Dramaturgy Guest Post: Welcome Into The Woods

This post was originally published on The 4th Wall, the dramaturgy blog of the BYU Theatre and Media Arts Department. We at FTTV have partnered with the cast, director, and dramaturgy team of BYU’s production of Into The Woods to host an exciting event on November 8th that dives deep into context, meaning, and stage/screen adaptations …

From the Page to the Screen: Why We Study Fairy Tales on Television

Just as Scheherazade spun tales for the king that kept his interest for 1001 nights, so do the shows we watch spin tales that entrance and delight us until we’ve binge-watched our way through an entire series. From the oldest listed fairy tale based television program in our database, a Disney Animated Short on Cinderella …

OUAT Premiere Screening — Event Recap

Once Upon A Time. At the end of a six-season run with a well-established finale, on the brink of a new curse to reset season 7, we meet as viewers, as scholars, as audience members and fairy tale enthusiasts, to discuss this show’s past, present, and future. Is Once Upon A Time a high-profile breakthrough for the …

Once Upon A Time Event: October 13th!

The BYU Fairy Tales & Television Group is having an event and we would like you all to join us! As you read about in Erica’s post, season 7 of Once Upon A Time is going to look a little different. After the two-part, tied-in-a-bow season 6 finale titled “The Final Battle,” which ended with a …

La Llorona versus Appalachian Jack: Assigning ATU numbers to International folktales

All of the fairy tale references in television in this database are categorized by a number from the Aarne Thomspon Uther index. This is an extensive list of mostly European fairy tales. Categorizing tales using these numbers was essential for the software that would show us the prevalence of specific tale types, but it also presented …

Mad Hatter Tea Party at BYU

On January 27th, the BYU Fairy Tales group hosted a Mad Hatter Tea Party in celebration of  Lewis Carroll’s birthday and the 150th anniversary of Alice in Wonderland. Students and faculty enjoyed tea, Alice in Wonderland mad-libs, pin the smile on the Cheshire cat, and learning to use the Fairy Tales in Television Database (FTTV). Party-goers visited the website (fttv.humwp.byu.edu) and then …

Fairy Tales: Why the Glass Slipper Fits More than One Foot

Cinderella came out this week: in anticipation of this, there has been a pitched war between the bloggers and movie critics who say it represents a dangerous return to 1950s assumptions about womanhood and female desirability or that it’s a refreshingly straightforward reminder of belief in kindness and achieving impossible dreams. I haven’t seen the movie yet, so …

Glass Slippers and Small Screens: Rags to Riches and the American Dream

          This is the powerpoint from Madeleine Dresden’s presentation at the 2014 American Folklore Society Conference in Santa Fe. Glass Slippers and Small Screens: Rags to Riches and the American Dream

#Visualizingwonder: A Fairytales on TV Symposium

  Yesterday and today, we are holding the Visualizing Wonder symposium at BYU. We have scholars from across the country and Canada participating, and we are excited! The purpose, participants and agenda are outlined below, and as soon as the conference is over, we will be updating the blog with a recap of what was discussed …