New York To Drop Indoor Mask Mandate This Week — Page 6

I was at MM Feb 5 matinee. Was amazed a guy center orch, 2nd row on aisle was videotaping first 2 minutes before anyone told him to stop. Right under nose of Hugh and company.

Looks like everyone is just plain "over it." All of it.

I know I am.

Shows closed from poor sales/lost income/cast illness. What's going into St James when Utopia is done? Do they have a show lined up? Or will it be another empty building just waiting?

Globally, everyone is done with vax and other strict measures.. Truckers blocking roads, unvaxed protesting losing jobs, airline passenger brawls, governors lifting restrictions, etc.

If opening the theater bars and lax mask enforcement expedites the return to normal, then great. Can't see this dragging into summer. No one wants sick cast members, but there's no cast in a show if patrons don't buy.

Regardless of what is the common practice, I will continue to wear a mask on Broadway theaters, where sitting side-by-side with strangers is the common practice. In church or in movie theaters, where we can spread out if space permits, I'll play it by ear.

JayElle said:

Once the show started, no "mask monitors" wandering up/down aisles tonight asking folks to mask up like they do in other shows. And I noticed among patrons when those masks slipped below the nose/mouth, they stayed there.

Hopefully David Byrne and his company will finish theirs without them, even if it's sagging masks conveniently ignored. Hope other theaters follow. That will hasten the return to normal.

My guess is that ushers are ignoring "sagging masks" or just ignoring noncompliance in general because they are afraid of angry audience members who think that the New York lift on mask mandate applies to theatre, too. Just look at all of the incidents with irate passengers on airplanes now. People can really act like jerks.

If the ushers feel like they can't enforce proper mask wearing right now, it's NOT a positive that means we are on our way to normal. It just means that people are not respectful of the guidelines that are currently in place, guidelines that influenced some of us to actually buy tickets because we felt safe. Those guidelines are also in place to protect the performers, and we should all want to do whatever we can to keep them well so we won't have a repeat of all the cancellations that happened just a month ago.

Honestly, I have been on this chat board as a pleasant place to celebrate a love for Broadway and get away from all the ugliness in the world, and yet the same divisive stuff is on here, too! It makes me sad to see a lot of comments about people wearing masks as "virtue signaling." If the virtues that I am signaling are that I care for others, am respectful of rules, and want Broadway to be able to operate without closures, then I'm all for "virtue signaling."

Updated On: 2/13/22 at 04:37 PM

One thing I’ve started to notice this week and especially this weekend, is that bars are no longer checking vax to get inside. Just walking around Hell’s Kitchen tonight i didn’t see one person checking to get inside.