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chocolateboxcomm )
Dear Chocolatier,
Thank you so much for making me something! I know my letter explanations can sound ficcish, but I would also love some art, whichever you're offering.
Some of my general preferences:
* Happy or at least hopeful endings (or in art, hopefulness and possibilities). That doesn't rule out bittersweet or melancholy or dark tones, and needn't be fluffy...in fact, I don't really find total fluff as comforting in general, for some reason. But I'm just not up for hopeless/tragic stuff.
* You can have sex in your story or art if you like, or not, any level of explicit or not--whatever suits the work best. I do prefer sex to have underpinnings to it, emotions, needs, etc.--something deeper than just sex for its own sake.
Some of the tropes and approaches I enjoy (alphabetically):
bathing/washing
communicating between the lines
cooking for and/or with each other
dressing and/or undressing the other
extreme competence (with honest weakness, no need for perfection)
first time (as opposed to an established relationship)
huddling for warmth
hurt/comfort (physical and/or emotional)
me-and-you-against-the-world
nurturing via food/drink/warmth
pining
pretend or mistaken for couple
protectiveness
rescue
sharing a bed or other cozy space--bedroll, boxcar, hammock, boat, who knows
stranded somewhere (idyllic or non-)
suffering/sacrificing for the other, especially when the other tries to stop it, has big emotions about it, tries to take it on himself instead
tending wounds
trust--especially trust being discovered, and/or trust being tested
uncovering a secret
undercover as or mistaken for rentboy or sugar-daddy-and-trade
words that camouflage deeper/unspoken meanings
worry
Thoughts on my specific fandom requests, alphabetically:
镇魂 | GUARDIAN (TV 2018)
Chu Shuzhi/Guo Changcheng
Chu Shuzhi/Ye Huo
Chu Shuzhi & Shen Wei
Chu Shuzhi, so handsome! His shoulders, arms, back, the way his upper body narrows at the waist like an inverted triangle. His fighting stance, the graceful way he uses his powers. I love the way he interacts with his puppet... the gentle way he holds (even clings to) the little doll, or the nurturing and delicate way he tends to the full puppet. I also dearly love his flaws, his fixation on fighting as a solution to any problem, his unresolved traumas and the way that when those get hit again he just completely falls apart. Plus I love his intense and passionate loyalty and devotion to Shen Wei.
I love how Guo Changcheng has all the resilience that Chu Shuzhi lacks. He's brave before he even has any skills to be brave with-- when Chu Shuzhi is in danger he throws himself instantly and repeatedly in the way (my favorite might be when he's about to attack a superpowered villain with a medkit <3 ). I love that after the healing, Changcheng tells him that he wasn't scared of him, even if he should have been. When he says Chu Shuzhi is a good person, he believes it, even if Chu Shuzhi maybe can't.
As for Ye Huo, we don't get as much of him, but what we get is great. He has that badass power, his fighting lifestyle and so forth-- but it turns out it's used for others, basically collecting troubled kids and looking out for them, mentoring them, finding them homes, sometimes even being that home. He envies Chu Shuzhi his life--is that about the duty and mission Chu Shuzhi has found, is it about the team, family, loved ones? And, why does he have scars from his own power, what might have happened?
Shen Wei of course is a gorgeous, complex, layered character who knocks my socks off. In his dynamic with Chu Shuzhi in particular, I focus on his role as the Envoy, who has striven so hard for so long to protect his people--and here is one of his people who he personally rescued, and who would do anything for him. But Shen Wei is no Ye Zun, mastermind-with-henchman. He is a grave and careful lord with a devotee he values and trusts and wants to be happy--and someone whose pride he honors. I find it interesting that Shen Wei is the one who has had to remind Chu Shuzhi that this is a "friendship between gentlemen"; Chu Shuzhi seems glad and in fact eager to kneel or bow, and while Shen Wei obviously knows how to receive obeisance, he does not personally demand or expect it.
The different ships:
Chu Shuzhi/Guo Changcheng:
I'd especially love a late-series and/or post-series dynamic, after Guo Changcheng has more experience and his own power, and Chu Shuzhi's hard shell has started cracking to let his softer feelings (privately) show. I love seeing worldbuilding details affect characterization. For instance, thinking of Chu Shuzhi as someone who was in Dixing prison doing penal labor for most of his life so far--how did that shape him (for good and for ill), how does it affect him now? And for Changcheng, how does his new mutation and power affect him, what else might he feel about it or do with it? Does having a mutation and a power help him understand Chu Shuzhi, Dixingren in general--?
