Mofongo on Broadway!- Page 3
Mofongo on Broadway!
DAME
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/15/04
#50Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 5:47pmWell said Henrik. Besides the silly attacks that normally go on here I am actually enjoying this discussion. Whenever I travel I always go to see local theater. Not just for the art but because I am always fascinated by the ways of audiences all through the world. Behavior in the theater can certainly be a cultural experience. I always try to take it all in and enjoy it. But I wonder since this is Broadway we are talking about; If a certain higher respect for the show and those around you should be considered. Just a thought.
HUSSY POWER!
------ HUSSY POWER!
Gaveston2
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/28/11
#51Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 5:48pm
Exactly - so, why single out the ethnic background? Extremely rude.
Not only rude but short-sighted. Last I heard, Latinos are the fastest growing minority in the U.S. If shows like IN THE HEIGHTS, WEST SIDE STORY (Spanish-language edition) and EVITA are drawing Latinos who are less likely to go to a Broadway musical, that can only be good for all of us who want to see the Broadway musical survive in the coming decades.
Updated On: 3/13/12 at 05:48 PM
#52Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 5:55pm
Different cultures do indeed respond to live theatre in different ways. Consider Noh theatre, which is to be watched in silence- many Broadway imports to Japan experienced massive culture shocks in the '70s and '80s when the shows did not get the laughs and applause in the normal spots.
Consider Italian opera and its highly vocal audience responses.
I know that the Hip Hop show 'Into the Hoodz' created quite stressful situations for the front of house staff with an audience which had no idea of the usual expected modes of conduct for theatre performances.
So, as Gaveston said, it is possible to distinguish between cultural responses to live shows.
The OP's comments, I believe, were not intended to be racist; I think they were just a little clumsy and insensitive.
Gaveston2
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/28/11
#53Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 5:56pm
But I wonder since this is Broadway we are talking about; If a certain higher respect for the show and those around you should be considered. Just a thought.
Interesting thought, Dame, but I wonder... If we announce that attending a Broadway show is somehow more "highbrow" and demands a different standard of audience behavior, won't we risk turning EVITA into high mass at St. Paul's Cathedral?
I guess I'm saying we should be careful what we wish for.
#54Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:03pmBut was Mayor Maturo eating tacos in the audience?
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
Gaveston2
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/28/11
#55Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:04pm
devonian, I can't resist pointing out that, as you say, noh drama was meditative and the spectator was expected to be silent. But at the kabuki a few centuries later, spectators not only ate lunch in the stalls, they cooked it there, too, over open flames. (Yes, a lot of theaters accidentally burned down.) Certain actor's poses were so famous, they literally stopped the show as the audience went wild!
The difference was that between a theater aimed at the educated upper classes (noh) and one originated by a prostitute and aimed at the working classes (kabuki). When Japanese audiences were silent at performances of Western works, it was probably a sign of respect and an assumption that those Western companies were presenting high art (like noh) rather than popular entertainment (like kabuki).
(My remarks on the origins of noh v. kabuki are simply historical facts and not a value judgment on my part that one theater is "better" than the other. I love both.)
Updated On: 3/13/12 at 06:04 PM
DAME
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/15/04
#56Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:04pmI don't know Gaveston. Maybe some kind of balance. It is Broadway. It is looked at all over the world as something bigger than big ( for lack of better words). I think it should be taken care of and treated with respect.
HUSSY POWER!
------ HUSSY POWER!
#57Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:07pmDAME - That ship sailed when BRKLYN opened.
"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
DAME
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/15/04
#58Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:08pmTrue. Sad but true. Sigh....
HUSSY POWER!
------ HUSSY POWER!
Gaveston2
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/28/11
#59Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:11pm
^^^But you know what the rest of the world respects, Dame? Our cheesiest musicals (many of which are held in higher regard in Poland than here in the U.S.). Other cultures have their own versions of Williams, Miller and Albee.
And despite the myths, Broadway has always been first and foremost a commercial theater. I don't think we're going to help it by telling spectators they have to behave in a manner that feels restrictive to them.
(That being said, I'm all for banning cell phones in theaters and, frankly, I'm shocked that Broadway theaters now allow food and drink in the seats. (That isn't allowed even out here in the boondocks.) So I'm not perfectly consistent in my views.)
DAME
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/15/04
#60Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:15pm
Gaveston,
The cell phone and food thing really pisses me off. And they are starting to give into it officially in some regional theaters. I blame the producers for not really caring. They just care that the seats are filled and they have your money. I think they are realizing that some people just won't go if they have to turn off their gadgets.
