Stephinitely | New narratives for the Ringling Bros. circus

Plus, my brain broke

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View on the web Go to our home page Subscribe to the Times Monday, May 23, 2022 Forward this to a friend Subscribe to more newsletters Me diabolically engineering every detail of the new circus. [Twentieth Century Fox] Ringling Bros. Presents: A Newsletter The most relatable announcement of last week came from the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. The show shut down in 2017, but Manatee County's Feld Entertainment announced a return planned for 2023.   Things are different now — sweet Mary, are they different — and the company will be excising familiar features from the big top. The new circus will not have:   Elephants or any animals. Clowns. A ringmaster.   The circus will have:   Um. Something! Something really good! Something great, even! The new logo literally incorporates a question mark into the "R," which I find brilliant. Like, oh, you want to know? Then? Come? See?   The company says, "The live production of The Greatest Show On Earth will celebrate amazing talent from around the world, displaying incredible feats that push the limits of human potential and create jaw-dropping moments!"   Well, I don't know anyone who doesn't like jaw-dropping moments. And I get it. This mysterious messaging is akin to what I told my editor this week (more on this below). "Let me tell you what my column won't have! It won't have any pollywogs. Or tardigrades. Or adverbs. Check back in four hours!"   The gist is, the circus was out of date, stale and mired in animal rights controversies. The vibe going forward will be more through-line narrative, less potpourri of spectacles and sideshows.   There's potential here for powerful Cirque du Soleil-style performances. All the circus folks have to do is examine everyday life in the 2020s for harrowing, action-packed premises. I'll get the brainstorming started.    Ringling Bros. Presents: An Average Day Consuming News   Ringling Bros. Presents: Hot Takes and Cold Cancellations   Ringling Bros. Presents: Is This Mole Irregular?   Ringling Bros. Presents: mRNA's Brave Little Journey   Ringling Bros. Presents: Eyebrows Are Sisters, Not Twins   Ringling Bros. Presents: Finding Your Evacuation Zone While Sea Level Rapidly Rises   Ringling Bros. Presents: Reaching the Zipper on the Back of the Dress When No One Is Home   Ringling Bros. Presents: TikTok for Olds   Ringling Bros. Presents: Teaching Math with An Abacus Because All the Books Are Banned   Ringling Bros. Presents: Expiration Dates and Other Lies   Ringling Bros. Presents: I Streamed All 12 Episodes and Am Still Empty   Ringling Bros. Presents: Overstimulated, Underpaid   Ringling Bros. Presents: These Sweatpants Again Me trying to write. [Paramount] Mother, I'm trying to tell a story here Do you ever just lose it? By "it," I mean inspiration. Whatever little flame burns deep inside the crevices of your being just peaces out momentarily, and all you can do is go through the motions of life (or melt down spectacularly!) until it returns.   Hi. That was me last week. I should issue a disclaimer that I absolutely love this job and do not struggle with ideas or vision 90 percent of the time. But it's also harder than it looks to be creative on deadline week after week. I think the general cure for blocked creativity is to do less, but that's not always an option in this business. So... cue spectacular meltdown?    I leaned into my writer's block and wrote about... writer's block. In a fun twist, writing through it sort of loosened my gears and I'm feeling more myself. My thesis is that writer's block doesn't just apply to writers, but to everyone in different ways. Actuaries! School bus drivers! Third chair violin! We all get the icks, right? Our current technological addictions don't help focus and introspection; Jami Attenberg's Craft Talk newsletter arrived in my inbox at the right time this week to shore up those suspicions.   While working through these feelings, I read a lot of quotes from writers on writer's block. Frankly, most of them infuriated me. Here's an entertaining collection from LitHub featuring plenty of writers saying that this problem doesn't actually exist and generally not being helpful at all. Here's one wholly useless thought from Jim Harrison in an interview with The Paris Review:   "I wonder, when a writer's blocked and doesn't have any resources to pull himself out of it, why doesn't he jump in his car and drive around the U.S.A.? I went last winter for seven thousand miles and it was lovely."    I wonder why.   Read it: Writer's block tried to ruin me   I do understand the general point, though, which is that getting out and doing new, or even old, things is an antidote for feeling stuck. My family took a dip in our community pool for the first time since the start of the pandemic. The echos of MARCO POLO and scenes of flirting lifeguards inspired an ode to our local municipal pools, and even a little poetry.   Where will you be swimming this season? No points off for sneaking into hotel pools. Not from this gal.   Read it: It's public pool season, Tampa Bay. Is that a Band-Aid?   We press on! I further fought my rut with exploration and activity over the weekend, from a Rowdies game to a visit to Gangchu Chicken & Beer in Seminole Heights to the most exciting journey of all, shopping for upcoming vacation gear at culty outdoors behemoth REI, which boldly displays the city of Tampa's monstrous flag, by the way. Inspiration is all around us, even in the aisle of nightmarishly ugly hiking and water shoes. Even there. Me waiting for Season 2. [Apple TV] And another thing! I just finished "Severance." I loved it. Who wants to talk about it with me???   One notable thing about this show is that it had a really arresting visual opening. Usually we skip the credits after watching one time, but we let these roll every time looking for clues. My husband kept remarking that Adam Scott must have been horrified to see himself imagined that way, in slack-faced animation with his brain split open.   Adam Scott, are you there? Can you confirm? Can you give us any answers? I'll wait. I'll wait forever. Contact Stephanie Hayes at shayes@tampabay.com. Follow @stephhayes on Twitter, @stephhayeswrites on Facebook and @stephrhayes on Instagram. Did someone forward this newsletter to you? You can sign up to get Stephinitely in your own inbox next time. Subscribe for free here. 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