Chu Shuzhi/Ye Huo:
I love the way they echo each other--Dixingren, fighters, powered--while also being full of matching surprises underneath: they care about and help others, they work and fight for justice. Wildfire collects and mentors troubled Haixing youth like a father goose! (Are his wards always humans, actually? Has he collected lost Dixing kids too?) I'd love to see them bonding over being Dixingren in a strange world, finding levels of understanding in each other they can't find in the humans and Yashou around them (what Dixing customs and memories might they share, what do they miss, what were they glad to leave behind?)--but also the possible differences between them, with their potentially different backgrounds, opinions, experiences.
I'd still like Chu Shuzhi and Guo Changcheng to be close, even if slashing Chu Shuzhi with someone else. So, no jealousy or sad-love-triangle among them, please.
Chu Shuzhi & Shen Wei:
I adore everything in their history: Shen Wei's personal attention to this tortured convict, rescuing him--asking him, inviting him, leaving it up to him!--and having mercy. The way Shen Wei is indeed worthy of Chu Shuzhi's devotion, the way he trusts Chu Shuzhi in turn, the way he grants him respect. The way he personally apologizes for not telling Chu Shuzhi his secret identity! I'd love to see anything at all about loyalty, devotion, trust, the willing servant and the respectful master, the powerful mutual regard. How did Chu Shuzhi's childhood hero-worship of the Envoy mature? The shared or mirrored tragedy of their younger beloved twin brothers (which Shen Wei knows about Chu Shuzhi from the start, but not vice-versa). Plus the things they share as fellow Dixingren with powers. Speaking of which: they have Dixing in common, but one of them was born and raised so long after the other--what has his Lordship learned about modern Dixing, from one who knows it so much more intimately?
HAP AND LEONARD (TV)
Hap Collins/Leonard Pine
Hap and Leonard are forever-lifemates and everyone knows it, including themselves. No matter what happens, like Leonard says, "In the end, it's always me and you." But I'd like to see that go even farther, to cross some of those last intimacies and boundaries, whether they mean to or not.
I love their big differences--Hap the white imprisoned conscientious objector vs. Leonard the Black war vet, for instance, which gets into big parts of their inner selves and experiences--but how in and among all that and more, they are still somehow made for each other. I love how tenacious and skilled each is in his own way, but also how they have big wounds and blind spots and weaknesses--and that's one of the things they do for each other, looking out for the soft places, protective. Hap has this eternal willingness to hope and trust, and Leonard doesn't want to see that openness get misused; Leonard presses his deep feelings down under a hard, hurt shell, but Hap knows very well that doesn't make the feelings gone.
I keep thinking about Leonard's private exchange with Trudy in season one, where he warns her to look after Hap while he's gone, and she responds tartly, "It's sweet, actually... the way you pretend *he* needs *you*." Ouch. She says it to hurt (i.e., you pretend Hap needs you so you don't have to admit how much you need Hap, but also wrongly implying Hap doesn't really need him), but how much might Leonard actually believe it when he's at his lowest?
The edges are rough in their world, and I love both how that shapes them and how they don't let it define them. They are definitely working-class, and not ashamed of it. A lot of their feelings are communicated with jokes and swearing, the back-and-forth of the crotchety old-marrieds--but they never let that be all there is to them. I love how middle-aged and worn down they are, but how together they always manage to bounce back for the next thing.
Other thoughts: that feeling of dusty itinerant wandering. Leaning on each other, collapsing together after a very hard day, working with hands and bodies left worn and sore. What happens when the wisecracks fail, how much does it cost Leonard in particular to open his shell a crack? The little vulnerabilities and tendernesses that might feel like a deepest secret even after all these years. Some kind of protection tug-of-war in which they fight over who gets to suffer for the other one. Physical/sexual intimacy coming as a strange (even shocking) but welcome change--did they think there were no surprises between them anymore? What if Hap takes to m/m sex like a duck to water--might Leonard have his assumptions shaken, might he be irked at first, might he learn something?
SHETLAND (TV)
Duncan Hunter/Jimmy Perez
(Including series 6 is fine if you want, but you don't have to. All up to you.)
I love Jimmy's caretaking, idealism, his desire to do right and protect his islands and his people. I love his calm--and the times he loses his calm. I love Duncan's flexibility, sociability, compassion, sense of humor; I love his insight and the way he understands people, especially Jimmy.
