#2 - More of the story...

One of the things I'm hoping to do here is answer questions about the show. So, I sent out a tweet for a good first question, and here it is:

From kyanzasu:
Aside from the story, what is the Princess Knight all about?
Not the summary all over again, but the idea? This show is an amalgamation of every story I've loved in my life. It is an homage to classic Disney. It is the movies I adore. It is the musicals and plays that have shaped me as a storyteller. It is jokes that molded my humor. It is pieces of my life projected into these colorful characters. I set out to create a show that was everything I love about a lot of what has made me... well, ME. There are probably a hundred references in this whole show - from lines of dialogue, to characters, to names, to situations - to something else. I think if someone could find them all, I'd give them a hundred bucks (There's a nice challenge for someone out there!). Some of the references are pretty vague, but there really are a ton. There's Shakespeare and movies. There's Grimm Fairy Tales and comicbooks. And there's things from my own life too (though finding those references might be a bit tougher).
I used the tried and true "Once Upon a Time" as the basis because fairy tales are universal. The hero and the villain and the princess tale is so well known. And then I tried to spin it. I didn't want a Shrek though. I didn't want to just have pop culture references to push the show. Pop culture references date a story. In twenty years, most of the gags in Shrek won't work anymore. They'll be lost because the reference won't be part of the pop culture anymore. I enjoy the gags now, but they'll get dated and dumb (some already have). Now consider movies like The Sword in the Stone or Lion King. Those movies stand the test of time because the themes are timeless. There are jokes that still hold up because they weren't grounded by the era they were made in.
Now, I am in no way comparing The Princess Knight to classics like Lion King or the Sword in the Stone, but they inspired me to create this musical. I set out to create something using the themes of stories like those. I've set up a hero, a villain, and a challenge that is very typical and familiar. You know the drill here: kidnapped princess, hero to the rescue, yadda yadda yadda. But then I tried to take it somewhere else - somewhere unexpected - and yet still somehow familiar.