ORC the Fourth

[lavendertook]

Sunday abandonada, spookystoy, and I headed back to ORC to catch Royd Tolkien's talk, which wound up being a panel because he didn't want to hold the floor by himself. I got in line to ask a question I was figuring no one had asked Royd before concerning my favorite footnote of all time by Christopher Tolkien to find out if any stories of The Bingos persisted in his family's folklore, and if he ever got to see Their Stuffed Excellencies. The person in front of me asked him a good question on his genealogy, which was great help in the framing of my question. He answered that, of the Tolkien children, Michael was his grandfather. So the Bingos belonged to his great uncle and great aunt--OK--got it. So then, right as I got up to the microphone, they cut off the question line, which was probably for the best, since I was the only person in that room, nay, on this planet, who was dementedly interested in this question. So I was just going to have to buy an autograph ticket for Royd if I was going to track him down and get some answers. And I did just that.

Then Daniel Falconer did a presentation on his work at WETA in designing Ents (not to be confused with the sitcom, "Designing Ents"). And now I saw why Spookystoy was praising him with great praise all weekend and intrepid fangrrling. Daniel Falconer is like the dashing young hero of a PBS mini-series about the British aristocracy who saves the day with his innate talent, grace, poise, and wit, who ushers in a new meritocracy and a new age of which he is the exemplar. Who would not want to be Daniel Falconer? So it was a great presentation, of course, as he talked about working with John Howe and Alan Lee and showed slides of the WETA design team and their conceptual work.

I then went wandering and ran into a wonderful Aragorn, who was glad to pose with Bingo because he had once snuggled a real live koala. Then we ran into an adorable Arwen, and then Singing Gandalf, each of whom Bingo needed photo ops with. Bingo did some more poses in the costume room and then I took a stroll in the art room. The winning painting was really conceptually nifty. It was a close up of the door knob on Bag End's front door, and in the shiny brass of the knob was reflected a scene of the front yard and the hills beyond. It was beautifully executed. I wish I could recall the artist's name. There were many other pretties in the room, including a number of Ted Nasmith's paintings.

I then caught a talk on the Literary Legacy of LotR. Like so many other academic fantasy & science fiction panels I've been to, everyone spent some time decrying academia's lack of acceptance of the genre. I really didn't learn anything new, but the call for more theoretical analyses of LotR was a good reminder for me to do something with the paper I wrote a little while back, so note to self.

I headed back to the main ballroom and spotted Royd Tolkien talking with fans. Abandonada and Spookystoy joined me. So I waited my turn and sprung my question on him about the Bingo's--if he had ever seen his great uncle and aunt's stuffed koala toys and if they told any stories about them.

Well, that was the first Royd Tolkien had ever heard of the Bingo's or his great uncle's footnote in the HoME discussing them. Ah well. I'm just going to have to write Christopher and Priscilla letters if I'm going to get any information on this ever. Aside from being woefully uneducated in his family's folklore, Royd was a good sport and took a picture with Bingo. He was very gracious and well-spoken, as you would expect a Tolkien to be, as well as being quite the snazzy dresser and the fandom's new sex symbol.

We then went and played with some of the WETA props and took pictures of Bingo and the denizens of Plastic Town among them. I got a Ringers t-shirt for Bingo that fit him perfectly--yay, Bingo's first convention t-shirt! And then we went back to the main theater and caught Charlie Ross's One Man Lord of the Rings Show. My thanks go to TORN for the brilliance of scheduling this wonderful performance at the con's end to give us all one rousing pick-me-up for the road. I couldn't see his face too well, but his voices of all the characters and his body movements were amazing. He performed most of it as straight homage, which made the comic lines and gestures into real zingers. But as he'd move from character to character he would also work in snatches of the musical score with perfect pitch humming, so he really did take us all through the trilogy. And the athleticism of the performance was amazing; for instance, for the scene when Gandalf is bested by Saruman, Ross threw himself on the ground and laid on his side spinning circles as Gandalf did. Some of the good lines (hey Rosamunde--I'm thinking of you!), and keep in mind he is delivering these with spot on imitations of the character's voices:

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**SPOILER ALERT: SKIP THIS SECTION IF YOU'RE GOING TO SEE HIS SHOW**

Saruman to Lurtz: Do you recall how the Orcs came into being? No? Then read the Silmarillion!

Elrond to Aragorn: Arwen's fate is tied to the ring . . . for some reason.

Orcs: Grund! Grund! Grund! Change the dvd! (He would work "change the dvd" into each appropriate spot for an ongoing gag.)

Aragorn: For Frodo!
Legolas: And Sam.
Aragorn: . . . and Sam. (This was an ongoing gag.)

Frodo: I'm glad to be here with you Samwise Gamgee. Here at the end of all things.
Sam: Are we gay, Mr. Frodo?

The Eagles! The Eagles are coming! And a moth.

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I stood with angstslashhope for some of this and were we both laughing so hard! A truly amazing performance for which description can do no justice.

So then--more standing in autograph lines! But with Abandonada, Spookystoy, rosamundeb, voontah, lilithlotr, and olotie so we had fun chatting away, being hyped up by Charles Ross' show, and I got Royd Tolkien's signature on my beloved copy of The End of the Third Age.

Abandonada, Spookystoy, Rosamundeb, and I finished the day by going out for dinner across the street in The Paseo. We had really yummy burgers and, for our entertainment, Abandonada asked us interview questions about our impressions of the con and the people we met there. And it was nice to finally get to spend some time hanging out with Rosamundeb. Our Fellowship of Four ended that evening, but I'm counting on sequels, yo.

Abandonada brought me to the airport Monday morning and we had a teary good bye.)-: My flight was graced with clear skies most of the way, so I got to watch a topographical map of the United States pass below all the way home, and it was rather nifty to view the canyons, mountains, and rivers all along the way. It clouded up some over the midwest, but I got to see the full circle of rainbows from above as I looked down into the clouds, so even that was a treat. I came back to Dulles Airport to find my car intact in the parking lot, but with a flat tire, so it was time to get back to Real Life, with my adventures and memories of my friends wrapped snuggly around me.

The End.

Comments

[brouhaha.livejournal.com]

Well, narlyenatvanya and I were just out at lunch and we agreed that there needed to be an MESPT meetup sometime in our lives.

And aww, I love Bingo so much.

[lavendertook.livejournal.com]

It would be cool. (-:

Awww--yay! (-: TY. And we're still MESPTing, so you and narlyenatvanya, should drop in, with or without sockpups! Bingo lives to chat and he needs more folks to interact with.

[bbolger-baggins.livejournal.com]

And aww, I love Bingo so much.

Y-you do? I-I didn't know that. You're a dear. Thank you! Thank you very much! *smiles stupidly*