And I love their relationship--their work as co-parents, their increasing bond as a family unit, the way they support each other, their history, their trust and vulnerability. Sometimes they bring out the worst--Jimmy's wish for Duncan to pull himself together can shade into self-righteousness; Duncan's wish for Jimmy to think past a black-and-white worldview can shade into immaturity. But they've been better and better for each other over time. Duncan comes to Jimmy as his automatic refuge in hard times; Jimmy in turn can stop pretending he has it all together, and lean on the supportive heart Duncan has beneath his casual exterior.
I also love the atmosphere of the islands, and am always up for more of it--the weather, the water, the shore, the ferries and boats, the sky, the birds... But if you want to take Jimmy and Duncan out of their comfort zone and have them travelling or otherwise being elsewhere, that's great too.
Other thoughts:
The co-parenting process of raising Cassie ended up turning them into (or giving them excuses to be?) their own kind of couple, a bond which persists even after the child they were parenting has grown up. Did one of them wake up earlier to the wish to be an actual couple, but kept it secret and has been pining? Or is it only surfacing now in one or both, as more of a surprise? We know Jimmy has been openly suffering Empty Nest Syndrome since Cassie first started spreading her wings--what about Duncan? Does he fear losing Jimmy, now that their foundational reason for being so close is changing?
The complexities of their roles and personalities--like Duncan as a people person who gives Jimmy surprisingly good emotional advice, but ruins his own relationships. The way they both strive to communicate--even if at first the defenses go up, in the end they sit down together and admit the hard things, they manage to use their words (though it seldom comes easy). Duncan's ambition, his morally flexible side, but he does have lines he won't cross and then is distressed when others aren't always sure what those are. Jimmy's protectiveness but the way that can turn into control-freak-panic. Jimmy's empty nest issues vs. Duncan's midlife crisis as a former fuckboy. Their unadmitted neediness and territoriality-- in season 5, for instance, Duncan joking-but-not-really that Jimmy's going to ride off into the sunset with Alice, Jimmy waiting till the last minute to beg him "Don't go."
Events like Duncan being traumatized/wet/cold in a blanket in season 5, and Jimmy stepping between Duncan and the shotgun in season 4, are inspirational. Were there aftereffects of any of that? I love seeing Jimmy protect Duncan--but also, what about Duncan protecting Jimmy? Physically-- emotionally-- reputationally? And of course the end of season 5 was so personal and revelatory--aftermaths of that are always welcome!
THE STING (1973)
Henry Gondorff/Johnny Hooker
I love the True Justice aspect of this type of grifting, never preying on the innocent, just helping the greedy hoist themselves with their own petards-- and I also love the "us against the world" feeling of these guys (and their grifter community) hanging in there during the Great Depression. So whether they're on a job or not, I love it! And I could really use some successful justice, vengeance, or plain old resilience-in-tough-times right now.
Henry and Johnny are the battle-worn veteran and the promoted minor-leaguer intensely eager to get in the game, whose competence and skill and risk-taking brings a little sweet justice into a hard world. They’re mentor and mentored, but also well on the way to equal partners by the end of the movie--I enjoy Henry teaching and Johnny learning, but also Johnny opening Henry's eyes or otherwise keeping him on his toes. I love Henry's knowledge and competence, his history and status, his close and loyal inner circle. I love how protective and worried he gets, how he bears such weight on his shoulders. I love Johnny's eagerness to get involved and to learn, his neediness and hunger, even his risky-carelessness. The way he runs like a deer, the way his eyes glow across a crowded room.
I love the whole con-artist milieu, and feel free to include other characters if you want—I especially love Kid Twist, but they're all great, as is that feeling of the far-flung network of skilled grifters who network like one big shady extended family.
Other thoughts: Train travel--as high-end passengers, Pullman cars, sleepers, etc.-- or suddenly having to ride the rails, in a boxcar, buried in straw, staying in Hoovervilles along the way, the intimacies of the road. Ocean liners, thumbing rides, other kinds of travel, where the journey is the whole point. Luxury suites, enormous bathtubs--or a little cold-water flat, a creaky Murphy bed folding down from the wall. Johnny being brought out into the wider grifter community, seeing and being seen. Is he nervous about it? Is Henry? That feeling of grifting as a show, then the theater folks pack up and move on...is there a worry that wanting to stick together, pair up, is somehow against the script? The movie only shows them in cities...what about small towns, the countryside, someplace rural or rougher?
