraggledy of a creature she is, sitting on the floor, carrying her heels rather than wearing them at every opportunity, I love that for her.
And now, okay, this freaking ship. Tobias is some genius choreographer brought to Paris on loan, the infuriating visionary who's unbelievably particular about every single detail of dance yet can barely tie his shoelaces (exaggeration) (barely). Honestly the insufferable genius trope would have been insufferable for us too, if it weren't for Gabin, the ballet dancer who's danced background roles with the company for so long and lays instant claim to Tobias on their first meeting, because he's desperate for this new choreographer to make him a star.
They are both so arrogant in different ways. Tobias because he's always been allowed to be, because everyone, dancer and director, wants his choreography, so no one dares stop him when he walks off mid-sentence or dances in traffic or just pulls his headphones on and plops down onto the ground. For Gabin, on the other hand, it's because he's been an underdog his whole life. Growing up in the rough outskirts of the city doesn't exactly make it easy to pursue the very masculine career of ballet, and the only way he knows to get some respect is to fight for it. I love that contrast in him, the swagger and the vulnerability. The posturing, the bravado, and the graceful pirouettes and jetés on stage.
Because Gabin wants the part, he needs Tobias. He comes in all blustering to the studio but it's to invite Tobias to size him up, take the measure of him, fit him to his design. Anything Tobias tells him to do, he does without question. He finally gets his sprain seen to, because Tobias can tell at a glance his stride is off. In the studio, he moves where and how Tobias instructs, and when Tobias devolves to nonverbal grunts and cues, learns to read them, and more. He learns all the little things that irritates Tobias, and seems able to recite them on demand, like he's been taking great pains to avoid them. "I know you hate that," when he comes in mid-rant. He moves with a strut but his facial expressions can get so tentative.
To become a star, he needs Tobias. Yet outside the theater, Tobias is so weirdly helpless, and completely needs Gabin back. (Well, needs someone who actually knows the basics of how to function as a human being, at least.) When a rat in his apartment completely debilitates him, it's Gabin who marches over, not taking no for an answer, and smoothly and competently takes care of matters, while Tobias is still standing out in the hallway with his headphones on.
Tobias: No one's done anything like that for me before.
Gabin: I expect I'll be doing it again.
What a response. Because Tobias is hopeless? Because the two of them are tied? Whatever it is, I desperately want more of this.
no subject
Date: 2025-06-14 08:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-06-14 03:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-07-30 05:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-06-14 05:13 pm (UTC)Honestly the insufferable genius trope would have been insufferable for us too, if it weren't for Gabin, the ballet dancer who's danced background roles with the company for so long and lays instant claim to Tobias on their first meeting, because he's desperate for this new choreographer to make him a star.
Oh yes that does make the genius trope so much better! It's interesting to think about why, both because it shifts the focus and the power dynamics maybe (and also hot ship?? And people liking each other and helping/needing each other).
Also omg I really love your description of Gabin! He sounds amazing as a character!
Is this a live show? Ahh, I do want to know more about this... Are you going to fic it? ;D
Tobias: No one's done anything like that for me before.
Gabin: I expect I'll be doing it again.
I am so starry eyed ahhh. This is so lovely!!
also I want an AU for my current ship nowno subject
Date: 2025-06-14 05:39 pm (UTC)Yeah!! There's something very different between "everyone must cater to me" and "this one person has paid so much attention to my quirks he knows what I'm getting at even when I can't express it myself".
It's a TV series on Amazon Prime! Eight episodes, sadly we just got the news there won't be a second season :( Devastating!
There should be more choreographer/dancer AUs!!! For sure!!
no subject
Date: 2025-06-15 06:58 pm (UTC)me: Bunheads!
Lol, I joke :P But I am amused to see her return to ballet again - and I hope this one can find a way to last longer than Bunheads did (also cancelled after one season...) I haven't watched Etoile, but it sounds like they really raised the stakes (and the budget) with this show! That sounds like a really fun ship, too.
no subject
Date: 2025-06-16 04:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-06-17 01:44 am (UTC)