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[[File:MaskedBall.jpg|frame|''Paper faces on parade...'']]
in an inhuman race!
Want to show off just how rich, elite, and extravagant your [[Blue Blood|upper class]] is? Have them celebrate everything with a
▲{{quote|Green and black,<br />
▲Queen and priest,<br />
▲Trace of rouge,<br />
▲Face of beast,<br />
▲Faces -<br />
▲Take your turn, take a ride<br />
▲on the merry-go-round<br />
▲in an inhuman race!|''[[The Phantom of the Opera]]'', "Masquerade"}}
▲Want to show off just how rich, elite, and extravagant your [[Blue Blood|upper class]] is? Have them celebrate everything with a [[Masquerade Ball]]. With bizarre masks and elaborate [[Gorgeous Period Dress]], everyone's identity is sufficiently obscured for any number of misunderstandings. Either Horror or [[Hilarity Ensues]].
For really grand scale masquerades, the writers may include festitivities where the entire city [[Gorgeous Period Dress|dresses up in grand costumes]], a la Carnival/Mardi Gras. Which maximizes the chance for confusion and mingling with people one would normally never know. Hard to avoid in [[It's Always Mardi Gras in New Orleans|New Orleans]] and Venice.
A popular 19th century setting, due, as [[The Other Wiki]] puts it, "both to their popularity at the time and to their endless supply of plot devices." To wit: Mistaken identities, untraceable murderers, believing something is [[All Part of the Show]], a normally-costumed character hiding in [[For Halloween I Am Going
The refinery on top of the sheer trope goldmine that is the
A modern costume party has some of the potential for this, especially if there are disguises abounding. If it's an ''actual''
Even those who vainly deny that [[Everyone Is Jesus in Purgatory]] may grudgingly admit the social metaphor inherent in the
Has nothing to do with [[The Masquerade]], and can actually mean a break from it; see [[For Halloween I Am Going
Subtrope of [[Dances and Balls]]. Has nothing to do with [[Idiot Ball]] or any of its subtropes.
{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==▼
* In ''[[
▲== [[Anime]] ==
▲* In ''[[The Big O (Anime)|The Big O]]'', Schwarzwald rigged it so that the masks would eventually explode. Damn.
** He didn't end up the [[Nietzsche Wannabe]] posterchild for nothing.
* The climax of the anime ''[[
* Both the anime and manga versions of ''[[Sailor Moon]]'' feature Usagi attending a masquerade ball held at the D Kingdom's embassy in order to find out if the royal family's treasure is the [[Mineral MacGuffin|Silver Crystal]] and if Princess D is actually the Moon Princess that they are looking for. The scene is more significant in the manga as {{spoiler|Mamoru and Usagi both reveal that they have memories of each other in a past life}} at this event. Naturally, the two of them also share a dance together.
* In ''[[Urusei Yatsura]]'' the Mendo family has a masked ball every year. This is a rather psychotic pun as the word for "ball" (as in party) can also mean "combat challenge". Which is what it was - all the participants put on masks and attack each other, taking out their frustrations in anonymity. (Then the monk Cherry shows up, having mistaken the Japanese phrase "masked ball" for "grape harvest" and wants to pick grapes ... [[Rumiko Takahashi]] likes puns.)
* The second arc of ''[[Umineko no Naku Koro
* ''[[Rose of Versailles]]'' works at least one into the plot, with Marie Antoinette sneaking out of Versailles to attend one in the city where she meets Fersen, kicking off her major romantic subplot.
* [[Vassalord]]: In vol. 4, {{spoiler|Rayflo sends Charlie a note to attend a masqueradeso they can meet up. They quote [[Phantom of the Opera]] at each other and eventually a fight between Barry and Charlie breaks out.}}
▲== Comic Books ==
* Featured in the [[Gargoyles]] comics by SLG. A costume party is held on Halloween at the Xanatos building- where the gargoyles fit right in and Elisa is dressed like Princess Jasmine. (She likes Disney Princesses for some reason.) Meanwhile, Fox and David Xanatos are attending a masquerade at the White House.
* Barbara Gordon first created the Batgirl outfit as a costume for a party - to annoy her father. When the party was crashed by supercriminals, she responded to the crisis like a costumed crimefighter rather than a costumed partygoer (Which Bruce Wayne did, seeing as he was in a clown outfit at the time), starting her journey to become a member of the Bat-Family.
== [[Film]] ==
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** Regarding the masquerade in Labyrinth, for those of you who like symbolic details:
*** Earlier, we see that Sarah owns a little music box with a princess-like figure twirling atop it, inside walls of glass and mirrors. In Jareth's illusion, he turns Sarah into this music-box princess.