Have fun with it, and thanks again!
chocolateboxcomm )Dear Chocolatier,
Thank you so much for making me something! I know my letter explanations can sound ficcish, but I would also love some art, whichever you're offering.
Some of my general preferences:
* Happy or at least hopeful endings (or in art, hopefulness and possibilities). That doesn't rule out bittersweet or melancholy or dark tones, and needn't be fluffy...in fact, I don't really find total fluff as comforting in general, for some reason. But I'm just not up for hopeless/tragic stuff.
* You can have sex in your story or art if you like, or not, any level of explicit or not--whatever suits the work best. I do prefer sex to have underpinnings to it, emotions, needs, etc.--something deeper than just sex for its own sake.
Some of the tropes and approaches I enjoy (alphabetically):
bathing/washing
communicating between the lines
cooking for and/or with each other
dressing and/or undressing the other
extreme competence (with honest weakness, no need for perfection)
first time (as opposed to an established relationship)
huddling for warmth
hurt/comfort (physical and/or emotional)
me-and-you-against-the-world
nurturing via food/drink/warmth
pining
pretend or mistaken for couple
protectiveness
rescue
sharing a bed or other cozy space--bedroll, boxcar, hammock, boat, who knows
stranded somewhere (idyllic or non-)
suffering/sacrificing for the other, especially when the other tries to stop it, has big emotions about it, tries to take it on himself instead
tending wounds
trust--especially trust being discovered, and/or trust being tested
uncovering a secret
undercover as or mistaken for rentboy or sugar-daddy-and-trade
words that camouflage deeper/unspoken meanings
worry
Thoughts on my specific fandom requests, alphabetically:
镇魂 | GUARDIAN (TV 2018)
Chu Shuzhi/Guo Changcheng
Chu Shuzhi/Ye Huo
Chu Shuzhi & Shen Wei
Chu Shuzhi, so handsome! His shoulders, arms, back, the way his upper body narrows at the waist like an inverted triangle. His fighting stance, the graceful way he uses his powers. I love the way he interacts with his puppet... the gentle way he holds (even clings to) the little doll, or the nurturing and delicate way he tends to the full puppet. I also dearly love his flaws, his fixation on fighting as a solution to any problem, his unresolved traumas and the way that when those get hit again he just completely falls apart. Plus I love his intense and passionate loyalty and devotion to Shen Wei.
I love how Guo Changcheng has all the resilience that Chu Shuzhi lacks. He's brave before he even has any skills to be brave with-- when Chu Shuzhi is in danger he throws himself instantly and repeatedly in the way (my favorite might be when he's about to attack a superpowered villain with a medkit <3 ). I love that after the healing, Changcheng tells him that he wasn't scared of him, even if he should have been. When he says Chu Shuzhi is a good person, he believes it, even if Chu Shuzhi maybe can't.
As for Ye Huo, we don't get as much of him, but what we get is great. He has that badass power, his fighting lifestyle and so forth-- but it turns out it's used for others, basically collecting troubled kids and looking out for them, mentoring them, finding them homes, sometimes even being that home. He envies Chu Shuzhi his life--is that about the duty and mission Chu Shuzhi has found, is it about the team, family, loved ones? And, why does he have scars from his own power, what might have happened?
Shen Wei of course is a gorgeous, complex, layered character who knocks my socks off. In his dynamic with Chu Shuzhi in particular, I focus on his role as the Envoy, who has striven so hard for so long to protect his people--and here is one of his people who he personally rescued, and who would do anything for him. But Shen Wei is no Ye Zun, mastermind-with-henchman. He is a grave and careful lord with a devotee he values and trusts and wants to be happy--and someone whose pride he honors. I find it interesting that Shen Wei is the one who has had to remind Chu Shuzhi that this is a "friendship between gentlemen"; Chu Shuzhi seems glad and in fact eager to kneel or bow, and while Shen Wei obviously knows how to receive obeisance, he does not personally demand or expect it.
The different ships:
Chu Shuzhi/Guo Changcheng:
I'd especially love a late-series and/or post-series dynamic, after Guo Changcheng has more experience and his own power, and Chu Shuzhi's hard shell has started cracking to let his softer feelings (privately) show. I love seeing worldbuilding details affect characterization. For instance, thinking of Chu Shuzhi as someone who was in Dixing prison doing penal labor for most of his life so far--how did that shape him (for good and for ill), how does it affect him now? And for Changcheng, how does his new mutation and power affect him, what else might he feel about it or do with it? Does having a mutation and a power help him understand Chu Shuzhi, Dixingren in general--?
