For those that are always bashing tourists and
For those that are always bashing tourists and
HBBrock
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/11/07
#1For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 1:09pm
How sad would you be if there were no tourists at all going to shows? You'd be miserable looking at the grosses and being in empty theatres every week.
Maybe it's time to start giving tourists more credit and respect.
Updated On: 2/11/08 at 01:09 PM
#2re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 1:20pmnah.
"Carson has combined his passion for helping children with his love for one of Cincinnati's favorite past times - cornhole - to create a unique and exciting event perfect for a corporate outing, entertaining clients or family fun."
"In Oz, the verb is douchifizzation." PRS
"In Oz, the verb is douchifizzation." PRS
#2re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 1:23pmHey doodle - weren't you a tourist when you went to see Moby Dick in London?
#3re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 1:39pmI never leave manhattan.
"Carson has combined his passion for helping children with his love for one of Cincinnati's favorite past times - cornhole - to create a unique and exciting event perfect for a corporate outing, entertaining clients or family fun."
"In Oz, the verb is douchifizzation." PRS
"In Oz, the verb is douchifizzation." PRS
Gothampc
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/20/03
#4re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 1:43pm
No, it would be like in the old days where you could buy a $4 ticket to see The Glass Menagerie the day of the show. You could go back several times to see Laurette Taylor's brilliant acting.
Perhaps tourists could act a bit more like human beings.
A few rules:
Theater is a live event. The actors can actually see and hear you. Some will embarrass you from the stage so try to keep comments to yourself until intermission or the final curtain.
The show begins when the house lights dim. The dimming of the lights is a signal for you to stop talking. Some shows have an overture. Just because nothing is happening onstage, doesn't mean you can talk. Listen to the music.
There is to be no taking of pictures. Yes we know you want to record an exciting event such as a Broadway show, but theater unions forbid it.
Broadway is not like a movie theater. Please eat before you come as they do not serve hot dogs, pretzels or popcorn. (Yes I understand that in the West End they serve ice cream and I would love that for Broadway. But until they do, the rule is no eating in the theater).
If English is not your first language, then maybe you should skip seeing a show. Unfortunately translation services are not available and it is bad manners to sit and translate for someone else.
Many actors are generous with their time and will socialize at the stage door. But this is not your chance to monopolize their time. They probably don't care that you played their part in your high school production. Tell them you enjoyed their performance, ask them to sign your Playbill, thank them for it, and then make like a banana and split. There are other people waiting.
If anyone ever tells you that you put too much Parmesan cheese on your pasta, stop talking to them. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.
Updated On: 2/11/08 at 01:43 PM
#5re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 1:47pm
To use an American expression - "Sure you do".
And this thread just when I was beginning to contemplate another visit.
And with the exchange rate still being so favourable too.
#6re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 1:55pm
aw, come on over, scripps.
We won't bite.
Doodle MIGHT, but I don't think you have to worry. 
"I'm an American, Damnit!!! And if it's three things I don't believe in, it's quitting and math."
#7re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 2:02pmTo be fair, it isn't just the tourists. I have had some New Yorkers "misbehave" around me at a show. Most recently at August:Osage. I chatted with him and his friend before the show and when the lights went down...out came the cell phone! He also decided to chat with his friend who was with him. I shushed him and told him that if the cell phone didn't get put away, I would get an usher. He put it away. Said he was just checking one last msg.
Just give the world Love. - S. Wonder
#8re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 2:52pmThe worst audience experience I ever had in New York was at Les Miz, with a group of ladies behind me from New Jersey who would not shut up. The tourists sitting in front of them from California (my parents and I) were far better behaved...
"This thread reads like a series of White House memos." — Mister Matt
HBBrock
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/11/07
#9re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 2:55pm
When I saw Wicked, there were 3 girls behind me (local New York girls) that were talking about the DETAILS of the plot before the show started because they had all seen it a few times. I had to turn around and tell them "Some of us haven't seen this before." They quickly got the point.
Updated On: 2/11/08 at 02:55 PM
#10re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 2:57pm
Gothampc - wow.. just wow
Behavior issues and the things all of you are pointing out aren't limited by ANY stretch to JUST tourists.
"A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men" - Willy Wonka
Gothampc
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/20/03
#11re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 3:01pm
"Behavior issues and the things all of you are pointing out aren't limited by ANY stretch to JUST tourists."
In my experience it has been. I'm not saying ALL tourists act this way, but whenever I've encountered behavior problems they have been tourists. I don't remember these problems in the 70s and 80s, prior to the tourist boom.
If anyone ever tells you that you put too much Parmesan cheese on your pasta, stop talking to them. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.
#12re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 3:02pmThey're not just limited to New York either. The West End has the same problem with tourists and ignorant Brits.
#13re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 3:05pmPerhaps the word "tourist" in theatre terms should be considered as someone who is not a regular play-goer and is unfamiliar with what is acceptable theatre behavior. A tourist to the Broadway experience.
#14re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 3:07pm
Just because they're neccessary to keep shows alive doesn't mean I have to like them...or that they are keeping the right shows alive. Technically, I am a tourist, but I go up at least once a month and I really don't consider myself one at this point...at least as far as theatre is concerned. Did that sound snobby? Sorry, oh well.
