Althouse: Watching scenes in movies and on TV where there are lots of candles next to the bed, do you worry about the bedding catching on fire?

October 19, 2018

Watching scenes in movies and on TV where there are lots of candles next to the bed, do you worry about the bedding catching on fire?

I understand why set designers want to put candles around a bed — to set a mood. But my mood ends up being: Get those candles away from bed.

I've seen the candles-by-the-bed setup many times, but here's where I saw it most recently. As you may know, I'm slowly working my way through a box set of the complete episodes of "Friends," so that's where this comes from. I like this little scene a lot, quite apart from the candles-by-the-bed issue. Phoebe is trying to soothe the lovelorn Monica by doing some absurd ritual of going to your "happy place":

42 comments:

Jess said...: You don't have to worry, unless the music changes.; 10/19/18, 6:18 AM
Ralph L said...: Rhhardin can chime in about girls and candles.
It's refrigerators and front doors left open that bug me.; 10/19/18, 6:19 AM
Darrell said...: I hate it when people order/prepare food and don't eat it.; 10/19/18, 6:22 AM
Rick.T. said...: What bugs me are period pieces which have a multitude of candles burning in even the homes of poor people.; 10/19/18, 6:23 AM
Darrell said...: If a candle is knocked over, I can be sure it will be a man doing that today. The woman will keep her head and put it out.; 10/19/18, 6:28 AM
Darrell said...: We all know where a woman's "happy place" is.
And no, it's not the NYT/New Yorker.; 10/19/18, 6:35 AM
Ann Althouse said...: Notice that the aim in that scene is to get Monica to sleep. Why are candles burning by the bed a good idea for falling asleep? That would keep me awake — vigilant.; 10/19/18, 6:36 AM
Eleanor said...: If I was watching a boxed set of Friends, I wouldn't need candles. I'd be asleep before the opening credits.; 10/19/18, 6:41 AM
Darrell said...: Ann Althouse said...
That would keep me awake — vigilant.

Correct. No open flame anywhere you're not watching.
I can't go to sleep when any motor/machinery is running. Except the refrigerator and boiler motor.; 10/19/18, 6:41 AM
BarrySanders20 said...: My dippy brother in law burned out his apartment in Boulder when he was in college by leaving lit candles unattended. And he still leaves burning candles around.; 10/19/18, 6:59 AM
Ralph L said...: Nicole Brown Simpson lit candles around her bathtub and got murdered. Don't do it!; 10/19/18, 7:08 AM
David Begley said...: I’d never put candles around a bed in any of my movies.; 10/19/18, 7:27 AM
FIDO said...: Hmm. When I see candles on a bed, I think someone it trying to set up a romantic ambush.

If a person thinks that unsolicited sexual advances are akin to rape, I think the main fear of seeing candles by a bed isn't an incendiary one at all...

Fraught is a perfect word.; 10/19/18, 7:33 AM
Paco Wové said...: "I hate it when people order/prepare food and don't eat it."

A scene in a favorite old TV show has two people talking, one pouring coffee for both, and then adding cream, and setting down the cups – and then neither one of them takes so much as a sip before they leave. Bugs the crap out of me every time I see it.; 10/19/18, 7:57 AM
Rory said...: Season 3....; 10/19/18, 7:58 AM
Wince said...: "Do that hurt, Daddy, or do that feel good?"

"It's both. It hurt and it feel good..."

"Bang, bang."; 10/19/18, 7:59 AM
ALP said...: My first thought when watching scenes with many candles is how long it would have taken to lay them all out and light them. Second is "who HAS that many candles lying around?". Third is the concern about fire. I guess I'm a RISK taker!; 10/19/18, 8:10 AM
pious agnostic said...: I hate the sexy bubble bath and candles-around-the-bathtub thing. All that wax dripping! When everything's said and done, there's going to be a soppy mess in that bathroom, and neither actor has to clean it up.

Also, nobody say's goodbye when they hang up a phone! "I'll see you in hell! ....ok,you too. Bye."; 10/19/18, 8:11 AM
tcrosse said...: Lee Marvin said it best in 1965:
Candles by the bed; 10/19/18, 8:16 AM
Fernandinande said...: It's refrigerators and front doors left open that bug me.

My Lpog's knots start churning when screen people leave doors open.

