One Playbill per person please.......one or one-hundred — Page 4

"I agree - it's not stealing, afterall how can you steal something that is already free? Everything costs money to produce."

I don't care if you agree or not. It is stealing, and that IS a fact. Just because you receive the first one free when you are seated does not entitle you to take as many as you want. The show pays money for these programs. Just because they don't charge you for one doesn't mean it is free. Its cost is part of your ticket.

I used to take 10-15 after a show, for god knows what reason, but because of space have recently changed my philosophy. Now, at most I go home with two.

"As for Playbill, my understanding is that they do deliver as many playbills as there are seats in the house -- but will revise that based on attendance records. So if you're seeing JOURNEY'S END, what's the harm of taking 15 extra playbills? There were probably 15 empty seats behind you. But at WICKED, maybe you want to take just a few. "

The harm is you are STEALING from the production. Do you know whether or not they received enough programs for the week? As I said, the house staff are not permitted to use the following week's shipment if they run out. It is up to the show to order the correct number of programs.

"And if the ushers are so worried about people taking extra's, then they should lock up the playbills elsewhere in the theatre when the show starts to prevent people from grabbing from their stacks."

And how are they supposed to pass out Playbill's to latecomers if they've locked them away? But that's not the point. You shouldn't take what doesn't belong to you. You are handed ONE program. There is this overwhelming sense of entitlement on this board that is disturbing. And let me reiterate again. The Playbill's are NOT free. They are technically part of your ticket, since the production (not the theatre) actually pays for them. I hope one day you go see a show when the theatre has run out of programs. Then maybe then you'll understand how frustrating it can be for others not to receive programs.

Just my two cents.

This past summer when the mayor advised everyone to conserve electricity for fear of a blackout Playbill did as well and did not print as many copies as they normally would have, which caused theatres to conserve. Les Miz had a very strict one playbill per person rule that week and the user even asked if people in the same party were willing to share.

Secondly some theatres do lock them away. The Hilton comes to mind as the primary example where they will leave about 5 on a table at the back of the orchestra for people who lose/forget theirs, but the stacks are locked away.

Thirdly, while I don’t doubt what Fosse is saying is true, I do know that the management often ignores these rules. I cant tell you how many times I’ve gotten the past months edition a week or two into the new month, similarly Opening night playbills are given out for the entire week of opening and there has been more then one occasion where I’ve gotten a playbill listing a cast member that has left the show within the past few weeks and an insert saying “[Show title] Welcomes [name] to the Company”

I know its wrong but I have to go along with most of the people in this thread and say that I usually grab an additional one for stage dooring. If they are opening night maybe I’ll take more than one (don’t you wish you grabbed a bunch at the Carrie opening night?).

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I don't think they like you taking extras at The Pirate Queen. They literally HID them after the start of the show and I was walking around the theatre looking for the stack and the usher gave me this "I know what you're doing and it's not gonna work" bitchy look. UGH. What a queen.

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Bumping

I counted 53 after a show once. This was 5 years ago when I was 9 and took as many as possible.

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The show pays money for these programs.

WRONG.

Playbills are provided to productions for FREE, unless the producers request to have the Playbills printed in color, in which case they have to pay a fee.

The cost to produce Playbills is funded by the advertisers inside the Playbill, NOT by the productions of the shows.

Without the existence of the shows, there would be no reason for the advertisers to pay for the making of Playbills.

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The productions also have to pay every time they have a cast, photo or staff change (which can be every single week, in the case of many musicals). There are also labor costs involved with all the people who have to stack the Playbills, carry them to the aisles, stuff them with the cast change slips, etc. So no, they're not "free" to the production.

I don't get why people feel the need to take from the ushers' stacks without asking. It's just rude. Is it really that much trouble to be polite and ASK instead of just grabbing whatever you want?

I was at Chicago once when I saw someone snatch a Playbill from the usher's stack. He ended up toppling them all over and all the little pieces of paper that had been stuffed in the programs went flying all over the place. Did the guy stop and pick everything up? No, he shrugged and walked on. What did it matter, he had his Playbill. And in the meantime, the usher looked as though he was going to cry, because he had to stop seating people to clean up the mess. My friend and I helped him pick everything up. Sometimes there's a real reason they ask you not to take from the stacks.

Well, for what it's worth I usually ask for an extra one first and if they won't give me one I'll grab a couple off the stack at the top of the row at intermission or, if the usher is mean about it, I'll grab it while they are ushering other people. I usually pay full price for a ticket so I don't think grabbing one or two extra copies is too bad. But that's just me. I wouldn't judge anyone who took more or less.

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I usually take 2. Those are for me to keep. I have two of every Playbill.

When I see Playbills in good condition left behind by patrons I don't hesitate to take those as well, but those are simply for my friends who also like to have some Playbills for their collection.

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When I went to the Gershwin this past weekend to pick up a Wicked playbill for a friend who lives in CA, I asked someone that was standing on the stairs, checking tickets after intermission. He informed me that the box office has stacks of them, so I was able to get 2 playbills without even seeing the show.

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