Bad Behaviour at a Show

[Michael]

This board wouldn't be complete without this thread. So spill - theatreboard is listening

[Sue]

Ok, I'll go first then!

At The (bloody awful) Bodyguard in Bristol last week, 3 rows in front of me, rear stalls there was a group of women. One had a runny nose and persistent cough so she blew her nose LOUDLY and coughed LOUDLY, all the way through the show. Her friend/colleague/relative/whatever sitting next to her decided to fill the gaps of no nose blowing and coughing with opening pack after pack of rustling packaging and then proceeding to pass said packets to her left and to the right, along the line of friends, shaking the contents just for a little extra rustling.

Why don't people realise it's not a chuffing picnic in the chuffing park??? Arghhhhhhhh!!!

[Coated]

^Congrats to the first moan on the test board

Boys (grown up variety) sniggering every single time when a female dancer appeared on stage in Le Corsaire. In the end I had to resolve the issue by leaning outrageously forward so they couldn't make out who's on stage one way or the other. Sniggering resolved, and I only had to repeat it 3 times until they finally cottoned on.

[drmaplewood]

Individually wrapped sweets galore at Master Builder last night - people in front and behind me.

[Deleted]

Jan 19, 2016 0:58:01 GMT Coated said:

^Congrats to the first moan on the test board

Boys (grown up variety) sniggering every single time when a female dancer appeared on stage in Le Corsaire. In the end I had to resolve the issue by leaning outrageously forward so they couldn't make out who's on stage one way or the other. Sniggering resolved, and I only had to repeat it 3 times until they finally cottoned on.

Why were they sniggering when a female dancer came on stage?

[viserys]

My moan is not so much about behaviour than about personal hygiene. At the matinee of wonder.land on Sunday a fella plonked into the seat beside mine, bringing with him a fruity aroma of rubbish tip and clothes unwashed for weeks. It was almost unbearable. Luckily the seat on my other side remained empty, so during the first act I leaned into that direction and after the interval sat down in it. The stink would be intolerable anywhere in the public sphere, but I'm aghast to think that people don't bother to take a shower and put on fresh clothes before going to see a show (or movie) in a tightly packed auditorium.

[ncbears]

Ok. This wasn't in London, but was in Champaign, Illinois at a show I directed. Saturday matinee. Curtain was at 2:00 p.m. Well, there was no curtain because we staged the show in the round. We held the curtain till 2:10 p.m. for stragglers. Had about 65 people in theatre which held 110. I did pre-show announcement. It's now 2:15. show starts. Over the next fifteen minutes, 20 people showed up and were escorted into the theatre. Hopping over people and railings. Sunday matinee - a woman buys three tickets and says she's going to get two friends. She is told show starts at 2:00. She leaves. We are sold out and scrambling for seats - I see a mysterious coat over two seats - which will be inaccessible once show starts. But, show much start - it's now 2:15 again. The women show up about 2:35 and are upset that we won't take them to their seats, but make them stand in a corner watching until intermission.

[adrianics]

The audience when I saw Bend It Like Beckham was truly atrocious, one of the worst I've ever encountered, and if it was a show worth getting angry over I would've been livid.

[longinthetooth]

I wasn't there, but from comments on Twitter I gather a drunken woman, glass still in hand, tried to get on stage at Kinky Boots this evening! Perhaps someone was in the audience who could fill us in?

[49thand8th]

In the interest of historical preservation:

[Steffi]

The mind boggles.

[BurlyBeaR]

[londonmzfitz]

Good grief ...

At one of the Royal Albert Proms I watched an audience member from one of the choir seats - mid show - somehow manage to walk through the back of the orchestra to the other side of the stage and through the doors ...

[BurlyBeaR]

At grey gardens last week a couple left early (probably caught out by run I g time, transport issues etc) but fortunately they were on the back row of the side where the entrance is so were able to get out without physically disrupting the actors (not that everyone in the room didn't see them leaving of course.

However I did wonder what they would have done if they're been sat anywhere else. They would have had to literally walk across the stage, around all the piles of clutter, and through the actors.