I try to keep an eye on burning cigarettes, drink levels and clocks in the background to check for unauthorized time travel, and the other night there was some show in a hospital and I swear the funny-looking guy in scrubs pushing a wheelchair in the background was sitting in the chair being pushed the other way a few seconds later.; 10/19/18, 9:09 AM
Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...: i use emergency flares, but then again, I like to sleep on the highway; 10/19/18, 9:09 AM
MadisonMan said...: My daughter will light candles in her room. Drives me, the worrier, crazy.; 10/19/18, 9:36 AM
William said...: Wealthier women were resistant to gaslighting, particularly at dinner parties. Candlelight was more flattering. There's a metaphor in there somewhere........Samuel Johnson was a poor houseguest. He liked to read until the late hours. Due to vision problems, he had to tilt the candle and hold it close to the book, As a result, the wax from the candle fell on the rugs and bedding and different places. Fires, messes, poor illumination. There's not much to be said for candles, and yet there they are.; 10/19/18, 9:46 AM
Fritz said...: There's a reason civilized people switched to electric lights ASAP.; 10/19/18, 9:47 AM
Ralph L said...: Wasn't there a famous lawyer who'd put a pin in his cigar so the jury would be distracted waiting for the ash to drop?
(back when people smoked everywhere); 10/19/18, 10:03 AM
Clark said...: Hey, there's nothing absurd about going to your happy place in meditation. It can be very helpful in dealing with stress, anxiety, insomnia. I sometimes remember myself back to the time I woke up in a sleeping bag, lying in the open air of an August morning at McCargoe Cove on Isle Royale. A fox (a typically small, unthreatening, island fox) was sniffing at my sleeping bag.; 10/19/18, 10:15 AM
Curious George said...: Box set of friends or burning bed.

Easy.; 10/19/18, 10:34 AM
JohnAnnArbor said...: I've had that reaction. Lots of things that happen in movies make no practical sense and are sometimes really bad ideas; fire danger is only one of the issues.

Like much of the Hollywood bubble the celebrities live in, for that matter.; 10/19/18, 10:52 AM
JohnAnnArbor said...: My daughter will light candles in her room. Drives me, the worrier, crazy.

If it's your house, you can put a stop to it or get those old-fashioned candleholders with glass sleeves that are somewhat safer.; 10/19/18, 10:54 AM
Critter said...: This is the 21st century. There are now battery-powered LED replicas of burning candles.; 10/19/18, 10:57 AM
rcocean said...: What a bunch of worry-warts.

Had candles by my bed a thousand times.

NEVER worried about it jumping off the night stand and landing on the bed.; 10/19/18, 11:01 AM
rcocean said...: i pity people in the old days. I've tried to read "by candlelight" and found it very uncomfortable.; 10/19/18, 11:02 AM
Portlandmermaid said...: Bull Durham, the first time they have sex. All I can think of is all that candle wax dripping on the floor.

Like @Darrell, I don't like meals being prepared and people not eating them. Most of the time it feels like an oversight instead of a way to add dramatic tension.

Also, people brushing their teeth and talking with a frothy mouthful of toothpaste, and kissing. A pleasant, lingering kiss. sure, but gnawing on each other's lips, gah!; 10/19/18, 11:53 AM
Portlandmermaid said...: Missed the period after toothpaste. And kissing is a new comment, not added to a mouthful of toothpaste, though that also would make me gag.; 10/19/18, 11:55 AM
Ken B said...: I do worry about the bad catching fire, but not from candles. Ba-da-boom.

I'm here all week folks. Tip your wait staff.; 10/19/18, 12:41 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: rcocean said...

i pity people in the old days. I've tried to read "by candlelight" and found it very uncomfortable.

Even worse, in the old days people had to watch TV by candlelight.; 10/19/18, 12:52 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Ken B said...

I do worry about the bed catching fire, but not from candles.

That burning sensation you are experiencing has nothing to do with anything catching on fire. See your doctor.; 10/19/18, 12:53 PM
JaimeRoberto said...: Reading Michelle Goldberg and watching Friends? You are wasting your retirement.; 10/19/18, 3:14 PM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: Women love candles, and many of them have long hair, and that's a bad combination.; 10/19/18, 3:21 PM
Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of New York said...: Friends is an encyclopedia of techniques for getting through breakups.; 10/19/18, 5:01 PM
Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of New York said...: I don't like meals being prepared and people not eating them. Most of the time it feels like an oversight instead of a way to add dramatic tension.

What if they have to do twenty takes?; 10/19/18, 5:02 PM
The Crack Emcee said...: I just want Phoebe to die. If it happens in a fire, all the better.; 10/20/18, 10:16 AM