‘Come along and listen to
the lullaby of Broadway the hip-hooray and bally-hoo
the lullaby of Broadway
The rumble of the subway train
the rattle of the taxi’
‘Ladies and Gentlemen, this show is set in 1933, more than fifty years before the invention of the mobile phone. So please, switch yours off before the performance begins.’
I went to see 42nd Street on Wednesday and I’ve been singing the songs ever since. It was a fabulous show – the costumes, the dancing, the sets. Sitting in the car going home I could still see the shimmering gold sequins and the bright lights behind my closed eyes, still hear the tap of the feet.
Just one thing spoiled the evening: the selfish behaviour of some of the audience. Why do people think it is acceptable to talk during a performance? Do they really think people around them can’t hear them? Most will stop talking for a while after being given a ‘hard stare’ or told to ’shush’. However, so many seem to think that the show doesn’t start till someone on stage speaks and that it’s okay to talk through the overture. I’ve even known this to happen at the ballet and the opera. It’s not just younger people doing this. Looking about at the selfish <insert expletive of your choice here> I could tell that mostly it is people in their fifties, sixties or older.
Have I become a grumpy? Has it always been acceptable to chatter away at the start of a performance? I’m sure I didn’t encounter this as much when I went to the theatre in the 80s and 90s. The only difference was that I went to London theatres then. Now that I have moved out of London I usually see shows at Milton Keynes Theatre. Many of the people in the audience had dressed up to go to the theatre so it can’t be that they didn’t see it as an event.
At the beginning of the show we were asked to turn our phones off. Do theatres really have to start reminding the audience that they should stop talking the moment the lights go down or the orchestra starts to play? It seems they do.
Then all that will be left is to stop the rattle of sweet wrappers.
