Why do kicklines provoke a Pavlovian applause response in audiences...?- Page 2

[DottieD'Luscia]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 10:24am

Thanks, Tazber! LOL I don't know why we decided to do that, but it made us laugh.

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 10:46am

It's that magic combination of music, visuals, and good old-fashioned tradition. If you see a group of people just kicking in unison on the sidewalk, you're not likely to have a response other than thinking they look like fools. But turn it into a long production number with flashy costumes and sets and lighting in a song that builds and builds and builds to a climax specifically written and staged to thrill, you can have them kick, or simply walk downstage (like in Curtains) and the atmosphere and setup will get applause. As long as it's choreographed (and usually in unison), it's the combination of elements that provokes the audience. It's really no different than the downstage-center-long-note-belt-raise-arms move that generates applause in 11 o'clock numbers. It's the most traditional and effective visual cue an audience can get. I'm as much a sucker for it as anyone else.

[noradesmond]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 10:58am

"I have to fight the urge to stand up and start screaming like Annie Wilkes."

Nearly choked on my coffee. Funniest thing I've read in days.

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 11:04am

I'm not a sucker for it. It P's me O.

Because I'm jaded and can't enjoy myself, as has been mentioned.

I'm weird about all spontaneous mid-show applause.

When a well-delivered monologue or an especially well-timed joke or an especially resonant line gets applause, it strikes me more as the audience applauding themselves for appreciating it.

There was some line in OTHER DESERT CITIES -- which I cannot remember -- that was sort of an easy potshot at the right wing, and of course the audience burst into laughter and applause. Now, I'm a lefty liberal, but I thought to myself, "Ugh, that's exactly the kind of crap people deserve to get crap for." It's gross and self-congratulatory. Finding it funny, sure, but to applaud spontaneously? It feels more like, "OHHH, that was SO good, and *I* AGREE! Watch HOW MUCH I AGREE AND GET IT!"

And obviously way off topic from kicklines and an entirely different kind of response, but not altogether unrelated.

Sometimes I wish we were more like the Japanese, who (I hear) reserve most of their enthusiasm for the show's end. (As long as they don't stand up.)

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 11:14am

It feels more like, "OHHH, that was SO good, and *I* AGREE! Watch HOW MUCH I AGREE AND GET IT!"

It's when a line is worthy of more than a mere laugh. Sometimes people feel the need to show their appreciation when a statement is made that not only expresses what they are thinking, but does so in a way that is more striking or poignant or clever than the average audience member could create. It worked for Julia Sugarbaker week after week after week after week...

I know I've reacted that way before and it's not about my pride in getting the joke or my vanity in appropriately appreciating something. It's about saying THANK YOU to the playwright, the cast, and the director.

[tazber]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 11:14am

I can deal with kickline applause (although in general I agree it's usually not genuinely felt; more like an obligation) but you what I can't take?

Applause for:

A)The set. Yes, Norma's mansion is amazing, but must we really clap for it?

B)Entrance applause. Just because they're a big star doesn't mean that being in the same theater as them is cause for adulation. I mean, shouldn't we wait and see if we are duly impressed first?

[WestVillage]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 11:27am

Patti and Mandy got applause while sitting in chairs, rolling them forward and doing a faux kick line. Go figure.

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 11:29am

I don't disbelieve you, Matt. And no doubt for a lot of people it comes from an honest place. And I recognize it's my problem and not everyone else's. Who am I to question people's personal responses? As I've gotten older, I've become more of a purist, and I want the piece to flow, uinterrupted, to the end, and there's where I'll show my appreciation. Applause always takes me right of a show and reminds me acutely that I'm sitting in an audience. I love feeling immersed, especially in an engrossing play or movie, and spontaenous applause messes with my experience, so I resent it a little. For me, it's akin to people talking during movies. It makes me crazy... maybe not quite to the same degree, but it propels the same impulse in me.

And, Taz, for that reason, I completely agree with both of your points. I never, ever give entrance applause.

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 11:31am

"Patti and Mandy got applause while sitting in chairs, rolling them forward and doing a faux kick line. Go figure."



Do y'see?!

[doodlenyc]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 11:35am

This also goes for modulations at the end of a song. It's nothing to the musicians and singers, but it always gets a big reaction.

Okay, reavealing my geekiness!
I do like to show appreciation through applause for great work which includes making me feel enough that i'm compelled to show it...but if I'm not feeling it, it is SO annoying to have a performance be interupted by inserted applause. I know people who dont clap after a number because it stops the flow of the show...and dont get them started on entrance applause!

Example: that kickline/straw hat number in Will Rogers Follies, which I hated (the show and the number). Any third grade class could pull that crap off if they practiced enough...but it got huge applause.

Okay...geekiness: When I was in high school marching band, we did a kickline after a modulation of "Ready to Take A Chance Again" and it choked me up every time. It was a visceral reaction because after rehearsing, it all became second nature and was not difficult...but always got huge reactions.

and we won states.

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 12:02pm

I actually don't get why some people equate excitement in the theatre to hitting the highest note, doing the most difficult dance step, or crying your eyes out on stage.

That's called a "most performance" in my book, not a "best performance."

