Inappropriate audience laughter- Page 2

[kdogg36]

Posted: 5/18/18 at 4:32pm

Duplicate. 

Updated On: 5/18/18 at 04:32 PM

[JudyDenmark]

Posted: 5/18/18 at 4:41pm

Fluffy 2 said: "I’ve heard stories of people laughing when Melchior rapes Wendla in SA, probably just because they’re uncomfortable, but still weird."

I love the score to Spring Awakening so much, which makes me love the show, but have a very hard time taking that melodramatic book seriously. Like, I know the part with the switch/stick is supposed to be very serious, but both times I saw it (original and DW revival) I was definitely giggling in my head. Not out loud, because I wouldn't be disrespectful in the theatre, but I found it very hard to take seriously. Don't know if that's a fault of the book or the actors, to be honest. But I've always struggled with the tone of that show, since it's about such a heavy subject, but so often is tongue-in-cheek or downright silly. 

[SweetLips]

Posted: 5/19/18 at 4:35am

I took a lady friend to a very well know modern ballet company touring Australia--the curtain went up, dancers appeared,and danced---no music.

I turned to my friend and said, 'I think I have just gone deaf'.

We were like 2 giggling school girls and just couldn't stop, even when the music started and I said 'it's come back'.

Truely, we had to leave and to this day, 20 years later, if I ever uttter those words we start giggling again.

[binau]

Posted: 5/19/18 at 4:49am

kdogg36 said: "The original production of PASSION elicited some unintended laughter. I’m afraid, despite the fact that I now consider this a masterwork, that I might have been part of the problem. I can’t cite the source, but I think Sondheim has said that inappropriate laughter is always the fault of the creative team, not the audience.

I am keenly looking forward to seeing PASSION at the Signature (Virginia) this season. "

I believe Sondheim claimed it wasn’t just laughing but also cheering when Fosca collapsed. I do wonder what it must have been like seeing Passion OBC for the first time without any knowledge of the show. It’s truly bizarre. 

[Dollypop]

Posted: 5/19/18 at 8:00am

I recall playing George Gibbs in OUR TOWN many years ago and hearing the audience laughing in spots I thought were truly earnest. They were consistent throughout the run of the play, so I guess it was the author's intent.

[ABitOnTheSide]

Posted: 5/19/18 at 9:14am

I have never seen a production of West Side Story where the audience doesn't laugh when Tony gets shot. I guess the gunshot scares people but it is outrageous how inappropriate people are.  

[PatrickDC]

Posted: 5/19/18 at 3:36pm

RippedMan said: "I was doing a production of Hunchback and people would crack up every time Frollo said "You don't want to hurt me" and the Gargoyles would reply "Yes you do." And we could never figure out why that was funny to people.."

Perhaps the audience was more familiar with the Disney animated film, where the gargoyles are comic relief and every line they say is for laughs. So even in the more serious stage production, they still feel they need to laugh. Even when delivered in a serious tone, I could see the "Yes, you do." line being taken as slightly funny. 

[Someone in a Tree2]

Posted: 5/19/18 at 4:04pm

"I do wonder what it must have been like seeing Passion OBC for the first time without any knowledge of the show."

It was a deeply uncomfortable experience that felt like it went on and on without any shape or direction. The two loveliest songs in the score, "Loving You" and especially Fosca's Letter ("I don't know how I let you so far inside my mind..." stood out a mile from the rest, because they held to a basic 32-bar structure, which was a great relief after all the formless recitative that came before. We were not fans of the show, and were very surprised to hear such adulation from most of our friends who saw the show later in the run. Years later I made sure to catch the hailed CSC revival-- lovely music-making but the show was still a bore and a chore for me.

 

[PhantomOfFleetStreet]

Posted: 5/19/18 at 4:09pm

I saw Harry Potter and the Cursed Child last week and I was sat next to the most annoying couple who kept laughing any time characters like Scorpius and Albus or Albus and Harry were having a serious heart-to-heart moment. I wanted to smack them both.

[mailhandler777]

Posted: 5/19/18 at 4:31pm

All 4 times I saw Frozen someone laughed loudly when Elsa struck Anna for the first time at the beginning of the show. There is a lot of funny stuff in the show but that isn't one of them.

[Ado Annie D'Ysquith]

Posted: 5/20/18 at 11:15pm

Okay, back to the important stuff...when is THIS GUY going to inevitable grace a Broadway stage?