I was at Young Frankenstein Saturday. The all-around behavior and etiquette was horrible--it's really not that difficult. Just sit in your seat before the show starts and shut up. Yet they kept coming up with all kinds of ignorant and irritating things to do!
#15re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 3:09pmSome people in every town that has any kind of tourism trade at all will ALWAYS say they hate tourists. Never mind that tourism is the main source of income for many of these communities, or that when they go on vacation they are then tourists themselves never seems to enter the equation. These people just need to feel superior.
#16re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 3:12pm
This certainly isn't limited to tourists, but my advice: If you can't hear, GO GET ONE OF THE DAMN LISTENING DEVICES. Or don't sit in the mezzanine.
The other day I was at "Crimes of the Heart," and I heard about every third line twice because a woman kept asking her daughter, "What did they say? What was that?" A few weeks earlier, when I saw Sheba, the two ladies next to me kept complaining out loud that they couldn't here any time Zoe Kazan spoke.
#17re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 3:13pm
Again - I'll assert that it's not just tourists or first time theatergoers.
And yes, it has gotten "worse" in the last decade. But I find behavior issues an "all over" phenomenon. Whether you're a New Yorker, from Kansas or Timbuktu - people from all over can be respectful and they can be disrepectful. Pigeon holing or making sweeping generalization never works and will never be accurate.
You can say that theater etiquette has gone downhill since the 70s and be 100 percent accurate. You can try and blame tourism but that's not the sole issue at heand. The bottom line is that people's (regardless of geography) behavior has changed.
And it's also not aged based either.
"A little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men" - Willy Wonka
#18re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 3:22pm
Virtually every annoying disruption I've encountered in a Broadway theatre was committed by locals not tourists.
Just because they're neccessary to keep shows alive doesn't mean I have to like them...or that they are keeping the right shows alive.
What would the "right shows" be? Only the ones of which you approve?
Just sit in your seat before the show starts and shut up. Yet they kept coming up with all kinds of ignorant and irritating things to do!
Like what? Before the show or during intermission, I don't really care as there is nothing but a curtain to be distracted from. I think the only time I was annoyed before the actual performance began was at Forbidden Broadway when two Bohemian college drama majors sat next to me all cutesy with their knees bent up to their chins and their feet in their seats. They proceeded to open their huge backpacks and pull out Doritos and other pungent noisy snacks so they could finish their dinner amongst the rest of the audience. The smell made me very nauseous.
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
amalou
Broadway Star Joined: 5/15/07
#19re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 4:03pm
You wouldn't think that seeing a show would be such a difficult concept to grasp! Tourists or not, people just don't grasp the concept that other people pay for tickets too, other people want to watch a show and other people EXIST. I can't remember the last time I've seen a movie and didn't have to deal with people talking through it.
"But I can tell you that Raoul, who was so handsome in "The Phantom," is now a drunken wreck."
Updated On: 2/11/08 at 04:03 PM
george95
Broadway Legend Joined: 1/1/08
#20re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 4:12pmIf I ever get annoyed by tourists, I always think "they're just here for a little while to bring the area some money. Then once they've given money out all over the place, they'll leave." so I'm very happy to see tourists in New York.
Jonny boy
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/30/07
#21re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 4:19pmBroadway would not be what it is without tourist. I'm sure that there are just as many New Yorker's that are disruptive or anoying...
Craww
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/13/06
#22re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 4:20pm
For every misbehaving person you've labeled a tourist in your head, there are many more surrounding you whom you'd never even suspect as being something so awful as an out of town visitor.
I think us tourists who behave through a show are an even worse breed. Without us acting up you'll never know the hideous truth we're hiding. You might end up exchanging pleasant words with us in the bathroom line, and be forever tainted by the pollens of Ohio infecting you with rudeness. Next thing you know, New York native that you are, you've become the kind of theater patron that sings along to the songs and eats oranges off the stage at intermission.
Its the corrupting influence of the silently menacing well behaved tourists that are really subjugating the New York theater experience. 
jordangirl
Broadway Legend Joined: 10/1/06
#23re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 4:24pmHey...I grew up in Nashville, so I'm so used to tourists. I may joke about silly things they do ~ but I even joke about the silly things my parents did their first visit up here. But I'm never intentionally mean. (Ok...other than not telling the "This is yellow like butter! We need red like a cherry!" girls from Alabama or Mississippi they were on the wrong platform at 42nd St ~ but that was because I was silently laughing too hard to be of any assistance.)
Experience live theater. Experience paintings. Experience books. Live, look and listen like artists! ~ imaginethis
LIVE THAT LESSON!!!!!!
LIVE THAT LESSON!!!!!!
#24re: For those that are always bashing tourists and
Posted: 2/11/08 at 4:24pm
Perhaps the word "tourist" in theatre terms should be considered as someone who is not a regular play-goer and is unfamiliar with what is acceptable theatre behavior. A tourist to the Broadway experience.
is exactly what I was thinking. I think tourists see shows every time they visit New York would know proper theatre etiquette. The rudest crowds I've witnessed are locals.
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