Sometimes the simplest way is the best way and works the best for an audience. Bob Fosse knew that. So did many others.

[AMH]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 12:26pm

Entrance applause. Just because they're a big star doesn't mean that being in the same theater as them is cause for adulation. I mean, shouldn't we wait and see if we are duly impressed first?

Yes, but aren't they a star because people are impressed with them based on past performances, thereby inviting the applause upon their entrance?

I think it's perfectly fine if an audience wants to show its appreciation to a performer, be it in his/her entry, exit, or during a good line or musical number. How else is an entertainer to know if what they've just said or done has landed?

This reminds me of the commentary from SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE. Stephen Sondheim said that Bernadette Peters would get so frustrated because she wouldn't get a good laugh from the audience after she sang the line, "I mean he kneads me - I mean like dough, George" from the "Everybody Loves Louis" number. It seems like the performers do enjoy getting audience feedback. Anyway, isn't that part of the whole theater experience?

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 12:37pm

"I think it's perfectly fine if an audience wants to show its appreciation to a performer, be it in his/her entry, exit, or during a good line or musical number. How else is an entertainer to know if what they've just said or done has landed?"

But in the example of entrance applause, what are people letting them know has landed? Their walking onstage?

I understand the frustration of not getting a laugh because it's a much more involuntary response. When something's genuinely funny, people laugh at it spontaneously. Between audience and performer, it's also an essential feedback loop for live comedy. Spontaneous applause is neither essential nor automatic. It requires the decision to pick up your hands and slam them together repeatedly. So, while I appreciate that sentiment and see the points, I don't think it's a correlative example.

But your post does remind me -- exit applause. That's right there on the list, too.

Everyone just stop clapping, all right? There should be a pre-show announcement, maybe.

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 12:52pm

No, please don't stop the exit applause. I like to see the look of gratitude on the actors faces when they exit.

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 1:03pm

You know what I do love, though? When one person claps and keeps clapping because they're trying to start applause and it never catches on. They feel pretty silly.

[AMH]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 1:22pm

I see your point, themysteriousgrowl. I didn't think about laughter and applause as being involuntary and voluntary.

Though I agree that applause may not be essential to the feedback loop, I do think it's a nice gesture. To me, it seems like there would be many awkward silent moments without it.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 1:35pm

If done well it is either technically impressive and or builds organically from the number moving the audience in a joyous show of solidarity and esprit de corps.

This compels well earned applause.

If, for whatever reason, it doesn't work, it is still obstreperously begging for a similar ovation.

In the latter case, it is far too gruesomely embarrassing for the audience and company alike to endure such an ordeal without the audience giving in to Pavlovian salivation.

Updated On: 12/1/11 at 01:35 PM

Posted: 12/1/11 at 1:40pm

It makes me sad- truly sad- that people get worried that someone else is enjoying the experience more than they should.

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 2:03pm

^ Well said.

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 2:09pm

Agreed. That sounds awful. I hope it's not happening somewhere!

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 2:11pm

I agree JoeKv99. Most audience members also feel a need, when they are enjoying themselves or truly moved, to communicate it to and aspirationally with the rest of the audience, with the aim of unitint to communally reflect it back to the performers in those "waves of love" Eve Harrington talked about, and there's nothing wrong with that.

But while I don't want to micromanage anyone else's audience responses, entrance applause for a star seems fine in a musical, and perhaps in some otherwise non-naturalistic shows; but in anything else I don't like it because it screws with the illusion. Once I gave exit applause after a scene during a serious drama because I was seriously impressed with the work. I felt the need strongly and didn't restrain myself, but I realized it irked others in the audience; in retro I could understand why (for similar reasons to the ones I just gave), so I haven't done that since.

[best12bars]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 2:26pm

I still remember the exit applause after Adriane Lenox's one scene in "Doubt."

[BenjaminNicholas2]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 2:48pm

For me, it all depends on the show and knowing just how tough what they're doing up there really is. Case-in-point, 'I Got Rhythm' from Crazy For You, closing the first act. It builds to a point where the audience is just waiting to jump up and clap. The Broadway production was truly sensational and the fact that it was an 11 minute, full-out number was equally as impressive. Yeah, try doing 25 wings at the end of that kind of tap number and tell me how easy it is.

A number like this (from 42nd Street) also always seems to make me want to break out in applause. Yeah, it's mainly a variation of a time step, but it's impressive when you add this many performers doing it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nS1XDaNgH1Y



BN
Updated On: 12/1/11 at 02:48 PM

[Gaveston2]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 3:24pm

"If everybody does a basic time-step at once, that will often get applause as well.

It's just an impressive step. It doesn't have to be complicated."

Exactly, b12b. I believe Busby Berkeley said words to the effect that one girl doing a time step is nice, but one hundred girls doing a time step together will invariably stop the show. I think it's because a large group of people doing anything in synchronicity requires planning, awareness and practice. This is why marching bands and drill teams also get big hands.

To me, the real question isn't why this is so, but why posters here are so bothered by it?

Is your world so full of rainbows and lollipops that an extra round of applause is a burden?

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 12/1/11 at 3:33pm

As a producer of Broadway's 42nd STREET revival once said to me, "It's total ****. But you've never seen so much **** in your life."