When I started going to the theatre...- Page 6

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/13/16 at 11:08am

uncageg said: "Hogans, that may be what you meat [sic] but it didn't come across that way."

well it did to me and now that you know what I mea[n]t, what do we gain by continuing to traverse that path?

[After Eight]

Posted: 5/13/16 at 11:51am

"I meant I confuse the two titles. They are both failed shows from before I was old enough to travel to New York."

 

Yes. And the titles are so alike, too. I can see how one could similarly confuse Pousse-Café with Kean, Pickwick with Hayride, etc.

 

As to the question of the way people dress, slovenliness is slovenly, whether it be at the theatre, at the supermarket, or in the street. There may be no escaping it, but there is certainly no reason to exult over it.

 

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/13/16 at 2:40pm

@After Eight-"sloven" implies, I think, careless. I think many of the people whose mode of dress you are criticizing are actually quite careful about how they dress; you just don't like their style and want them to dress in the style you like. Same song, different verse.

@PThespian-Seriously? It was a frigging joke. P.S. I a fully grown. 

[JayG 2]

Posted: 5/13/16 at 2:56pm

This was once an interesting thread until it became a stupid debate about how people dress. Some people sure know how to deflate a balloon quickly.

 

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/13/16 at 6:19pm

@JayG2-making people feel unwelcome in the theatre or like they have to act like they were white folks in the 50s in order to become interested in it is the unhealthiest thing that has ever happened to the theatre. If you think that's stupid, then you are a part of the problem. 

[jo]

Posted: 5/13/16 at 11:22pm

One of the most iconic portrayals I have ever seen on a live stage was that of Richard Kiley in Man of La Mancha in the late 60's, off -Broadway if I recall right.  That was such an emotional experience - the stage was bare but his Don Quixote touched many hearts ( and tearducts) in the audience. 

 

[yankeefan7]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 8:30am

"Second, it suggests the opinions of people who don't go to the theatre much. I go over a hundred times a year, in a slow year. My constitution cannot handle being special that often. The truth is, a requirement of getting dressed up for the theatre is about dwelling in the past-the same thing all of the nostalgia freaks on here do anyway"

 

Nobody said it was a requirement, myself and others just were expressing that it was something we did when we started going to the theater and liked it. This is how I was brought up by my Mom that certain events in life required dressing up. I feel the same way when I have attended the ballet and opera. I also understand that casual dress is a way of life today even at the workplace. I think we all agree there is a line between business casual and wearing shorts and a t-shirt. I still go pretty dressed up but there are times I will not wear a tie. 

BTW - the amount of shows I see in a year have nothing to do with how I dress going to the theater. I don't live in NY anymore so the amount of shows I see on Broadway depends on how many times I visit NY in a year. There have been years I have seen 6-7 shows, other years maybe 2-3.  I also was in London last March and saw three shows. IMO the crowd was dressed nicer than most audiences on Broadway. 

[After Eight]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 9:30am

"One of the most iconic portrayals I have ever seen on a live stage was that of Richard Kiley in Man of La Mancha in the late 60's, off -Broadway if I recall right."

 

You do recall it right, as it played at the Anta Washington Square Theatre. Though the theatre's location was definitely off-Broadway, it was considered Broadway for awards consideration, and won the best musical Tony Award that season.

And Kiley was indeed great.

[jo]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 10:08am

Thanks. Wasn't that place a theatre in the round --and was why the staging was quite bare?   All I remember vividly now was the staircase they lowered down at the end  to bring Miguel Cervantes up (for his trial by the Spanish Inquisition).

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 10:55am

yankee "Nobody said it was a requirement" Great! As I said above, I have no issue with your dressing any way you wish. My beef is with folks who tell us how others " should" dress at the theatre, which I would call a requirement. Aside from my strong interest in not erecting unnecessary roadblocks to people becoming interested in the theatre, I think this nonsense over how other people dress conflates this with something we SHOULD fret about, which is things people do that DO legitimately interfere with the enjoyment of the show by others-talking, cell phones and what people wear when it encroaches on the space of others or on their sightlines (too much). 

[JayG 2]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 11:03am

Why can't cute little PC HogansHero and the other bores start their own thread about how to dress or not to dress for the theater - or what to eat or not to eat in the theater - or how quickly to jump up or not jump up at the end of a mediocre show. This is soooooooooooo dull.

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 11:21am

JayG 2 said: "Why can't cute little PC HogansHero and the other bores start their own thread about how to dress or not to dress for the theater - or what to eat or not to eat in the theater - or how quickly to jump up or not jump up at the end of a mediocre show. This is soooooooooooo dull."

Thank you for calling me cute. It's been a while. How this in any way relates to PC escapes me. I guess in your facile sensibility anything you disagree with is PC. Whatever.

I actually agree that the theatre behavior stuff should not have become a part of this thread, but it was interjected here by those who want everyone to dress for the theatre the way they do, based largely on the 1950s, just as they wish all theatre still adhered to the styles and ethos of that era. I on the other hand believe, to quote A. Burr, " the world [is] wide enough"  for both those folks and me.  

If you find this thread dull or boring, then do as others do and move on to the next one. 

[Someone in a Tree2]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 12:11pm

HogansHero, wise as you are on many other threads, you seem to have gotten stuck in a circular rut on this one, making a connection between folks who love shows from the 50's and ERGO, folks who wish everyone would dress like the 50's when going to the theater. That simply is NOT a connection you can defend. 

