Theater Mess-ups- Page 3

[Unknown User]

Posted: 8/27/04 at 9:34pm

When i saw little shop of horrors last month, everything was fine with the cast, it was the set that was the problem. When the dentist's office came out (it comes out from both sides of the stage) it smashed together and some of the "diplomas" fell off and broke.

[kittykat2428]

Posted: 8/27/04 at 9:46pm

I have told this one before but when I saw Wicked at the end of July, Idina tripped over Dr. Dillamond's pointer in one of the classroom scenes. She caught herself, but seemed a little shaken up and says.." That's your stick" to Dr. D. Then she does a kind of Ba-dum Ching with her feet and starts moon walking across the stage! It was great and got a lot of cheers. Then she went up to Dr. D and said " I am supposed to ask you something..." She totally forgot her lines, but quickly remembered and got back in the scene. I never thought she would lose her concentration so much but I guess when you are that close to busting your ass on the goat man's stick you tend to lose it...so anyway...that was a good one. Updated On: 8/27/04 at 09:46 PM

[jonartdesigns]

Posted: 8/27/04 at 9:53pm

during my school play 2 years ago we were doing annie and there was some vocal issues with the cast members playing the servants and warbucksso the girl playing miss hannigan and i were instructed to stand behind the door of the set with a mic and sing for the groupo and warbucks (i handled that). well one night the guy playing drake forgot this and when he went to get sandy flung open the door we were behind, so miss hannigan went flying and landed in one of the orphanage bunk beds and i was left standing with a spotlight on me and nothing to say.

[Ebonic_Singer]

Posted: 8/28/04 at 2:14am

Wait--when Idina moonwalked, did she do it well or a bad imitation?

[POLisPOL]

Posted: 8/28/04 at 2:30am

Tonight I went to a musical called "He camed in a boat". The band was inside the stage, and in the middle of a number the violin broke a wire... the poor musician had to ran away from the stage to change his violin, while the winds of the band picked up his pentagram and started to cover him.

[marebare]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 3:17am

On opening night of our high school production of "Into the Woods" last spring, when the Mysterious Man dies at the end of Act I the Baker exclaimed, "SHE'S Dead!......*pause* I mean, he's dead". Of course we teased him for weeks!

[badkarma719]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 4:42am

I have a couple of good ones

when a theatre that I used to work with did "Sweeny Todd" sp
they had the barber shair over the orchestra pit, when the person was killed off the chair recliend and they should slide into the pit.... however you had to sit just right in the cahir for it to allow you to slide otherwise you would sit there and have to force yourseld to slide down. because of this you would hit your chin on the front of the stage

I did Grease a few years ago and the girl playing Sandy hadnt eaten that day, so we litteraly get to the end of summer night( the break right after the song before the dialogue starts) and when the song ends I go back to my math book (I was Eugine) and we never start again with then I hear the girl playing Jan ytell for out stage manager cause Sandy had passed out and busted here chin on the very edge of hte stage

when I did Little shop of horrors my senior year I was Seymore and right after grow for me I was putting the soat on for the second stage of Audrey 2 and the plant just fell out of the pot I yelled a few curse words when it happened and the greatest thig was my mic was still on

A cell phone went off durring the Jail scene in Hairspray with Matt and Carly, right begore Link say I love u and they kiss Matt covered by saing " Tracy I can hear the bells"

when I did the music man last year the director/set designer had never worked with a fly stystem and an orchestra pit before so they thought someone would either get hit by the scenery or fall into the pit. To fix this he painted yellow and white crosswalks on the stage EVERYWHERE where we shouldnt walk to keep us from getting hit and then put a ladder over the opening in the pit just so we could see and know where the giant hole in the floor was.

I did Bang Bang Youre dead my jr year in hs and I was supose to have a fight with someone on stage where they acted like they hit me but one night the guy actually hit me. and we all knew he ment to do it cause he hated me for some odd reason