HUSSY POWER!
------ HUSSY POWER!
henrikegerman
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/29/05
#61Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:20pmVery interesting discussion, indeed. To the variety of audience custom and practice in opera, especially in Italy, (including the unabashed hostility unleashed by unhappy opera audiences many places in the world), kabuki, noh, and our expectations of "Broadway" propriety, we should also consider the notoriously boisterous interaction of Elizabethan audiences when they first encountered Shakespeare and Marlowe.... ironically, works many think should be witnessed with the greatest solemnity today. And ironic given that the rowdy Elizabethan audiences represent a long hegemonic culture noted for order, pomp, and propriety (of course issues of class also come into play when speaking of the audience in question, especially in the English theater).
Gaveston2
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/28/11
#62Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:21pm
I'm sure you're right about the thinking of producers. But I'm not sure people WON'T go with cell phones turned off; I think they just aren't used to going. It takes a little guts and a great deal of patience to educate an audience.
But when it comes to different cultures and their theater traditions, I don't think "they" need to be educated. I think the production itself has to accommodate different viewing habits.
Gaveston2
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/28/11
#63Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:27pm
henrik, are you sure Elizabethan audiences were all that hegemonic or had been for such a long time? Elizabeth I was only two generations removed from all-out civil war and faced a few armed rebellions herself, not to mention an ongoing struggle with her subjects over religion.
You are certainly correct that Marlowe and Shakespeare wrote some of the greatest poetry ever written for the benefit of some of the rowdiest audiences ever encountered. There's almost certainly a lesson in that...
#64Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:27pm
In my (limited) experience, oddly, people at Broadway and West End theatres--at least the big commercial shows--behave WORSE than various regional and touring productions I've gone to. Also, at least in my experience (which is primarily limited to Montreal, Vancouver, Seattle and San Francisco when it comes to touring shows), the theatres still haven't given in to letting people bring in drinks (aside from bottled water) and food to their seats. I'm sure it's all relative, but that's why I am not sure I buy the argument that this being Broadway somehow people should know to give it more respect.
Nearly all theatres now, again in my experience, do make an announcement to turn off your cell phone before the show. Really, that should be enough and it is still kinda shocking to me when people just ignore it.
DAME
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/15/04
#65Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:31pm
"I think the production itself has to accommodate different viewing habits. "
But to what extend? I don't think it is right that I spend my hard earned money only to have my focus taken away by the light of someones cell phone. It is weird. I see the ushers going up and down the aisle yelling at anyone that takes a pic of themselves seated in a broadway theater before the show so they show people at home they were in a broadway theater. But with cell phones ( in my experience) they turn the other way.
HUSSY POWER!
------ HUSSY POWER!
Updated On: 3/13/12 at 06:31 PM
henrikegerman
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/29/05
#66Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:35pm
Gaveston, as I believe you've also said, I'm not sure whether, or to what extent, any particular viewing habit, might be culturally linked.
Surely whether or not there might be a cultural or social link, the question of whether a particular viewing habit should be remedied by education (assimilating the audience subculture?) or regulation or the production (and all audience members) need to accommodate that particular habit, depends on how distracting and detrimental the particular habit is.
I personally have no problem with the practice of sippy cups and wine on Broadway right now. In fact I love it. And I wouldn't call the issue an ethnic/demographic one. (Although the North Fork and Sonoma audience lobby is very strong today. Not to mention the Chileans. No doubt dozens of Peronist vinateros from Mendoza will be descending on Manhattan to see Elena every night!)
But, as you can tell, this is a question of debate here on bww.
Updated On: 3/13/12 at 06:35 PM
#67Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:36pm
Hm, I wish I saw the original post!
That said, the OP aside, I also don't think it's necessarily "racist" to stereotype cultural groups... it may not be right, but in this day in age, it's to be expected.
Formerly: WishingOnlyWounds2 - Broadway Legend - Joined: 9/25/08
DAME
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/15/04
#68Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:41pm
I don't have a issue with the sippy cups as long as they don't have ice in them to make noise. I do have a problem with candy and wrappers. But I am a bit anal. But cell phones and texting do set me off. And I am tired of my evenings being about verbal fights with people.
HUSSY POWER!
------ HUSSY POWER!
Updated On: 3/13/12 at 06:41 PM
#69Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:48pm
Cell phones in the theatre are completely inappropriate. It's not only distracting to other patrons, but the performers are giving it their all and something like that can really throw you off. I think we should put buzzers into everyone's seats and when a cellphone is spotted, you just get a fierce electric shock. Yeah, that'd be nice.
