Bad Theater Behavior — Page 24

At the first preview of Sunset Boulevard this year there were two 60ish ladies next to me that were chatting away as the show started. The man in front of them had a fedora type hat on and the ladies lean forward asking him "Would you take off your hat?". He actually was in the process of taking it off because he had a thin fabric beanie in hand that he was in the process of putting on instead. He turns back to them, "Would you mind stop talking?" Finally the ladies shut up.

I feel that some of the issue with people using phones, talking etc is worse today because with folks being so hooked on their devices that they're used to constantly being engaged in doing something. They aren't used to paying attention around them or sitting still. It certainly doesn't make it ok to do these things during a show. I seriously want to slap some people when I see the way they act at shows. I wish they'd stay home.

karen24 said: "...The one thing that kind of irritated me was that both Jake and Annaleigh got entrance applause. I find that distracting although obviously not nearly as bad as some of the things described here. At least Annaleigh got her share and not just the Big Movie Star (he was great, nothing against him in the role!)



"

If entrance applause bothers you so much, you should by all means stay home and watch HBO or Netflix. Both offer filmed entertainment, uninterrupted, that will be the same no matter how many times you watch it.

Seriously. With so much of "live" theater now amplified, digitized and pre-recorded, why gripe about a rare moment when the audience reacts spontaneously and the actor has to respond to it?

Babe_Williams said: "clb10162 said: "
I'm afraid I'll lose it if I take it off. Most times I don't have a bag with. I turn the light down as far as I can and try to keep my sleeve over it.

Have you tried turning it so the face is on the inside of your wrist (i.e., the palm side of your hand)? You can still see the time with just a quick glance.



"



Or, even better, try not wearing it to the theater?





"

In my experience most people wear a watch to tell the time. Imagine that. Most of the time my phone dies or I don't even have it with so I need some way to know the time.

VintageSnarker said: "Re: ponytail discussion

I don't think we should really be policing hairstyles. Especially a simple ponytail. Unless you do something to wrap the hair where it's tied I don't understand how you would get it higher than the top of your head. Would you complain if someone was wearing their hair in a teased out afro? I think it's a different situation if someone is wearing a big hat. It's easy to take off a hat. "

Does anyone even still wear a hat?

"

Interesting... It reminds me of when I saw The Front Page last year... it takes quite a while for Nathan Lane to appear, every time someone remotely similar to him walked on stage there would be this beginning of applause, only to quickly fade away once people realized it wasn't actually Nathan Lane... Granted, it could have been applause for the actor entering, but that's not really what it looked like...



"

YES. Every time a new character came on there was this roar of applause. This was STILL occurring AFTER Goodman, Slattery, Jefferson Mays, and Sherie Rene Scott had entered. Maybe people just assumed it was Nathan Lane without knowing that Walter Burns isnt in the text until the middle of act 2.

Took my daughter (15) to see Rent tour in Boston last Friday. Front row center mezz, been waiting for almost a year to see this!!! Seats next to us remained open until last minute when another mother/daughter (35?) came and sat down. Immediately the 35ish woman said something like "Always the best for me mom, front row center, I'm such a spoiled b@tch, aren't I?" very loudly. As the performance started, she began to sing along, and it became very annoying and distracting. After the third time, I leaned past my daughter, who was unfortunately seated next to her, and asked her to please stop. She looked at me in a "Who do you think you are?" manner and proceeded to sing louder. Meanwhile, she is seated next to my 15 year old! I leaned over again, and said "Please stop, it's enough". She then said to her mother something loudly about me being an old b@tch and having no right to tell her what to do. Luckily, I think after the next time she began singing he mother must have told her to quiet down, because it subsided after that. At intermission they immediately got up and I wanted to switch seats with my daughter so she would not have to deal with sitting next to her. She declined, saying she didn't want the woman to antagonize ME, because she was so hostile. When they came back THEY had switched seats, or I would have insisted my daughter move away. THANKFULLY, it did not ruin our evening, and my daughter and I loved the show. Another example of my favorite quote "Other people ruin everything". Ugh.....

Well I just finished a 3 day, 5 show binge. Hamilton, Come from Away, Hello Dolly, Phantom, and Sunday in the Park with George.

I did not see any cellphones near me. Nobody was letting ice slosh around in his/her cup. No crinkling of candy bags (ok maybe just a bit of that lol), NO TALKING, no singing along. It was like everybody had just gotten a good talking-to from this board before they sat down. The ushers were great too. While nobody in my vicinity was acting up, the ushers had their hands full at Hello Dolly and Sunday in the Park with picture-takers. What a workout! The Hudson theater has no center aisle, and all kinds of people were taking pictures of the curtain call, and the ushers were flashing their lights on them to no avail. Some of them even attempted to climb over 15-20 people to get to the center of the long row where the picture-takers were. In each case, by the time the usher stopped falling over old ladies, etc, and got to the offender, the offender had already put the phone away and gave the usher a quizzical look. The oddest part was the usher would say something to the picture-taker, the picture taker would nod in agreement, and the usher would turn and do his best to not fall on top of the some old ladies on the way out of the row. I was in the mezz and I had a perfect view of it. Unfortunately I did miss the bows because the ushers' performances were so entertaining. That said, I still love me some aggressive ushers. I think it was clear to the average person in each audience that the ushers weren't going to put up with nonsense.

Updated On: 4/21/17 at 07:57 PM

I forget if I've read about this here, but some people in my row were dangling their feet over the seat in front of them at Amélie yesterday. This was in the mezzanine. Since when is this appropriate behavior? I mean, the ones who did have someone sitting in front of them had to stop, but some didn't.

Had a tickle in my throat a few nights ago and coughed into my arm three times during the first act. Each time the guy in the row in front of me turned half way around as to show his displeasure. I admit that by the third turn around I wanted to punch him.

I saw Miss Saigon a couple of weeks ago and people were loudly talking up in the (half empty) balcony through the first ten minutes of the show. After that a group of people began to loudly eat a full meal behind us and throughout the show, people felt the need to constantly come and go as if they hadn't spent a pretty penny on a ticket. The night was concluded with a cellphone ringing during Maybe. At first I thought the harp player was having a stroke. It was awful.

On the other hand, the closing night of Sunday had the best audience I had ever seen, as was expected with THE Sondheim in attendance. They were enthusiastic, but respectful of the piece and knew right where to clap and laugh. It was wonderful to see one of my favorite shows with an audience of fans.

I don't know if this necessarily pertains, but I saw a Groundhog Day playbill in a trash bag outside my house! It just breaks my little heart to see that. ;(

It always seems to take that person five minutes or more to get that little piece of candy out of the wrapper. It drives me crazy too.