Annoying audience members in the theatre

[beverleybass]

Does anybody else ALWAYS seem to have seats right by the worst people in the theatre. I must just be unlucky.

This year saw Come From Away and was directly behind 3 women who kept chatting all the way through, including during really emotional and key moments and solos. Someone tapped them on the shoulder and told them to shush in the end which improved things slightly.

I also saw Cinderella and more chatters as well phones coming out constantly with their shining lights.

What is the point spending all that money on tickets to look at your phone or chat to people??

Anyway saw Mamma Mia as a birthday treat today and it was honestly the worst of the lot. People on my row playing musical chairs, people arriving up to fifteen mins late (and still being let in) the man to the left of me kept singing along with the songs, the people in front chatting and constantly zipping/unzipping bags and rustling noisy bags of snacks.

How hard is it to sit still and be quiet

I'm find with people eating, but not through the whole thing. I don't go to the cinema very often so sometimes the sweets are also a treat- but gone in the first 20 minutes.

@OmgIThinkILikeYou

Come From Away is brilliant. It's quite short with no interval. Heartwarming, moving and funny; the band play live on the stage with the actors which I really enjoyed. I'd highly recommend it.

I get easily distracted at the theatre, when I went to see Wicked I had two women behind me singing every single song which drove me mad. If someone is eating when I am trying to watch a play that also annoys me. I wish people could sit though something without having to eat.

I’m torn because theatres need to attract new audiences, celebrities are a good way to do that, and I hate the idea it’s “just for” people whose parents took them and “know how to behave.” Watching Shakespeare in the Globe where it’s broad daylight and you can see everyone else, is a good reminder that audience reaction to the actors and one another used to be part of the experience (and still is at the Globe, certainly for some of the rowdier plays).

But in modern theatre everyone sits in the dark, the theory being that you are as unaware of the rest of the audience as possible. So it is intensely distracting when others make themselves obtrusive.

Theatre-goers shouldn't have to police other people's bad behaviour (from some-one who's given many a death stare). Behaviour expectations sent in advance with tickets, announcements in foyer, zero food/drink allowed in auditorium & then ENFORCE it. Old-fashioned torches in face from ushers - cheeky blighters would soon get the message . Public flogging an optional extra ...

Seriously though, theatres & cinemas are begging us all to return to save the industry - they've got to do their bit in return. With the price of tickets, in current economic climate, there are too many reasons not to be supporting them. Time for them to step up.

went, along with many a teenage girl, to see Richard Chamberlain in Hamlet at the Birmingham Rep. It must have been 1969. Oh the wonder of seeing Dr Kildare in person. I think we were all far to in love with him to make a sound.

I have had a crush on RC since The Thorn Birds. Wow!

There are relaxed performances for anyone who for whatever reason is unable to cope with a normal theatre show.

Drunken behaviour still not tolerated but good for those with autism, ADHD, the need to move around more etc.

@Infinitemoon

went, along with many a teenage girl, to see Richard Chamberlain in Hamlet at the Birmingham Rep. It must have been 1969. Oh the wonder of seeing Dr Kildare in person. I think we were all far to in love with him to make a sound.

I have had a crush on RC since The Thorn Birds. Wow!

Yes it was a wow. He was so beautiful.

Theatre, cinema, even events that cost a fortune with people taking lots of selfies and posting where they are etc. Me, me, me culture and little regard for people who wish to actually watch and listen to a show.

I thought it was just me! I have given up on the theatre and cinema because of it. Mind you, it even happened to me at the circus. I deliberately chose the back of the the three rows at the front but I was lobbed on the head with a balloon by the performers themselves (for the entertainment of the majority of the audience sitting behind me). I was then sprayed with a large water pistol and to top things off, I suspect I caught covid there which gave me the dreaded omicron backache! I may give live performance a miss altogether

A show in Belfast recently was stopped at the interval because of the behaviour of the audience. It was a corporate event. They didn't do the second half of the show!!

When DH and I were in New York we went to a Broadway musical (Jersey Boys?) which was ruined for us by six drunken British women immediately behind us, singing loudly to every song and talking throughout. The theatre was packed so we couldn't move seats. Very annoying and spoilt the evening.

I paid a fortune for best seats for Grease, a hen party nearby stood and sang and screeched drunkenly all the way through and the staff did nothing

This is why we now only go to a posh cinema where people seem to know how to behave

Same. Though I wouldn’t necessarily say ‘posh’; it’s a local cinema we’re incredibly lucky to have nearby where people - with a very few exceptions - don’t feel the need to talk constantly, play with their phones and generally ignore the film they’ve paid a decent amount to see.

DH and I gave up on multiplex-style cinemas years ago, people seemingly can’t understand they’re not in their front rooms. Luckily we don’t like musicals so haven’t encountered the singalongers.