As far as the original post, I didn't find it that racist. Stereotyping is annoying, but it's unfortunate when it proves true. The theatre crowd at The Color Purple was majority African American the night that I went and it would get fairly rowdy throughout the show. At one intense moment, a man shouted: "Get 'em, girl." Do I think every African American is disrespectful and loud? Absolutely not! But those few disruptive people making the problems, unfortunately, speak for the majority of us. Similar to when you see a closed-minded, bible-thumping Christian.
Gaveston2
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/28/11
#70Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 6:56pm
"Surely whether or not there might be a cultural or social link, the question of whether a particular viewing habit should be remedied by education (assimilating the audience subculture?) or regulation or the production (and all audience members) need to accommodate that particular habit, depends on how distracting and detrimental the particular habit is."
I don't think all distractions are created equal, even if they are roughly equivalent in impact. In the case of new technologies such as cell phones, we are at the moment in history where the conventions of decorum are being invented. Let's don't surrender before we have to.
On the other hand, I was greatly disturbed at the original production of DREAMGIRLS by a predominantly African-American audience that applauded in the middle of numbers whenever Jennifer Holliday sang a particularly tricky melisma or hit a very high or sustained note.
I had never heard of applauding a performer in a book musical in the middle of numbers and it knocked me completely out of the play. I felt like I was watching Holliday's night club act and never felt a thing for Effie.
But it wasn't the audience that needed education, it was I. And after all, it was a show with content and a cast that successfully appealed to a black audience, and good for Bennett & Co. for doing so!
I needed to get over myself and learn to go with the flow. After all, the audience was totally engaged in the performance--more so, as it turned out, than I. This "distraction" was very different from cell phones for precisely that reason.
If some shows today are bringing in Latino audiences, the rest of us should stay home or get used to whatever conventions those audiences follow. (In my personal experience with Latino audiences here in the West, I haven't really noticed any difference. I'm merely allowing for the possibility based on the OP.)
DAME
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/15/04
#71Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 7:02pm
"If some shows today are bringing in Latino audiences, the rest of us should stay home or get used to whatever conventions those audiences follow. (In my personal experience with Latino audiences here in the West, I haven't really noticed any difference. I'm merely allowing for the possibility based on the OP.) "
I have not had a bad experience with a latino audience. I think the OP was just expressing his experience. Nothing offensive was really said. The few posters that followed when out of their way to take it that way and ran with it for a few comments. Then the OP did a edit. Not sure of what. Sometimes it is fun to re read these things just to see who the real troublemakers are.
HUSSY POWER!
------ HUSSY POWER!
blaxx
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/28/05
#72Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 7:13pm
Nothing offensive was really said.
Oh, please, to you maybe it was not. It was extremely offensive for some of us and shame on you for labeling those who felt offended as "troublemakers". If the OP had a problem with the audience's etiquette, he should have refrained from assigning the blame because he identified those in question as being part of a specific ethnicity. Beside, his issues were with lack of etiquette, usually displayed by all kinds of audiences.
If it wasn't racist, it was ignorant. He wasn't overwhelmed by culture shock, even if you'd like to make it sound that was the issue.
If you were not offended by it, you have no right to say I shouldn't and that I also shouldn't bring up my concerns.
Listen, I don't take my clothes off for anyone, even if it is "artistic". - JANICE
DAME
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/15/04
#73Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 7:17pm
I am labeling YOU a troublemaker. Not anyone else who might have been offended. YOU. And maybe two or three people who didn't really have much to say other than get in on the game of attacking someone. But most especially... YOU! Are we clear now? Notice everyone else having a intelligent discussion? You should read it. Maybe you can learn something.
HUSSY POWER!
------ HUSSY POWER!
Updated On: 3/13/12 at 07:17 PM
blaxx
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/28/05
#74Audience behavior at Evita. ( especially with the Latin community)
Posted: 3/13/12 at 7:21pm
You know, I'm sorry that you have to go that way. What part of what I have said has been label as such by you? The real problem here is that YOU didn't find it offensive - taking away the issue a lot of us had with the negative connotation the OP had regarding Latino audiences at Evita.
I think I was very polite with you and try to explain throughout the post why it was offensive. Shame that the fact that you do not, makes everyone else a "troublemaker". I hope you are never in a position where your feelings are not validated and such an awful stereotype is assigned to you.
And again, if the OP didn't mean to offend, the comment was still ignorant.
Listen, I don't take my clothes off for anyone, even if it is "artistic". - JANICE
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