"[The laugh] was unsettling. It was disturbing." -Greg Sestero

[GeorgeandDot]

Posted: 5/21/18 at 1:30am

I saw the original production of Passion and was probably the only person in the world that absolutely loved it. The audience was consistently disrespectful and vicious and would laugh and sneer and boo, loudly during the show. I remember watching it really affect Donna Murphy on stage, who gave one of my favorite performances of all time. It's a treat to go back and watch the PBS broadcast without all the nastiness. I always saw it's multiple Tony wins as a form of justice in a way.

I've seen every Sondheim musical with the original cast since A Little Night Music, which I saw when I was quite young. His shows always puzzle audiences and the response is usually strange in the house. I remember seeing Sweeney Todd opening weekend and the response was both a mixture of loud gasps and roaring laughter. The woman next to me thought it was a horror drama and the man next to me thought it was a comedy.

[PatrickDC]

Posted: 5/21/18 at 1:39am

GeorgeandDot said: "The audience was consistently disrespectful and vicious and would laugh and sneer and boo, loudly during the show."

Did the audience really boo? Hmm...in all my decades of theater going I can’t recall ever hearing someone boo. They may leave at intermission, give lukewarm or no applause, or no standing ovation. But I’ve never heard an audiencue member actually boo and do so loudly and often enough for the actors to get put off, especially at a Broadway theater and especially during a Sondheim production. 

[jo]

Posted: 5/21/18 at 2:00am

I saw the London production of PASSION with Maria Friedman and Michael Ball first, before I saw the filmed production of the Broadway PASSION.  Coupled with her grotesque makeup and stalkerish pursuit of Giorgio, there was not much sympathy for Maria's Fosca, until maybe when she fell terminally ill. Tbh, I found the interpretation by Donna Murphy more sympathetic even if I did like Maria's singing better. Surprisingly, I found the score a little more melodic than other works of Sondheim but that is just a personal preference.

[GeorgeandDot]

Posted: 5/21/18 at 9:21am

There was definitely a boo or two when the lights dimmed at the end of the show. A lot of people went to go see it just to hate watch it and would be purposefully rude during the show.

Also, I agree that Passion has one of Sondheim's most melodic scores. It might actually be his most melodic.

[Alex Kulak2]

Posted: 5/21/18 at 9:33am

I was in a play once about the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, and I played the superintendent of the factory. In one of the last scenes of the play, he shows up drunk to one of the funerals, and it ends with one of the survivors spitting in his face and saying she'll never forgive him.

The audience laughed. That was four years ago, and it perplexes me to this day.

[mpkie]

Posted: 5/21/18 at 8:58pm

Does anyone else find Phantom of the Opera hilarious? Don't get me wrong, I find the show highly enjoyable. It's one of those things I have to fight to not laugh AND not sing along! I lost my cool sometime during the second act, it takes itself so seriously but it's sooo ridiculous. It was too funny to me, but I definitely tried to be low-key about it.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 5/22/18 at 7:00am

GeorgeandDot said: "I remember seeing Sweeney Todd opening weekend and the response was both a mixture of loud gasps and roaring laughter. The woman next to me thought it was a horror drama and the man next to me thought it was a comedy."

They were both right.

 

[thresholdofrevelation]

Posted: 5/22/18 at 8:37am

I saw Falsettos on November 5, 2016 and in the end of the show, ******SPOILER***** Whizzer dies of AIDS and he and his lover, Marvin are singing to each other in the last song, "What Would I Do?" and they say, "Once I was told that good men get better with age," and when Marvin (played by Christian Borle) sang the following line "We're just gonna skip that stage" some man in the balcony starting laughing. It wouldn't be that much of a problem but this guy had a very loud laugh during a quiet and emotional moment and it set off the scene for everyone. I know that Christian Borle talked about it when some of the Falsettos cast was on Seth Rudetsky about how it made him upset because he doesn't think it should be taken as a funny line and he tries not to deliver it that way. That is the most prominent experience in my mind.

[VintageSnarker]

Posted: 5/23/18 at 2:49am

In Saint Joan, Patrick Page has a short monologue that is quite serious and earnest as the Inquisitor. There were chuckles and titters throughout the audience until almost the very end. I'm not sure if the irreverence of the rest of the play confused people or if they just really hate organized religion and didn't realize they were supposed to take what he was saying at face value. I'm curious if this happens all the time or if it was just my audience.

[HogansHero]

Posted: 5/23/18 at 8:03am

Apropos of much of this, I remember many years ago a respected director telling me "don't blame the audience. ever."