Chu Shuzhi/Ye Huo:
I love the way they echo each other--Dixingren, fighters, powered--while also being full of matching surprises underneath: they care about and help others, they work and fight for justice. Wildfire collects and mentors troubled Haixing youth like a father goose! (Are his wards always humans, actually? Has he collected lost Dixing kids too?) I'd love to see them bonding over being Dixingren in a strange world, finding levels of understanding in each other they can't find in the humans and Yashou around them (what Dixing customs and memories might they share, what do they miss, what were they glad to leave behind?)--but also the possible differences between them, with their potentially different backgrounds, opinions, experiences.
I'd still like Chu Shuzhi and Guo Changcheng to be close, even if slashing Chu Shuzhi with someone else. So, no jealousy or sad-love-triangle among them, please.
Chu Shuzhi & Shen Wei:
I adore everything in their history: Shen Wei's personal attention to this tortured convict, rescuing him--asking him, inviting him, leaving it up to him!--and having mercy. The way Shen Wei is indeed worthy of Chu Shuzhi's devotion, the way he trusts Chu Shuzhi in turn, the way he grants him respect. The way he personally apologizes for not telling Chu Shuzhi his secret identity! I'd love to see anything at all about loyalty, devotion, trust, the willing servant and the respectful master, the powerful mutual regard. How did Chu Shuzhi's childhood hero-worship of the Envoy mature? The shared or mirrored tragedy of their younger beloved twin brothers (which Shen Wei knows about Chu Shuzhi from the start, but not vice-versa). Plus the things they share as fellow Dixingren with powers. Speaking of which: they have Dixing in common, but one of them was born and raised so long after the other--what has his Lordship learned about modern Dixing, from one who knows it so much more intimately?
HAP AND LEONARD (TV)
Hap Collins/Leonard Pine
Hap and Leonard are forever-lifemates and everyone knows it, including themselves. No matter what happens, like Leonard says, "In the end, it's always me and you." But I'd like to see that go even farther, to cross some of those last intimacies and boundaries, whether they mean to or not.
I love their big differences--Hap the white imprisoned conscientious objector vs. Leonard the Black war vet, for instance, which gets into big parts of their inner selves and experiences--but how in and among all that and more, they are still somehow made for each other. I love how tenacious and skilled each is in his own way, but also how they have big wounds and blind spots and weaknesses--and that's one of the things they do for each other, looking out for the soft places, protective. Hap has this eternal willingness to hope and trust, and Leonard doesn't want to see that openness get misused; Leonard presses his deep feelings down under a hard, hurt shell, but Hap knows very well that doesn't make the feelings gone.
I keep thinking about Leonard's private exchange with Trudy in season one, where he warns her to look after Hap while he's gone, and she responds tartly, "It's sweet, actually... the way you pretend *he* needs *you*." Ouch. She says it to hurt (i.e., you pretend Hap needs you so you don't have to admit how much you need Hap, but also wrongly implying Hap doesn't really need him), but how much might Leonard actually believe it when he's at his lowest?
The edges are rough in their world, and I love both how that shapes them and how they don't let it define them. They are definitely working-class, and not ashamed of it. A lot of their feelings are communicated with jokes and swearing, the back-and-forth of the crotchety old-marrieds--but they never let that be all there is to them. I love how middle-aged and worn down they are, but how together they always manage to bounce back for the next thing.
Other thoughts: that feeling of dusty itinerant wandering. Leaning on each other, collapsing together after a very hard day, working with hands and bodies left worn and sore. What happens when the wisecracks fail, how much does it cost Leonard in particular to open his shell a crack? The little vulnerabilities and tendernesses that might feel like a deepest secret even after all these years. Some kind of protection tug-of-war in which they fight over who gets to suffer for the other one. Physical/sexual intimacy coming as a strange (even shocking) but welcome change--did they think there were no surprises between them anymore? What if Hap takes to m/m sex like a duck to water--might Leonard have his assumptions shaken, might he be irked at first, might he learn something?
SHETLAND (TV)
Duncan Hunter/Jimmy Perez
(Including series 6 is fine if you want, but you don't have to. All up to you.)
I love Jimmy's caretaking, idealism, his desire to do right and protect his islands and his people. I love his calm--and the times he loses his calm. I love Duncan's flexibility, sociability, compassion, sense of humor; I love his insight and the way he understands people, especially Jimmy.