I'm at Broadway shows 10 to 15 times a year, but also attend theater frequently here in LA at the Music Center. I'm a devoted Sondheim fan (does that make me a fan of 50's musicals?), but also raved about the recent Deaf West's SPRING AWAKENINGS. Oh and I'm pushing 60. My choice has always been to dress in accordance with the show I'm seeing. So on a recent week of shows SHUFFLE ALONG demanded a jacket and bow tie, while for AMERICAN PSYCHO we wore blood red dress shirts with suspenders. I'll never insist on anyone wearing what I'd wear to the theater. I just demand that they treat the space they're in with respect. Wear gym clothes to the gym, wear theater clothes to the theater.

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 1:10pm

@someone I did not make a connection between liking old shows and expecting people to dress in a certain way. Some of the people who like old shows created that nexus, and that's what I was objecting to. 

I fully support your approach to dressing for the theatre because you enjoy it and you hurt no one. I feel the same about everyone else. There are obviously things that seem inappropriate in certain situations, like bathing suits in church or a tuxedo on a tennis court or the elderly man I saw on 10th Avenue on a chilly, cloudy day last week in a bikini and a floral parasol. But especially in New York we just grin and bear it. There is a slippery slope between what constitutes gym clothes and street clothes-there were sneakers in multiple runway shows in the last crop of fashion weeks-are they inappropriate for the theatre? Who decides? I don't think you have standing to complain about respecting "the space."

[yankeefan7]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 4:25pm

"we SHOULD fret about, which is things people do that DO legitimately interfere with the enjoyment of the show by others-talking, cell phones and what people wear when it encroaches on the space of others or on their sightlines "

 

I agree but I think you know as well as I do that that topic has been talked about quite often in many different threads on this board.

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 4:49pm

yankeefan7 said: "I agree but I think you know as well as I do that that topic has been talked about quite often in many different threads on this board."

Indeed. Yet when we conflate talk about those things with how people dress we diminish the import of the former. When we tell Madonna she cannot text during a show, and also can't have a bare midriff, the message is that both are about a cultural divide. 

[yankeefan7]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 6:27pm

"When we tell Madonna she cannot text during a show, and also can't have a bare midriff, the message is that both are about a cultural divide. "

 

Maybe I am confused so excuse me. People may say they think that they don't like the too casual dress of some people but nobody is being prevented from seeing the show being dressed in shorts and a t-shirt. People texting during the show does prevent some audience members from totally enjoying the show. I think the message of texting or leaving the cell phone is more on the radar in the Broadway community than the dress of audience members.

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 6:38pm

Agreed, but in this thread some posters have conflated the two " evils." I think your confusion may derive from the fact that it seems clear that you are not among those with the problem attitudes. You and I are in basic agreement. 

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 6:54pm

Methinks Patti Lupone would not care if you came in naked as long as you were not using your cell phone for calling or filming.

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/14/16 at 7:11pm

Mr Roxy said: "Methinks Patti Lupone would not care if you came in naked as long as you were not using your cell phone for calling or filming."

methinks you are so right. 

[After Eight]

Posted: 5/15/16 at 8:00am

There was no half-price ticket booth, no papering houses, no discount codes to boost advance sales and put people in the seats for new shows. As a result many new shows that received negative reviews would give up the ghost sooner --- one week runs were not uncommon --- and in their brief stays, sections of the theatre auditorium could appear something like a ghost town. I recall going to shows that ran but a handful of performances in which they closed the balcony and relocated the (few) balcony patrons to the rear of the mezzanine. In some instances the entire audience would be relocated to the orchestra. Orchestra ticket holders would be placed in the front, mezzanine patrons would be in the middle, and balcony patrons placed in the last few rows. The lines of demarcation were strictly drawn  to make sure hierarchy still held sway.

One didn't have to look at telecharge seating charts (there were none to look at, in any case) to have a sense beforehand of whether the upper levels would be closed off for the performance that day. One's sixth sense--- and common sense. ---   told you they might, and that often proved the case.

 

Of course, it goes without saying that actors would be happier playing in a hit to a full house than in a flop before a smattering of people. And yet at these one-week flops, I rarely got the feeling that the actors were not going full out, or that the play  was not registering as it ought to have due to the small house. In fact, it  was just the reverse. These were very rare and unique theatrical experiences; never was the evanescent nature of theatre brought more strikingly home --- to both cast and patrons --- nor the importance of seizing the moment while you can. Thus was a special bond forged and shared between those on stage and off. I treasured these performances, and felt/feel so grateful and fortunate to have experienced them.

 

[jo]

Posted: 5/15/16 at 10:41am

It wasn't just the shows which closed after very, very short runs... but there were also shows who never made it to Broadway after out-of-town tryouts?

 

I do remember seeing the tryout of the musical version of  Breakfast at Tiffany's  (with Richard Chamberlain and Mary Tyler Moore) while on a visit to Boston. If I recall it right, it never made it to Broadway...or did it?

Updated On: 5/15/16 at 10:41 AM

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 5/15/16 at 10:51am

After 4 previews , Merrick pulled the plug knowing nothing could save it not even Dr Kildare.

[Wick3]

Posted: 5/15/16 at 10:52am

It was back in the early 90s where an orchestra or front mezz seat cost $65. 

I did rush back when I was college student in the early 2000s but nowadays normally do digital lottery or discount code tix or TKTS for a show; and if I really liked it, would then pay full price for a great seat in center orch or front row center mezz a few months later.

[lightguy06222]

Posted: 5/15/16 at 11:41am

I love these back in the day posts....

 

when I started going to the theatre there were no black people.... And if there WERE they had their own water fountain to drink out of, and were only permitted to sit in the balcony. 

 

Ohhhhh those were the days...

Ohh