Posted: 12/21/15 at 10:25am
Last week, during a performance of the new Broadway hit The Color Purple,capital-D Diva Aretha Franklin (and her purse) broke just about every rule you’re asked to follow in the announcements before a Broadway performance—and that’s probably because she showed up too late to hear them.
Writes Page Six, in one of my favorite stories of 2015:
According to a witness, Franklin showed up late to a performance at the Jacobs Theatre, took up six seats around her and began holding her phone in the air to snap photos of the show — and that was all before intermission!
According to Brandon Voss, a writer who attended the same performance—you know, the one where Aretha ran into James Earl Jones—an “older” woman in the audience eventually began “gesturing wildly for her to put down the phone,” and told one of Franklin’s four bodyguards that “it wasn’t allowed.” When she realized the woman she was complaining about was Aretha Franklin, she apologized for making such a ridiculous request.
There is no better confirmation of someone’s unimpeachable status as a living legend than a commoner’s apology for being annoyed. It’s like apologizing to Meryl Streep for being in her way after she knowingly cut in front of you in a bathroom line.
