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Author Topic: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't  (Read 15309 times)

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Tempest

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #15 on: Nov 03, 2009, 12:46 pm »
At the Cabaret last weekend, one of the acts was "Undead Standup."  Luckily, the premise of the act is that he's supposed to be really bad, so when he asked, "What do you call a witch at the beach?" and an audience member immediately shouted back, "A sandwich!" it worked.  Actually, that was the best that act ever went....
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lesliedcole

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #16 on: Nov 03, 2009, 06:44 pm »
Several years back when I was doing summer stock in Jersey, I was prop manager one season and we did a show (I don't remember the name) that takes place in the back room of an Italian restaurant.  Our set designer had a live fountain on stage (which somehow became a prop - whatever) and it ran for the whole show.  There is also ALOT of food in the show and my intermission change had me onstage for most of the 15 mins, during our matinee (overwhelmingly blue haired) an audience member came up and knocked on the stage to get my attention and ask me to turn the fountain off because it made her have to go... 


Leslie D. Cole
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philimbesi

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #17 on: Nov 03, 2009, 09:42 pm »
I was SM'ing a production of West Side Story, and the Tony looked the part, acted the part, but really couldn't. sing. the. part.  Anyway we're about halfway through and I can't quite remember what song was getting ready to start and all you hear is "Oh crap he's going to sing again!"
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BlantonRK

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #18 on: Nov 04, 2009, 05:34 pm »
An educational tour of the opera CARMEN in Kentucky. When Don Jose slapped Carmen a young voice called out "Don't you be takin' that, girl." At the finale of the same performance after Carmen stabs Jose the same child cheered "He's earned two. Cut him again!"
« Last Edit: Dec 11, 2009, 03:15 pm by BlantonRK »
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LCSM

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #19 on: Dec 06, 2009, 05:35 pm »
Performance of Charlotte's Web for local elementary school classes: one of the classes was late arriving so the (fantastic) actors went out and did a bit of improv with the kids to keep them entertained. When asked what he liked to eat, one boy in the audiance cheerfully answered: "Wood!"
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DeeCap

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #20 on: Dec 11, 2009, 01:42 pm »
Two stories

Years ago I was run crew on a show in NYC that had a HUGE scene shift at intermission. Took about 20 minutes, had a pool, about 40 real rocks (yes, the director wanted real rocks) and about 15 people working on this shift.
In the middle of the shift one blue-haired kept yelling at the stage "Excuse Me? Excuse Me?" I was silly enough to pay attention to her and came downstage. She asks "Where is there a good place to go get something to eat?" I shrugged my shoulders and went back to my rocks.

Another time I was road manager for "A Christmas Carol" and I had to lead a Q+A session with some of the theatre's patrons. One adult asked me if the show ever opened for Metallica. You can't make this stuff up.
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Tempest

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #21 on: Dec 04, 2010, 12:22 pm »
I know it's an old topic, but I had one last night I just HAD to share. 
A grown man, in the 4th row, kept making squalling cat, and very loud bird calls.  Through the whole show. 
It's a show in which there is no such thing as a fourth wall,  and a few sections of ad-lib lines.  During one of them (rife with the squalling cat noises) my lead said, "Someone is starting to wear on my nerves."  At which point the offender yelled back, "Isn't that what they pay you for?!"  We just ignored the man the rest of the show, and eventually his companion got him to calm down.
Unfortunately, he wasn't in a place where the house manager could get to him without making an even larger disrution than he was making.  Though if he kept it up at his initial intensity I WAS going to use the God-mic.  It's the sort of show where I could have gotten away with it, and been pretty scathing, too.  (My cast would have adored it) 
Dr. Dolittle, over there, was also the only one who did not stand in the standing ovation.  Jerk.
« Last Edit: Dec 06, 2010, 10:46 am by tempest_gypsy »
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Jessica: "Of course I have a metric size 4 dinglehopper in my kit!  Who do you think I am?"

