Most embarassing moments on stage

[Stagerage2003]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 3:50pm

Hey guys, I need to tell stories for my acting class and one of them has to be a lie. So, I figured why not tell someone elses story for my own....SO here's what I think would be fun. Tell me your most embarassing moment onstage, or an embarassing moment that you have witnessed. Its going to really help! Thanks guys!

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 3:54pm

i thought i saw a thread like this on the student board

[trpguyy]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 4:03pm

My most embarassing moent on stage? Being in Will Rogers Follies

[peach]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 4:10pm

I think I've posted this before, but here goes...

Years ago, I was in a production of Carousel. I had a backstage costume change, and my lacy "bloomers" were missing from my bin. So, in a rush, I pulled a pair of black bike shorts off the floor (not sure whose they were), put them on over my tights (and under my long, ugly turn of the century dress), seeing as I had to do a cartwheel in that next scene, and exposing bike shorts was probably better than exposing my underside through my pink tights!

Oops. Local paper reviewed the show - called out my tacky bike shorts right there in the article.

[JulianHookbucks]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 4:16pm

Singing the wrong verse of Captain Hook's Waltz, and having to go back and sing a verse... or knocking over the Piano I was standing on as Julian Marsh in 42nd Street... luckily that was just a dress rehearsal... but the Hook's Waltz.. yeah that was closing Night... erk.

[mikewood]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 4:30pm

This is someone else's story not mine. A friend was doing a production of "Company" and managed to cut himself with broken glass on stage before he sang a solo. At the start of the song, his stuck his arm through an open window on the set and while he was singing, the SM or someone wrapped his hand. By the time he finished his song, his hand was completely wrapped and he continued.

Another friend of mine was the lead in "Butterflies are Free". In the scene at the end where the main character has a hissy fit and slams something into the sink, a fork flew up and cut his forehead. He proceeded to bleed throughout the scene until the character who plays his mother came in and tended the wound on stage.

Not embarassing necessarily but interesting....

[orangeskittles]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 4:33pm

For my high school theater class, everyone had to do short scenes for this comedy show one night and we were going to be graded on them. The other person was supposed to "pull" me off stage with her, but she actually pulled rather hard, so I slipped off my shoe. The big chunky heel hit the stage (which was hollow underneath) and it let out this huge "BOOM!" that echoed throughout the theater. The two of us froze for a second, then started to walk offstage. I got almost behind the curtain when I realized my shoe was still out on the stage, so I had to run back out and get it. My friend burst out laughing at me from behind the curtain, when I picked up my shoe, then I started laughing and hobbled offstage with one bare foot and one shoe in a 4 inch heel.

Thankfully, we were doing a comedy scene, so the only person that knew we had screwed up was the director. Unfortunately, she was also the one grading us.

Updated On: 9/14/05 at 04:33 PM

[WonderBoy]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 4:43pm

I have told this story before in another thread like this. The short version is I fainted on stage in a Christmas revue during the live nativity (yes we had live animals on stage as well) and I was Joseph. I knocked over the manger and the baby Jesus rolled across the floor yet I still held my crook up in the air while also falling onto the Angel of the Lord. The best part is afterwards I overheard an audience member ask, "Is Joseph supposed to faint at the sight of his illegitimate child?"

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 5:08pm

Not really the most embarrassing, but in the last show I was in: Ragtime, I was playing Willie Conklin and in my last scene for my last line I shout "White people should be grateful for what I done!" as the police drag me off-stage. well one night they dragged me off and their legs moved faster then mine did so I ended up falling on my ass as they dragged me off... it worked, I guess, but ya know... it wasn't supposed to happen...

[Stagerage2003]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 5:27pm

These are great thanks guys...but keep em coming...I need at least one minute of material

[Holliwoodblonde]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 6:43pm

When I was SM'ing Oklahoma one of my crew members brought the lights up too early for "Farmer and the Cowman" and there I was onstage still adjusting the house. The only way out would be to walk off the stage or slip through the fence which was upstage and then wait behind the house until the next black-out. The fence was the most discreet and thankfully, our Judd was great and stood in front of me as I squeezed my way through the fence. To make matters worse, my head-set fell off and got caught in the fence!! So I quickly untangled my head-set and rushed behind the house, Judd was hysterically laughing at that point. Miraculously, the only people who noticed were the lighting crew.

[Prisoner 24601]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 10:49pm

Here's someone else's story:

Their friend was a Kurt in a community production of The Sound of Music, and in the final scene where the Von Trapps are escaping, the gate that they escape through wouldn't open due to technical difficulties, so the group of Nazi's came on too soon. (they were supposed to come on after the Von Trapps go through the gate) There was an awkward pause for a few seconds because the Von Trapps just couldn't keep going because the Nazi's were there. So, after a bigger pause, one of the Nazi's decides to just yell out, "I got Gretl!" and takes gretl hostage while the rest of the Nazi's "shoot" the Von Trapps. The poor kids, not knowing what to do, just fall down and play dead.

