h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Why think about gender-bending today?

No particular reason, other than that SashaQ has an excellent Guide Entry on 'Victor/Victoria', over in PR: A87828286

Drop by and read, comment.

If you're interested, the entry put me in mind of a funny German silent by Ernst Lubitsch called 'I Don't Want to Be a Man'. It's got humour and cross-dressing, and a tiny bit of Wilhelmine social commentary from 1918:

http://vimeo.com/17596063

The modern music on that version is a bit recherche, so you might want to turn the sound off. It's up to you.


If you'd like to see the original German film 'Viktor und Viktoria',archive.org has it, free gratis:

http://archive.org/details/ViktorUndViktoriaBeschwingtesMusikalischesSpielParExcellence

Bring your own popcorn.

Meanwhile, my personal nomination for all-time BEST female impersonation by a male actor goes to...

David Duchovny. Before he was Fox Mulder of the 'X-Files', Duchovny played a DEA agent on 'Twin Peaks':

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkPALneB_k4

It's those doe eyes that get you. Seriously.

All-time WORST female impersonation? This would have to George Hamilton, in 'Zorro, the Gay Blade':

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZxHGvphbjc

Now that I have, hopefully, given you enough material to mess with your minds for an entire evening, I shall say adieu.

35 minutes and 2legs hasn't commented on this yet

that... was the best sympost ever! You coudlnj't have planned it better!

Yet more fascinating links - thanks Dmitri

Time for me to log off, but I'll come back to these tomorrow

Thanks for inspiring me. We've been watching the German film.

re 5:

Always happy to be of service, my friend

'I don't want to be a man' is quite a film - no coyness about kissing in that one Fascinating... Reminds me of this book http://www.amazon.co.uk/Self-made-Man-My-Year-Disguised/dp/1843545047

I see what you mean about George Hamilton - real pantomime dame style...

I had heard about David Duchovny being in Twin Peaks, as I read a biography of him when the X-Files was on TV, but I'd never actually seen his character until now... Swooon! David is handsome as Mulder, but Denise is the next level - those eyes, that smile... wow...

Hehe. I thought you'd enjoy that. He sort of amazed me - who would have guessed he could pull that off?

Thanks for the book link - it looks fascinating.

In recent years I found myself with a bunch of friends in the Queer community, so ended up learning more about things like gender fluidity even just 'by osmosis' so to speak (and also by curiosity, following links that people post, reading about it, and so on). And being more comfortable with the idea (because what can you do, some things are kinda socially ingrained, and I need to actively struggle to get rid of these biases). While I'm definitely, boringly, traditionally cisgendered, I could never really perform 'high fem' - don't do well with high heels, don't like make-up and so on - and whenever I had to do so, it did feel like _performance_ rather than something natural.

Back to the subject of genderbending, however, one of the interesting phenomena in fan-creations (fan-art and cosplay) is 'Rule 63', creating genderbent versions of your chosen characters. Are you familiar?
Some neat resources (as might perhaps be expected, they are all Tumblr blogs) :
http://rule63rules.tumblr.com
http://fuckyeahrule63.tumblr.com
http://therule63.tumblr.com

Some of these are just 'hey, let's do [male] character X, but as a hot girl with a big cleavage', which I find a bit disappointing, but some are very well done, and really make you think about what this alternate character.
I'm sure there's a good discussion somewhere about why this became so popular, and the relation to fandom-culture in general. I can only have a vague idea, since that isn't really my 'scene'.

Wow, I'm quite impressed that the system allowed me to enter the secons Tumblr's address as-is. I was sure I'll have to it.

THanks, Lady P.

And good to see you around.

Thanks. It's nice to be around.

Wow! Those are neat resources

The Ursulas are brilliant, and I love the switch of Roger and Jessica Rabbit The Cruella De Ville photo is excellent, and the Super Mario one is really good too.

I'd seen a little bit of that sort of thing on the internet before, mostly of Disney characters, but I didn't know it was known as Rule 63 - fascinating...