Why don't the theatre staff stop this behaviour? I'd encourage complaints (especially public ones on social media) every single time, poor reviews of the venue, etc. I'd imagine that it's the only way to get theatres to care about this enough to stop it - they need to feel the impact.

They need bouncers, not ushers.

At the theatre where my daughter works there are both ushers and security.

@LaMarschallin

CognitiveDissolver

Twice, but reverse, and in the cinema, not the theatre. Perhaps I should add that I do go to the opera before I am accused of being crass...

Anyway, once with a friend who looked at her (digital watch with a light) a few times. Its a habit of hers and I barely notice.. But she really just glanced at it for seconds, and not often. The woman two seats away from us boomed out giving her a telling off. I nearly jumped out of my seat. Very, very loud and went on for quite a while. Far more off putting than anyone glancing at a watch. At the end I actually said to her I found her shouting at my friend really off putting and unwarranted, and that it ruined the film for us as we were nervous of setting her off again.

Also in the cinema, I ate maltesers and the woman next to me got really annoyed and gave me a row. I told her to suggest to management that they banned the sale of maltesers and eating in the cinema if she was that bothered, but until it was, I would continue to eat quietly. (I think she thought I was a child though as I'm quite young looking for my age).

How young do you have to look for someone to mistake you for a child?
And why would anyone tell a child off for eating Maltesers quietly?

I think it would be interesting to have the story from the point of view of both women who spoke to you. Most people won't have needed to be spoken to about their behaviour in a cinema and/or theatre once, let alone on two separate occasions.

I don't think it would be that interesting to be honest. It was a very stuck up cinema in Morningside in Edinburgh on both occasions and you get a certain type of smug there who think going to the cinema is akin to being invited to the Royal box with the royals in attendance.

Since it wasn't me "who was spoken to" on the first occasion, what you suggest is inaccurate. It was my friend who was told off for looking at her watch because the light on the watch for the 5 seconds it was on caused angst.

I can assure you that I have often attended the cinema before and since without the need to be "spoken to" if that provides you with the reassurance you require.

I wonder why its always the latecomers to every show that have their seats in the middle of a row of 30 (our theatre hasnt got a centre aisle)
so at least 15 people have to struggle up, they always have to go to the bar at interval and then are last coming back to go through the whole process again.

I went to Rocky Horror a few years ago and although audience participation is encouraged at particular points it was ridiculous. People were going in and out to the bar all the way through, standing up shouting along, and then there was arguing between audience members. It was awful.

I don't go to the cinema because of other people and I don't bother travelling to see anything at a theatre now. It's a shame as I love live performances, but you can't guarantee that the theatre won't be full of selfish and boozed up idiots.

This is why we now only go to a posh cinema where people seem to know how to behave

Sadly this hasn’t been our experience. The most entitled behaviour we’ve seen has been in “posh” cinemas. Even at preview screenings of films so you’d think the people are there for the actual show. I think entitlement isn’t something that is limited to one sector of society.

I love theatre and going to see shows and plays, but this absolutely grinds my gears. And as many have said, I think is getting progressively worse. We actually have tix for Moulin Rouge this weekend and am now slightly dreading it based on the previous posts.

Worst experience of this we had was seeing King Lear at the Globe. I think this was about 15 years ago. Lady sitting near to us, whose mobile phone rang, which in itself was sufficiently embarrassing, but then to our incredulity, she actually answered the phone, and sat in her seat and continued the conversation. My husband and I were totally astounded. And all of us around her said something. She looked totally affronted and shocked that we were cross. She left at the interval.

We saw Company a couple of years ago, and the ushers there were on top of their game, even telling off people taking pictures of the set before curtain up. Really strict.

Used to do amateur shows when I was younger, and in a matinee performance of the King and I, we had some loud people in the audience. The chap we had playing the King helpfully had a line 'you will say no more, no more' which he managed to direct very forcibly at said audience members. It was very effective!

As so many have said, going to the theatre is in general not a cheap experience and more and more frequently it's ruined by people who are incapable of sitting quietly and who do not recognise that for both the actors and the audience, their noise is a huge distraction.

Mama Mia sounds like the kind of thing to sing along to tbh. I don’t mind people singing along at the theatre as long as they’re not particularly loud

Yeah I hate the chatting, etc too

I've spent £300 on Jersey Boys tickets for Mother's Day and this thread is not filling me with confidence...

We went to a musical last Saturday, I couldn't believe how many people kept getting up and down.

A lot of theatres now do 'order to your seat' drinks and snacks which doesn't help. The order comes in a paper bag, god knows how many bottles the couple next to us had in their bag but it was rustle, rustle, rustle all the way through. A few rows down, bottles of wine were being passed along too.

To be fair though, the only singing from the audience was at the end when everyone was standing up clapping.

I'm also not someone who was bought up going to the theatre. I don't think I went to see a show until I was in my late 20s but it never occurred to me to sing along, talk or move from my seat until the interval.