[NoDayButToday2]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 12:34pm

when i was in middle school we did a production of 'anything goes' and during 'be like the bluebird' when moonface says Then be like the bluebird and sing, "Tweet tweet, tra-la, tra-la, tra-la.", on the first 'tra-la' he tripped and fell into the pit, so it sounded more like tra LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! then ge finally was able to stand up and all he could think of to say was 'tweet tweet' then the rest of the kids onstage could not stop laughing for like 5 min or so and moonface would not go anywhere near the pit again in that performance

also in middle school we did 'the wizard of oz' though it was just a rehersal, my friend aaron, a techie, was bringing rocks for a scene, and as he was turning around to grab some more, he tripped and fell backwards into the pit while the orchestra was in it

also during 'somewhere over the rainbow' we had techies pulling dog treats on strings from the wings to direct our 'toto' to his places. one treat fell off the string and was situated behind 'dorothy's house' so through the whole song poor dorothy was standing there singing and toto was strangling himself trying to reach the treat but being held back by a leash

[LittleFish8386]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 12:51pm

One of my first major parts was Glinda in the Wizard of Oz in 8th grade---and our Toto was like on crack or something. Once during a performance he attacked my dress and started pulling at it, and I didn't know what to do. So there I was performing the whole scene with this little dog attached to my dress. He would run off and on stage the whole show. He also didn't like the Scarcrow and would try and eat him while they were onstage together.

[timote316]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 1:16pm

When I saw The Producers in February, Nathan said a joke, but no on in the audience laughed (Rule number one of being a producer: don't spend your own money. That's taboo). Nathan and Matthew just froze for a second, then you could see Matthew starting to laugh. Nathan actually stopped the show to explain that he ad-libbed that joke (Taboo, produced using Rosie's money, had just closed. Get it now? lol). Then, in Betrayed, he made mention of the joke again. Nathan and Matthew also started laughing during Roger's YESSSSSSSSSSSS thing too. I also remember them laughing at another point in that scene, but I can't remember at what...

In my HS production of Fiddler, our Tevye couldn't get his black jacket on before Sabbath Prayer, and the girl playing Golde refused to help. It was rather funny, I was cracking up. Good thing I wasn't onstage

For more stories, search for some, as this has been discussed. However, everytime there is a thread like this, more stories pop up, so its ok.

[MadeofGold]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 1:36pm

During "The Internet is for Porn," (AVENUE Q), they have the puppets singing in the windows- and I saw that one of the puppets fell over the window- and you could see two faces in the window- looking totally shocked! (I'm almost positive that one was Jen B. but I'm not positive) It was like puppet suicide, the puppet (it might have been Rod, I'm not sure) was just drooping over the sill. It would have been even worse if it fell out of their grasp and hit the ground.

LadyGuenevere, that is hysterical! I would have loved to see that in person. :)

I was there the night that Taye Diggs was in as Fiyero and threw the broom to Idina who totally missed it. He then said something like "oops" and proceeded to run back and try again. Idina swung her hands together like a clapboard and then she, Taye and Kristin couldn't stop laughing. I remember a lot of people on this board complaining about how unprofessional it was but I thought it was funny.

Also, as a former Rent head, I can think of a million things that Norbert did as Roger that were little mess ups. He missed catching the bottle of Stoli a bunch of times. One time he screamed out "Spring" instead of "Happy Spring" and he also messed up the chords during his guitar solos. Oh Norbie. :)

[Ebonic_Singer]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 3:29pm

Whenever they do that scene in Rent I'm afriad they're going to drop whatever food they have!

[Tiny-Toon]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 3:51pm

At little shop once, when Douglas Sills sang Dentist!, at "I AM A DENTIST!" he forgot to open his jacket.. so 45 seconds after that he said to Chiffon "And i have a uniform too baby!" (and opened it)

Updated On: 8/29/04 at 03:51 PM

[Unknown User]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 3:56pm

in a school play, i was supposed to have on a jakcet, but i forgot, and this girl was supposed to take it off, and i had a vest on, so i started unbuttoning my vest and it took forever! it was so akward and embarrasing!

[xluckystar2107x]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 4:17pm

hahaha so many times. When i saw les mis and Valjean and javert are fighting and Valjean was supposed to scream JAVERT but he accidentally spit a huge loogie across the stage and the audience started laughing.
Also, when i saw wicked in the same scene kristin chenoweth almost fell but it looked like it was supposed to happen and she accidentally flashed the audience...or well...the mezz.

[Ebonic_Singer]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 4:36pm

owowwwwww.
That'd be nice.

[Rentaholic2]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 5:46pm

We also had a Guys and Dolls blooper...when I was a fish, I was in the chorus and in the Cabana scene when Sky and Sarah Brown (i think that's her name) run out, Sky was supposed to throw her over his shoulder and run out...well, he ended up basically just tackling her into the rear curtain...I swear they fell for 2 minutes with legs and arms flailing every where and everyone on stage going "NNOOO!!!!" in slow motion...