*** There are mirrors in abundance. Jareth removes his mask while the guests retain theirs, and yet he is often in close proximity to mirrors, including two which are held up to him on either side by masked women when Sarah first spots him.
*** The walls of the room itself are mirrors. Sarah has to shatter them to break the illusion.
* ''[[The Man in the Iron Mask (1998 film)|The Man in the Iron Mask]]'' uses this to switch out the corrupt (literal) [[Evil Twin]] king for the good one, with the added bonus that the hidden twin had spent his entire life wearing a heavy iron mask, which he flashed to the king from under the decorative gold one to freak him out.
* At least one Cinderella adaptation makes the Prince's ball a masquerade, making the whole "find her by her shoe size!" idea seem slightly less silly.
** If you're referring to the Hilary Duff movie, it still seems pretty obvious who everyone is under the masks.
** It also happened in a Muppet version.
** In ''[[Ever After (
* In ''[[Zorro]]: The Gay Blade'', the governor holds a
* ''[[
* The first ''[[Pink Panther]]'' film has one.
* In ''[[Amadeus]]'', Salieri follows Mozart to a masked ball, at which Mozart ridicules Salieri to the delight of the crowd.
* In the musical number/flashback "Poor Thing" in ''[[Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (
{{quote|
She wasn't no match for such craft, you see,
and everyone thought it so droll.
They figured she had to be daft, you see.
So all of them stood there and laughed, you see.
Poor soul!
Poor thing! }}
* In creepy parallel to Judge Turpin above, ''[[Revenge of the Nerds]]'' has the lead nerd use his college-fair [[Star Wars|Darth Vader]] costume to trick the heroine into sex.
* The film ''[[Start the Revolution Without Me]]'' (a humorous account of the French Revolution, and yes, ) has a hilarious send-up of this type of party. Even though it's technically not a
* Happens in ''[[
* The [[climax]] of [[Alfred Hitchcock]]'s ''[[To Catch a Thief]]'' is set at a ball, where people wear lavish costumes fom the era of Louis XV.
* ''[[Sky Blue]]'' has one of these at the very start; Shua sneaks into Ecoban wearing an appropriate mask.
* In ''[[Brick]]'', Laura holds a "Halloween in January," party.
* In ''Ridicule'', a scorned lover attempts sabatoge at an elegant costume ball in pre-Revolutionary France.
* Marie-Antoinette, her husband, and her two favorite ladies sneak out of Versailles to attend a masked ball in Paris in Sofia Coppola's ''[[Marie Antoinette (
* In ''[[
== [[Literature]] ==
* [[Edgar Allan Poe]]'s ''[http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Masque_of_the_Red_Death The Masque of the Red Death]''. [[Captain Obvious|It ends badly.]]
* Referenced by [[The Grim Reaper]] in ''[[Discworld]]'', explaining why he appeared at a summoning ritual with a cocktail and a sausage-onna-stick.{{
** ''Witches Abroad'' also includes Death apparently wearing a carnival mask, and in ''Maskerade'' he actually does (along with the full ''Red Death'' ensemble), with the shock coming when he ''does'' take it off. Pratchett uses the same gag in the short story ''Turntables of the Night'' set at the modern-day, ultra-mundane version of the
** The [[Discworld]] novel ''[[
* ''[[The Phantom of the Opera]]'' has a masquerade scene where the Phantom tributes Poe's story.
* Very obliquely mentioned in an excerpt from a scene of the eponymous [[Brown Note]] [[Show Within a Show|playscript-within-the-book]] ''[[The King in Yellow]]'':
{{quote|
STRANGER: Indeed?
CASSILDA: Indeed it's time. We all have laid aside disguise but you.
STRANGER: [[Not a Mask|I wear no mask.]]
CAMILLA: ''(Terrified, aside to Cassilda.)'' No mask? No mask! }}
* In the book version of ''[[Ella Enchanted]]'', Ella wears a mask to the ball so she can see the prince without being recognized. In this case, though, no one else is masked.
** No, it's a three night ball event where everyone is wearing masks the first night, but then take them off quickly, so the Prince can see their beauty. This troper is not sure if everyone wore them the next nights, but Ella certainly did.
* The beginning of the climax of the sequel to [[Incarceron]], ''Saphique'' takes place in a Masquerade Ball.
* In the [[Discworld]] novel ''Witches Abroad'', the story of <s>Cinderella</s> Emberella is done at a masquerade ball. The Witches use this to switch the poor scullery girl with one of their own.
** Just how they managed to change the very dark-skinned Emberella to pale Magrat [[Fridge Logic|is never explained.]]
*** Well, the point is that nobody knows who it is - the herald who was carefully coached to announce "Mysterious and Beautiful Stranger" probably wasn't ''told'' "It'll actually be Ella from the kitchens, who's really the Baron's daughter".
