# Obvious things about a creative work you realize after the millionth time (OPEN SPOILERS POSSIBLE) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 24, 2009, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117 "2009-07-24T13:20:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 316
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2025, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6307 "2025-05-25T16:23:37Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > OK, for those of us not as familiar with old movies, what movie is that? The Errand Boy. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2025, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6308 "2025-05-25T17:04:17Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > And did either or both have dialog, or was it just the music? The Errand Boy, and that’s the actual audio from the movie. Here’s the clip. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/Q4v8UdkTx30/hqdefault.jpg "Jerry Lewis - The Errand Boy (1961) Pantomime.flv") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4v8UdkTx30&t=39) ---
**Author:** ![leahcim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/b4bc9f/32.png) [@leahcim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/leahcim)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2025, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6309 "2025-05-25T23:02:47Z")
Here’s the Family Guy clip: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=\_-m\_V5lfmuU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-m_V5lfmuU) . Also just music, no dialogue. ---
**Author:** ![Mops](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mops/32/16494_2.png) [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2025, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6310 "2025-05-31T07:34:26Z")
After only ever hearing selected arias from both for decades, I have realized that _Il barbiere di Siviglia_ (Rossini) is the prequel to _Le nozze di Figaro_ (Mozart). ---
**Author:** ![kwintenstraler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kwintenstraler/32/10698_2.png) [@kwintenstraler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kwintenstraler)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2025, 9:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6311 "2025-05-31T09:10:06Z")
I know the Tree man from The garden of earthly delights by Hieronymous Bosch for a long,long time, but I always thought that you are looking at him from the front, as of he was carrying something on his shoulder like a waiter perhaps. Recently I learned it is his (open) backside you are looking at and his face is also looking backwards. [This dude](https://images.fineartamerica.com/images/artworkimages/mediumlarge/3/the-garden-of-earthly-delights-tree-man-hieronymus-bosch.jpg) So I thought his left leg was his right arm. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2025, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6312 "2025-05-31T12:31:05Z")
> [@Mops](#): > > After only ever hearing selected arias from both for decades, I have realized that _Il barbiere di Siviglia_ (Rossini) is the prequel to _Le nozze di Figaro_ (Mozart). And it’s still a common misconception that “Largo al factotum” (the “Figaro, Figaro, Figaro” aria) is from the latter, because it has “Figaro” in its title. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2025, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6313 "2025-05-31T13:41:55Z")
I knew that the one followed the other, but it never clicked for me that they were written by different composers. Until today. Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2025, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6314 "2025-05-31T16:00:36Z")
The depiction of Hell is the most famous but it’s only the third part of the whole work. Perhaps the second part (actually the largest panel of the three) was usually not mentioned in polite company because of its showing what led to the corruption and decay of the Edenic paradise: [Yiffing](https://i.etsystatic.com/32056079/r/il/02e1cb/4961546291/il_1588xN.4961546291_dkhc.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2025, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6315 "2025-05-31T22:55:11Z")
> [@kwintenstraler](#): > > I know the Tree man from The garden of earthly delights by Hieronymous Bosch for a long,long time, but I always thought that you are looking at him from the front, as of he was carrying something on his shoulder like a waiter perhaps. > Recently I learned it is his (open) backside you are looking at and his face is also looking backwards. > > [This dude](https://images.fineartamerica.com/images/artworkimages/mediumlarge/3/the-garden-of-earthly-delights-tree-man-hieronymus-bosch.jpg) > > So I thought his left leg was his right arm. I always thought his body has been cut in half, around the waist, above his backside, and the tree trunks ARE his arms. His legs and butt are missing. Do you have a cite that’s his butt and legs? The whole thing is very weird either way, and obviously meant to be. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2025, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6316 "2025-06-01T00:48:01Z")
This is giving me flashbacks to [**the poster for _The Santa Clause_**](http://www.impawards.com/1994/santa_clause_ver3.html) that had me convinced that the main character’s transformation into Santa Claus somehow involved transplanting his butt onto his abdomen. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2025, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6317 "2025-06-01T08:08:16Z")
