BE

Fanfiction
Title:	BE
Author(s):	tothewillofthepeople
Date(s):	8 June 2016
Length:	38,667 words
Genre:	Modern AU
Fandom:	Les Misérables
External Links:	on AO3
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BE is a Enjolras/Grantaire fanfiction by tothewillofthepeople. In it, Enjolras becomes a stage director for a production of Hamlet and Grantaire is the actor who plays the titular role. It was written for the Les Mis Big Bang and Baby Bang 2016.

The accompanying art created for it as part of the Big Bang by hyenateeth is here: Traditional art for the wonderful @makeyounervous ‘s fic BE, ^{Archived version}.

Author's Summary

Grantaire is earnest in this, and it’s heartbreaking. Enjolras can’t look away. This is just a rehearsal. Grantaire is still wearing skinny jeans. They have lights and phones and textual analysis and thousands of years of history between now and then and yet–

When Grantaire speaks, the distance collapses.

(Grantaire as Hamlet.)

Comments by the Author

BE is an unusual fic in that enjolras is somewhat of an outsider to the hamlet gang, because i didn’t want to cast him as any of the characters. none of them worked for me. he’s not a hamlet, he’s too much of fire and action, and he could never be a horatio - a character much more suited to the pollux side of the coin.

grantaire, however, i loved as hamlet. the melancholy is there, which wouldn’t have suited any other character save perhaps éponine (who becomes director). so R is hamlet, E is on the outside but still Involved.

from there it felt natural to put cosette as ophelia, joly and bossuet as ros and guil. i made feuilly into horatio based on pure vibes and favoritism. the one bit of casting i was never fully happy with was montparnasse as laertes—it’s just not quite right—but i wanted him to be an antagonist and he’s too young for claudius.

some people aren’t in the show—notably courfeyrac, off in his own production—simply because i didn’t want it to feel like i was massively shoehorning characters in. like that one kpop tweet. you know?

and because it felt more realistic to have adult friend groups that ranged across places and productions, even if they often get irrevocably tangled. it’s still maybe a bit convenient. but i like my choices

Reactions and Reviews

oh my god okay.

this might be my new favourite fic??

like, the whole thing was completely and utterly flawless and it was absolutely perfect in every way, and the whole story just came together so well and the characterization was so so so accurate and literally everything about enjolras and grantaire's relationship was perfect, and feuilly was just wonderful, and i really loved montparnasse which is something that i can't normally say but in this he was perfect, and having eponine as the director was really really just great and i adored her in this, and cosette and fantine?? it was so perfect i can't even handle it- really, just everything about this fic was beautiful and some parts were heartbreaking (enj's backstory just about killed me, and so did grantaire's whole character and also the scene where he was drunk?? perfect and tragic and terrible and wonderful all in the best ways) and altogether it was just an absolute pleasure to read!

it’s got hamlet. it’s got grantaire starring as hamlet. it’s got enjolras never wanting to come back to theatre ever again because of [spoilers] but guess what. pining. angst. misunderstandings.

Iconic: BE by ToTheWillOfThePeople (@kvothes)

ExR theater AU fic, Enjolras’s perspective. Enjolras is roped into directing a production of Hamlet.

it is nearing 2 in the morning and i am having some kind of delayed cry about the layers upon layers of overlapping, igniting, crescendoing love in this. if i remember for one more second the part where enjolras thinks about how he /loves mornings like these when feuilly is happy/ i will be inconsolable. his heart is bared in his every word of narration, his every observation of his friends, new and old and re-met, his every description of every individual around him giving their all to build this production from nothing but their scripts and pencils and discipline. there is so much space for their lives here. their days extend far beyond the edges of what transpires in this story, well beyond what enjolras is aware of -- and /so much/ happens in the world of this story. there are many stories happening at once, as many as there are characters, and more besides, heckin skillfully written in all the hectic, mundane unpredictability of actual lives -- through every room, every hallway, every change in setting, there is so much space for them to breathe.

and the way the text of hamlet is woven throughout, in order, until their production has been built to the best of their collective ability and is ready for opening night, and it all comes back around full circle with the guards once more telling what they saw -- it is so good and so deftly done. i don't know much about the play, but reading this gave me so many feelings about the characters having feelings about hamlet that i practically as well as had feelings about hamlet. about their reading of it, certainly. grantaire, late at night on enjolras and feuilly's couch. enjolras, guilt in his gut as he watches grantaire perform a speech from a different version. cosette, tears streaming down her face as fantine relays that ophelia has drowned. the way enjolras observes and worries after all of his actors (his!), seeing their exhaustion as the rehearsal period hurtles toward its end and not wanting them to be consumed by their roles, even as he works at his own part with just as much of himself given over.

each moment of levity washed through me like sunlight -- the violinists on the subway, the movie marathon, the way there are scenes of the characters in serious discussion in rehearsals interspersed with scenes of them rehearsing, but letting themselves be light, have fun, dissolve into laughter. the opening scene in the green room. the afternoon where enjolras hangs backward off their couch and does three voices at once. the skull. enjolras tackled by éponine while feuilly and grantaire look on, all of them laughing, unrestrained, alive. my gd heart. and there are times when everything in the world becomes still, and the pair of characters are focused entirely on each other, speaking so plainly about the work they find purpose in, about the desire for death that rears its head, about how grating it feels to accept let alone ask for help, about how the work they love is also the work that takes the most from them, and. and they don't reach a conclusion because there isn't one, but they see each other a little clearer because of the time and care they took to communicate. there are so many incredible conversations in this.

i love how there is no ending. i love the clarity with which this says, you can love more than one thing. and none of those things need define the shape of your life from now on, but if you let them in and let your love fill the space beneath your sternum, the shape your life takes now, right now, can be worth the act of being awake. what a work of magic. in the way that human connections and theatrical productions are magic, which is to say, not magic in dismissal of the deliberate, painstaking, fiercely personal work that goes into both, that is brought so incredibly to life here, but magic in the sense of what comes of it. oh my god, i love this.

Inspired Fanworks

Fanart

• everyone pls read be by @makeyounervous in which grantaire plays hamlet, ^{Archived version} by druidhand
• BE by tothewillofthepeople, ^{Archived version} a fanbinding by hexagonspress