[theatremiss]

I'm sure I mentioned it on the last forum but I thought seeing a woman jump on stage at the end of Jersey Boys was beyond dreadful and possibly the worst thing ever, but this behaviour at Kinky Boots has to be the worst I've heard about

[49thand8th]

There's a legend that someone climbed on stage during the second national Miss Saigon tour in San Francisco (1998 or 99) and Steve Pasquale (Chris at the time) had to wrestle the person into the wings. I guess someone who's really curious could tweet Mr P and confirm, but I won't...!

[theglenbucklaird]

Jan 29, 2016 11:11:48 GMT londonmzfitz said:

Good grief ...

At one of the Royal Albert Proms I watched an audience member from one of the choir seats - mid show - somehow manage to walk through the back of the orchestra to the other side of the stage and through the doors ...

Tickled me that, beer all over the keyboard. In my mind it is Leslie Nielsen in Naked Gun

[pochard]

At "Herons" last weekend, when the young cast came on stage, two ladies in the audience jumped up and down and waved at a cast member, for all the world as if it where a school performance; I thought the cast did really well to stay focused.

[Coated]

Finally! I've been waiting for some fowl misbehaviour for the entire run of the Royal Ballet's Two Pigeons, and about 40 seconds before the final curtain one of them gave in to its base pigeon nature and delicately pooped right behind the heads of the tenderly embracing ballet's protagonists.

[kathryn]

Audience at Funny Girl this afternoon were well behaved up until the curtain call, when the people sat beside me (in row B!) blatantly got their phones out to take pictures and record the bows - right in my eyeline, since we were on the far side, so I basically saw the curtain call via his phone screen. I was furious!
It really spoilt what had been a really enjoyable experience - I walked away wishing I'd 'accidentally' slapped his phone out of his hands with my vigorous applause.

[aksis]

Woman next to us at Fatal Attraction(Netherlands) took out her phone every 10 minutes. We first tried to sigh her but eventually had to stare her down with two of us before she understood how annoying it was. Behind us a woman was constantly explaining her husband how to interpret things happening on stage.

[Kim]

Did both shows of The Bodyguard in Bristol yesterday as it was the cast change, I don't think I've had such awful audiences so close together before. The first show was just the normal rabble eating, talking, constantly on the move for the toilet plus what sounded like an argument going on in the circle.
The second show was just full of people trying to film then getting near the end woman two seats down from me had been checking her phone constantly which I'd just been glaring at her for, next thing she starts calling someone, usher came flying down going mad with a torch at her, she puts it in her bag, usher walks away, phones straight back out at that point I leant over and told her to put it away, I never snap at strangers but she had been annoying me all show with her phone.

[DuchessConstance]

Women at Escaped Alone last night kept checking her phone. It's a 50 minute play ffs!

[Deleted]

Grey Gardens on Saturday.......wow......one of the little girls family was in, i am talking two full rows of people, ranging from children up to oap's. I was sitting on one of the sides so constantly had them in my peripheral vision. I think we had nearly every single range of bad behaviour going:

Tupperware coming out with snacks
Shoes being taken off
Constant loud coughing
Lack of interest in any bit of the show which didn't contain the person they were there to see
Children being tired so laying across people with coats over them (This was on the FRONT ROW!)

The worst though was there was one adult and child who literally talked throughout the whole thing and i mean the whole thing. It got so bad in the second act that some of the cast were shooting them glares whilst mid song. I was desperate to say something or shush them (which i never do!) but due to the sort of performance space and where i was sitting it would have caused even more commotion and disturbance.

[49thand8th]

This weekend I was at Sojourners, an off-Broadway play where a main character is pregnant in Act 1 and by Act 2, has given birth. The theatre is very small and the first row is exactly the same floor level as the stage. The puppet baby they had was very realistic (there was a remote controlled speaker; it would move and cry, and the noise would actually come out of the doll) and the ladies in the front row HAD to say to each other, "Oh, it's so realistic! They did a great job!" This was during a very intense scene between the mother and a friend of hers, when they're center stage and pretty close to the audience.

I know the actors heard it. And I couldn't shush these ladies either because we were so close.

Not terrible in the grand scheme of audience behavior, but low-level appalling.