[“Summer of the 17th Doll”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Summer_of_the_Seventeenth_Doll) is a classic Australian play. Probably _the_ classic Australian play. In high school, we read the play without the benefit of the internet, so we had to find our own meanings. I’ve just learned what a [Kewpi Doll](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kewpie) is. As a teenager, reading about adults, I thought that the dolls were some kind of adult thing that adults collected. Actually, they are childish, and intentionally so. Suddenly the whole play comes alive in a way that a teenager had absolutely no way of understanding. It’s a play about a teenager realizing that he/she is 40. It’s a tragedy. I missed all that when we read it at age 15. I had absolutely no understanding of the tragedy of turning 40. The dolls are a fundamental key to understanding. It’s right there in the title. (Textually, aging from 20 to 37, but that’s ok) ---
**Author:** ![kwintenstraler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kwintenstraler/32/10698_2.png) [@kwintenstraler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kwintenstraler)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2025, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6318 "2025-06-01T14:54:18Z")
There is an earlier sketch of the Tree man which shows it better. [Link to drawings](https://www.thecollector.com/hieronymus-bosch-mysterious-drawings/) Before, I did see it the same way you did. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2025, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6319 "2025-06-01T14:55:33Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > I always thought his body has been cut in half, around the waist, above his backside, and the tree trunks ARE his arms. His legs and butt are missing. > > Do you have a cite that’s his butt and legs? > > The whole thing is very weird either way, and obviously meant to be. It pretty clearly is, to me at least. Bosch had earlier done a drawing of him, _The Tree Man_, where it isnt in Hell > **[Reddit - The heart of the internet](https://www.reddit.com/r/museum/comments/1cvzez3/hieronymus_bosch_the_treeman_c_1505/)** > **[The Tree Man - Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen](https://www.boijmans.nl/en/collection/artworks/27017/the-tree-man)** > > The Boijmans collection: discover the stories behind more than 50,000 works of art ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2025, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6320 "2025-06-01T20:19:34Z")
It still looks like his arms, not his legs. We will just have to agree to disagree on that point. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2025, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6321 "2025-06-01T20:36:50Z")
The tree trunks are at the same end of his torso as his head. The end of his torso opposite his head is missing and open. There’s no place for his legs, if he ever had any, to attach. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2025, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6322 "2025-06-01T23:57:24Z")
Charlie Chaplin – City Lights – Street sweeper. City Lights is perhaps CC’s greatest film. In part of it, he is a “street sweeper”. So, I know a little bit more about city streets now than I did when I was at university, and I realize that “street sweeper” is a euphemism for someone who cleans up after horses. He’s in front of a parked car, but he’s shoveling something up from the street. (you can’t see what). He heads off, and sees some horses go past. Then some more horses. Then some _more_ horses… He turns around and heads off in the other direction 🙂 Then an Elephant goes past. Now I laughed. Totally missed that the first time around. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2025, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6323 "2025-06-02T04:34:50Z")
> [@commasense](#): > > I knew that the one followed the other, but it never clicked for me that they were written by different composers. Until today. Thanks! The original plays are by Pierre Beaumarchais. There is actually a third Figaro play to complete the trilogy, _The Guilty Mother_ (_La Mere Coupable_) but none of the operatic versions have been overly noteworthy (other than Corigliano’s _The Ghosts of Versailles_ which loosely includes it as a play-within-a-play). ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2025, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6324 "2025-06-02T13:03:36Z")
When I lived in Bozeman, there was an annual parade that about a third of the town turned out to watch, because the other two-thirds were in it. There was one fellow in town who had a business of going to people’s yards to clean up their dog droppings for them. He strategically positioned himself in the parade right behind one of the equestrian groups, and made a big show of it every time it became relevant. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2025, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6325 "2025-06-02T13:23:04Z")
I searched the wayback machine for an example [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/-UFEZvZx5Ms/hqdefault.jpg "Peabody's Improbable History - Opening and Close") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-UFEZvZx5Ms) ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2025, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117/6326 "2025-06-02T15:13:36Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > He strategically positioned himself in the parade right behind one of the equestrian groups, and made a big show of it every time it became relevant. I’ve heard there’s recommendation about planning a parade. You can have marching bands or equestrian units but not both. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117.md?page=315) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obvious-things-about-a-creative-work-you-realize-after-the-millionth-time-open-spoilers-possible/504117.md?page=317)