I also played Hamlet last year for our school OneActPlay state contest and during our district meet, I was dragging my dead best friend (Polonius)away and the entire set almost collapsed like it had in a rehearsal. We didn't even know it, but everyone watching said it defied gravity and physics by not falling over.

[Unknown User]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 6:12pm

When I saw PoTO last summer, the wires holding the chandelier got caught in with the drapes covering it during the overture. They had to stop the show for at least 10 minutes to get everything untangled.

[CapnHook]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 6:28pm

PETER PAN...6th grade.

Final dress rehearsal, all the teachers were allowed to come with their families for $1 a ticket.

Middle of the I'm Flying scene, and for some reason, our Pan flew VERY slowly that night. She dangled from her wire and was dragged left to right. She was waving and flapping her arms, like a swimmer, trying to go faster. Looked OH SO BAD! Never found out why this happened.

That's what you get for using FOY over ZFX .

[everythingtaboo]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 7:06pm

At Sly Fox (RIP) Wednesday night, right after the scene where Bronson and Bob Dishy mug with each other forever (and Bronson was cracking up and slapping Bob's butt during their hug)...


Bronson Pinchot has to sound aghast at being able to trick Bob Dishy's character to bring his wife to sleep with him...so instead of saying "wife", he said "son", quickly followed by giggles and hitting Richard Kind with his hat, saying "oh, you're not that kind of man." The audience could tell he flubbed, so they started laughing. Soon the two started giggling with the audience, and Bronson tried to start over "So where was I? Oh god, where was I?!" his face turns bright red and starts cracking up, rolling up his hat and biting on it. He kept laughing and trying to find his place and Richard at that point was laughing too hard to help him out, everyone had to calm down before Richard could calmly give a line so he could start over.

I was Orch A2, right in front of them, it was very cute.

[LadyGuenevere]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 7:12pm

I just remembered another one, I spent a wonderful first preview night watching Cupid and Psyche.

First of all, ALL THE LIGHTS went off, and Laura Marie Duncan (Venus) said "Ahh....live theater!" Love her!

Another time, she was talking to Cupid when she swayed her head to the side and her earring flew off across the stage. There were a lot of costume and lighting changes after that, though. But I had so much fun. It really improved, but I was really happy to be able to see it- I didn't feel that one cent was wasted, despite technical problems. Updated On: 8/29/04 at 07:12 PM

[Ebonic_Singer]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 9:40pm

Ummmm this isn't exactly a mess up, but when I went to see the tour of Les Miz a month or two ago, instead of coming out of the sewer, the Thernardiers ran from the side of the stage--do they just do that when not on tour?

[jonartdesigns]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 10:10pm

another one:
during a production i co-starred in of sorry, wrong number we were plagued with errors for the 2 performances the school allowed us to do (they were saving the budget fro the king and i) we had continual issues with the lighting and sound cues the worst offenders were these:
after mrs. stevenson talks to the first operator the light was supposed to go out on the operator to allow the switch over to the 2 hitmen. at both shows there was a 2 minute delay on this cue.

and at the end of the show when i came out to kill the old lady the train sound effect was supposed to drown out her scream then a blackout so when the lights came up she was dead. Well when we did it both times neither the lights nor the sound happened so i ended up graphically faux slitting her throat to cover

[Roxie]

Posted: 8/29/04 at 11:01pm

When I was in Chicago we sort of have a rough last night. The mc anounced I Can't Do It Alone by saying...."And now Ms. Roxie Hart, I'm sorry Velma Kelly...." Velma ripped my newspaper in that number, Billy got kicked in the face by a cartwheeler and when he was supposed to catch a juggling ball in Razzle Dazzle, it hit him in the face.

[RustyJusty830]

Posted: 8/30/04 at 12:12am

o0o0o0!! i have a fun one...when i saw Wicked for the 8th time (yes, call me a loser, im all up for it) on June 27th, the standbys, eden and laura bell, were on and ready to go (YAY)...however, during the scenes prior to "dancing through life", one of the shelves moved on stage as usual but then came to an abrubt halt and started to tip over at which point a talented member of the ensemble ran over and pushed it back into a resting position...this, as a result must have delayed the stairs for the ozdust ballroom scene moving out, forcing norbert and laura bell to just walk on from stage right, it was hillarious!