* Popular in [[Mary Sue]] and [[Shipping]] [[Fanfic|FanFics]] as it gives the writer an excuse to [[Costume Porn|describe the gorgeous ball gowns]] that their female characters are wearing, a chance meeting with someone's [[Mysterious Protector]], and, if the host/hostess hired a band, a scene where a character shows off their amazing singing abilities. The fact that [[Most Fanfic Writers Are Girls]] could be responsible for the first and second reasons.
** A common trend of this in ''[[Harry Potter]]'' fanfics is to hold another Yule Ball (sans the Triwizard Tournament that it's supposed to go with).
* Jacqueline Carey's ''[[
* [[John C. Wright]]'s ''[[The Golden Oecumene
* Many of the [[Batman]] short story collections feature this. A few times Bruce Wayne shows up in a Batman costume. How silly!
* [[
* The climax of the first book of the ''Swan's War'' trilogy is a mask ball with such an abundance of plotting, provocation and foreshadowing that it defines the evenings of both following books.
* In Phillipa Gregory's "[[The Other Boleyn Girl]]" Mary Boleyn flirts with Henry the VIII at a masquerade in his court.
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* German author Spoerl once had a ball in one of his stories. The narrator/protagonist meets a girl there and wants to get closer. But when midnight is near, she suddenly wants to leave. He doesn't want to let her go, follows her and takes off her mask. To see to his shock that she has a disfigured face. She explains that she never meets other people except on Masquerade Balls, once a year. Yes, it's pretty much a [[Tear Jerker]].
* Variation on the planet Adumar in the [[X Wing Series]]; the perator (king) of Cartann puts on a mask at royal balls which makes it socially acceptable for others to treat him as just another guest, even though everyone knows it's him.
* [[
* ''[[Alias (TV series)|Alias]]'' brought the [[Wig, Dress, Accent]] to new levels by attending a modern retro masque party, where Sydney meets a [[New Old Flame]] who's probably [[The Mole]].▼
▲== [[Live Action TV]] ==
▲* ''[[Alias (TV)|Alias]]'' brought the [[Wig, Dress, Accent]] to new levels by attending a modern retro masque party, where Sydney meets a [[New Old Flame]] who's probably [[The Mole]].
* A black-and-white masque ball in an episode of ''[[Ugly Betty]]'' provides cover for on-the-lam Claire Meade to talk to her estranged husband again.
* ''[[Gossip Girl]]'', being about rich socialite teens, has a [[Gorgeous Period Dress]] costume ball.
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== [[Music]] ==
* A masquerade ball is the central setting for the [[
* One Republic's video for "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrOeGCJdZe4&ob=av2e All the Right Moves]" feature a masquerade ball of Edwardian style - complete with a thieving rat.
* Completely unsurprisingly, the video for [[
▲== [[Theater]] ==
* ''[[Shakespeare|Romeo and Juliet]]'' fall in love at the masque ball, not knowing that they're members of enemy families.
* Act II, Scene i of ''[[Much Ado About Nothing]]''.
* Verdi's opera ''Un ballo in maschera'' is [[Very Loosely Based on a True Story|very loosely based]] around the assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden, who was shot during a masked ball.
** Francois Auber also wrote an [[Opera]] about the same incident, called ''Gustav le troisieme, ou le bal masque''
* [[The Phantom of the Opera]] has one turned [[Up to Eleven]] - the song is simply called "Masquerade," and gets used repeatedly throughout the remainder of the play.
{{quote|
Paper Faces on parade!
Masquerade,
Hide your face so the world can never find you!'' }}
** As in the book, the Phantom attends dressed up as Red Death. He's much more blatant about crashing the party in this version, though.
== [[Video Games]] ==
* In the retro-[[Steampunk]] ''[[
** They also use them to hide how disfigured their faces [[Nightmare Fuel|now are]].
** Some of them have been wearing the masks so long that their faces have deformed in the pattern of the mask's interior...
* [[Infocom]]'s third mystery, Suspect, was set at a costume party. The hostess is murdered with part of the protagonist's costume, making the protagonist...well, as the title implies, the suspect.
* Lord Fain of ''[[Lusternia]]'' has an aesthetic that mixes
== [[Western Animation]] ==
* An episode of the first ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 1987
* The episode "Heart of Tarkon" of ''[[Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers
== [[Real Life]] ==
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Disguise Tropes]]
[[Category:Settings]]
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[[Category:Dancing Tropes]]
[[Category:Plots]]
▲[[Category:Masquerade Ball]]
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