BeckyGG

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #22 on: Dec 05, 2010, 08:46 pm »
One audience member I wouldn't have back, and another I would (same production...different performances)

(To preface this ... I'm doing a production of Measure for Measure that just spent 2 weeks touring to prisons, homeless shelters, etc.)

At a women's shelter just after Thanksgiving, a somewhat angry-sounding woman sitting towards the back yelled "Y'all better call your director and get on out of here right now!" in the middle of part 2.

(Same production) At another venue, a woman responded to Isabella's question of "To whom do I complain?" "The Po-lice!"

We had many, many great moments with these audiences...
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SMLois

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #23 on: Dec 06, 2010, 02:48 am »
At the opening for Seussical (TYA) one 6 year old boy turned to his friend and said, "See! I TOLD you it was magical!" Can he come to every show please?
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FMurray

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #24 on: Dec 26, 2010, 03:38 pm »
I wasn't really involved in the Aladdin I worked backstage on it but on saw it on the second to last night. One of my friends played the visor role, and at the end of Act I he laughs maniacally with all of his goons as the lights fade out. One of the teenage boys who is very involved in the community youth theatre had already seen the show many times and he said loudly (b/c he had a loud voice) "That's funny every time", and the whole rest of the audience went up in an uproar.
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On_Headset

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #25 on: Apr 18, 2011, 04:51 am »
I was recently in the audience at a performance of Oleanna. (This post will be full of spoilers for an otherwise-excellent play, JSYK.)

We got right to the very end. The actress gave her final line beautifully:

"Don’t call your wife baby. You heard what I said."

And there was this wonderful pregnant pause, full of tension and rage and all the emotional buildup of the play to that moment. It was perfect.

Until the man in the back row shouted "JUST HIT HER IN THE FACE WITH THE [redacted] PHONE ALREADY, GAWD!"
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lsears

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #26 on: Apr 18, 2011, 01:09 pm »
Two moments from a recent performance.

Two men meet in a bus station, have a very awkward goodbye.  Later they are on the phone together and one says "Wait...are you flirting with me?"  Pause.  Woman in the front of the audience says "I sure hope so!"

Later in the same show, a character is staged to mumble through a speech because he is nervous.  Another woman, trying to be helpful, shouts out several times that she can't hear him, please speak up.

I love the matinee crowd.
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Jonas_A

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #27 on: Apr 21, 2011, 11:02 am »
A few years back I was in a pantomime about pirates, and we had a 'Pirate School' scene where one of the old pirates was teaching the kidnapped kids how to be pirates. This involved lots of audience participation and usually it worked really well. Until one night:
Pirate Jake: "So, what's a pirate be saying when he be surprised?"
Audience: " ... "
Then we hear a single voice from somewhere up the back; "Arr?"

Thank God someone did it!  ;D
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Amandanellb

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #28 on: Aug 25, 2011, 06:38 pm »
Several years ago we did And Then There Were None. Well at the end the "real" murder comes out and we had this really intense "I'm gonna kill you!" scene. Our theatre is in the round and the first row of the house is pretty much on the stage. So, on the night of filming, the Murderer is on top of this character, choking them to death and this little elderly woman gets up from the front row and starts swatting at him with her program. I can only assume it was her husband holding her back...

I never laughed so hard in my life...
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ErgoCue

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Re: audience callbacks- the ones you want, the ones you don't
« Reply #29 on: Sep 01, 2011, 04:04 pm »
I was working on a production of Marat/Sade a few years ago, which is quite a disturbing piece if you haven't seen it.  It takes place in an insane asylum in the 1800's.  Anyway, at the end of the play, all the inmates start ripping the set apart, kill the asylum guards, and just go nuts, all with strobe lights going, screaming, pandemonium.  Then everyone just left the stage.  As the lights came up one night, the audience sat in stunned silence until one frightened college girl squeaked, "What just happened?"  It could not have been more perfect!
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