And I love their relationship--their work as co-parents, their increasing bond as a family unit, the way they support each other, their history, their trust and vulnerability. Sometimes they bring out the worst--Jimmy's wish for Duncan to pull himself together can shade into self-righteousness; Duncan's wish for Jimmy to think past a black-and-white worldview can shade into immaturity. But they've been better and better for each other over time. Duncan comes to Jimmy as his automatic refuge in hard times; Jimmy in turn can stop pretending he has it all together, and lean on the supportive heart Duncan has beneath his casual exterior.
I also love the atmosphere of the islands, and am always up for more of it--the weather, the water, the shore, the ferries and boats, the sky, the birds... But if you want to take Jimmy and Duncan out of their comfort zone and have them travelling or otherwise being elsewhere, that's great too.
Other thoughts:
The co-parenting process of raising Cassie ended up turning them into (or giving them excuses to be?) their own kind of couple, a bond which persists even after the child they were parenting has grown up. Did one of them wake up earlier to the wish to be an actual couple, but kept it secret and has been pining? Or is it only surfacing now in one or both, as more of a surprise? We know Jimmy has been openly suffering Empty Nest Syndrome since Cassie first started spreading her wings--what about Duncan? Does he fear losing Jimmy, now that their foundational reason for being so close is changing?
The complexities of their roles and personalities--like Duncan as a people person who gives Jimmy surprisingly good emotional advice, but ruins his own relationships. The way they both strive to communicate--even if at first the defenses go up, in the end they sit down together and admit the hard things, they manage to use their words (though it seldom comes easy). Duncan's ambition, his morally flexible side, but he does have lines he won't cross and then is distressed when others aren't always sure what those are. Jimmy's protectiveness but the way that can turn into control-freak-panic. Jimmy's empty nest issues vs. Duncan's midlife crisis as a former fuckboy. Their unadmitted neediness and territoriality-- in season 5, for instance, Duncan joking-but-not-really that Jimmy's going to ride off into the sunset with Alice, Jimmy waiting till the last minute to beg him "Don't go."
Events like Duncan being traumatized/wet/cold in a blanket in season 5, and Jimmy stepping between Duncan and the shotgun in season 4, are inspirational. Were there aftereffects of any of that? I love seeing Jimmy protect Duncan--but also, what about Duncan protecting Jimmy? Physically-- emotionally-- reputationally? And of course the end of season 5 was so personal and revelatory--aftermaths of that are always welcome!
THE STING (1973)
Henry Gondorff/Johnny Hooker
I love the True Justice aspect of this type of grifting, never preying on the innocent, just helping the greedy hoist themselves with their own petards-- and I also love the "us against the world" feeling of these guys (and their grifter community) hanging in there during the Great Depression. So whether they're on a job or not, I love it! And I could really use some successful justice, vengeance, or plain old resilience-in-tough-times right now.
Henry and Johnny are the battle-worn veteran and the promoted minor-leaguer intensely eager to get in the game, whose competence and skill and risk-taking brings a little sweet justice into a hard world. They’re mentor and mentored, but also well on the way to equal partners by the end of the movie--I enjoy Henry teaching and Johnny learning, but also Johnny opening Henry's eyes or otherwise keeping him on his toes. I love Henry's knowledge and competence, his history and status, his close and loyal inner circle. I love how protective and worried he gets, how he bears such weight on his shoulders. I love Johnny's eagerness to get involved and to learn, his neediness and hunger, even his risky-carelessness. The way he runs like a deer, the way his eyes glow across a crowded room.
I love the whole con-artist milieu, and feel free to include other characters if you want—I especially love Kid Twist, but they're all great, as is that feeling of the far-flung network of skilled grifters who network like one big shady extended family.
Other thoughts: Train travel--as high-end passengers, Pullman cars, sleepers, etc.-- or suddenly having to ride the rails, in a boxcar, buried in straw, staying in Hoovervilles along the way, the intimacies of the road. Ocean liners, thumbing rides, other kinds of travel, where the journey is the whole point. Luxury suites, enormous bathtubs--or a little cold-water flat, a creaky Murphy bed folding down from the wall. Johnny being brought out into the wider grifter community, seeing and being seen. Is he nervous about it? Is Henry? That feeling of grifting as a show, then the theater folks pack up and move on...is there a worry that wanting to stick together, pair up, is somehow against the script? The movie only shows them in cities...what about small towns, the countryside, someplace rural or rougher?
Have fun with it, and thanks again!