And that's how the show ended.

[Lavieboheme3090]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 10:57pm

Last year when we did Stand and Deliever we were doing the school performance and one of the stage hands tripped down the stairs dropped the American Flag in front of 2000 kids. It was soooo funny

[Sumofallthings]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 10:59pm

Prisoner 24601 that is one of the best theatre stories I have ever read on this board. I honestly laughed out loud.

[Pippin]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 11:06pm

I was playing finch in How to Succeed... . it was a matinee for all the blue hairs. we got to the old ivy fight song, and the lyric is "rip, rip, rip the chipmunk off the field" well, I was doing a little dance, and each time we sing "rip", we lunge a little further, well on the final, "rip", a lunged a little too far, and the crotch of my pants split open. it wouldn't have been so bad exept for the fact that I was wearing black slacks with white underwear. for the rest of the song, everytime I took a step, the audience got a full picture of my tidy whities.

Updated On: 9/14/05 at 11:06 PM

[C is for Company]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 11:08pm

During my performance as Charlie Brown in our HS production of YAGMCB and I kicked a newspaper off stage that I was supposed to read in the whole upcoming scene and I knew when I kicked it, I just see it sliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiide and time stood still as I hoped it wouldnt go over the edge and ughhhhhh ALMOST made it but it fell and I was thinking sitting on a bench with no paper, Did that seem like it was done on purpose. I was hoping the audience thought nothing of it, but idk

[timmetzner]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 11:22pm

I agree, Prisoner 24601, that story is absolutely hysterical. I would have peed myself.

[JulianHookbucks]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 11:23pm

Oh also... not as funny, but incredibly embarassing for me... I was doing a National Tour of Christmas Carol when it came through Syracuse. They needed kids, and I was playing Peter Cratchitt. My line was, "and the goose, mother, will it be enough?" and I called it a turkey... but they didn't have turkey for Christmas in old England. It wasn't awful, but it was our first time doing the show with the cast, and Momma Cratchitt and Papa Cratchitt were none too happy with me. I was like... I feel incompetent... but the next night I called it a goose, and it was fine.

[VonTussleGirl]

Posted: 9/14/05 at 11:27pm

I cracked up at that Sound of Music story... thing is, I can honestly see the guy who played the head-Nazi-persson in our production actually doing that.

[Liz_Bennet]

Posted: 9/15/05 at 1:18am

Fiddler. Bottle Dance. Oops! Enough said.

Well, maybe not quite enough. A quick stagehand and a Tevye with a flair for the dramatic transformed it into a Broom Dance.

[Lizziemonster]

Posted: 9/15/05 at 6:52am

not my story but I was there, Imn a production of greece i was the chorus had a very quick change from the greas lightening scene to regular teenage clothes. We had girls in our grease lightening scene and in the quick change between coveralls and pretty swishy skirt one of them manged to get hee skirt caught in the back of her panties and dida good bit of the next scene like that, luckily she did not turn around too much but obviulsey the poor girl was mortified when she came off, to make it worse the lead guy came and had a go at her for it during the interval right before the second act......he then promptly walked straight back on stage and did the rest of the performance with his flys undone and *everything* on show with out realising it.....funnily enough the chorus girl felt alot better after that and although we all remember what she did no one else does where as everyone still talks about Danny flashing his bits and pieces to a packed house

[fiesta1]

Posted: 9/15/05 at 8:50am

I was a community theatre production of "Carnival". I played Dr. Glass, a veternatian, who tries to woo Rosalie with his animal skills. I had a duck in my medical bag (that bit me regularly when I picked him up), and a rabbit in the pocket of my lab coat. Apparently, one night the bunny got stage fright, and peed in my pocket. Imagine being on stage with a large yellow spot spreading on your costume while being bitten by a duck. Priceless.

The adage about not performing with children and animals is right. Just Say No.

[lildogs]

Posted: 9/15/05 at 11:55am

That is the best, Prisoner!

Along the same lines: I was in Big River and when the posse is looking for Jim, they were supposed to be in a boat that was pulled across the stage. Of course, the rope breaks and they are struggling with the rope backstage. I try to cover with a line "Ya'll having trouble over there" which gets a laugh but not as big a laugh as when one of the posse guys walked across the stage, paddling with an oar in the air.

Or

Our coach in Damn Yankees messed up the first verse of Heart, and then when we were supposed to come in--he just kept on singing the same verse again, only right this time--the orchestra had to drop out, and finally the horn player LAID DOWN his transition and my friend Blake screamed his lyric and we got back on--whew!