Bad Behaviour at a Show

As far as I can tell they weren’t much worse than the usual but refused to leave and so it escalated to the point it took several police to convince them to leave. By the time they left I think the interval had hit 45 minutes so I think that was why the crowd were turning ugly

Good question. From what I can tell, when they finally decided to use reasonable force the two couples realised the jig was up and got up. I don’t know what took the police quite so long

Some patron trying to lay down the law to a Kings Council could have been interesting. Fights at classic plays now that is a new one. What next riot police called to the Scottish play?

Jeremy Brier further tweeted = The couple who refused to get up ultimately had to - but proceeded to shower abuse at the people passing, yelling they'd fight one of them outside later & trying to trip them - & this was at The Crucible which (sorry if presumptuous!) one assumes might be a thoughtful crowd?!


I've said earlier in this thread I think it's a TikTok thing, a Twitter thing, where the go-to emotion is confrontation/anger. I don't think it's going to be long before tickets come with a "Rules of Behaviour" - which, honestly, I'd welcome.

God this country is grotty. This simply does-not-happen at musicals in Germany and Austria. Even in the USA, which heaven knows has it’s own problems this would be vanishingly rare.

I actually wanted to see this production of Grease but decided not to owing to the endless stories of bottom barrel binge Britain audiences. Grim!

Of course there are always exceptions to general trends.
Of course most audiences are fine in UK.

But on the balance of probabilities. Your experience is FAR more likely to be ruined by bad audience behaviour in UK than the other countries I mention. Sometimes I get kids talking through Starlight in Bochum. That’s the worst I personally have experienced abroad.

Very perceptive points Sfsusan - the worrying thing if everyone was their authentic self is that those with a "hatred" agenda may somehow feel justified.

"Bottom Barrel Binge Britain" - Love it, there's a job for you as a headline writer (sadly for The Sun, but it would keep you in theatre tickets).

Interesting points from others about Zoom during lockdown.  I guess going to the Theatre may hold over that strange mix of people seeming to be professional and respectable on Zoom screen, but there's that snarky secret that they enjoy holding, that really they're sitting in their underpants.  We're getting a lot of that 'wait til I stand up' behaviour.

Shows like X-Factor, BGT, Strictly have been on our TVs for the best part of 20 years. THe audience sometimes applaude when the singer hits the first note or they vaguely recognise the song being butchered. A lot of the rowdiness is reacting to the judges comments and scores. THe likes of CRH and Simon Cowell to a lesser extent play up to the part of "the pantomine villian" but the late great Len Goodman would get annoyed when he was giving constructive feedback and was getting booed.

The same thing with Torvill and Dean on Dancing On Ice like Len they know way more about the performance aspects than the people "disagreeing" with their feedback. Maybe we see this in the rawest sense on BGT and X Factor when some deluded starlet has a meltdown when they hear a few home truths about their supposed "talent".

Except it ISN'T fine.

It's fine if what they are doing is only affecting 'them' they can do what they like, but when it effects others it most certainly isn't 'fine'.

I read lots of comments about letting him stand and dance if he wanted to but I'm curious as to what Adele songs you would dance to? Aren't all her songs dreary ballads?

On a similar note, years ago I went to see Glee in concert at the o2. Don't judge me!
Anyway this very camp lad, probably about 16 years old and 2 female friends were in front of me and stood the whole time. If that wasn't bad enough he just screamed at the top of his voice for the whole show.
I nearly resorted to violence.