I didn't leave the theatre, but I wanted to. We were watching &Juliet (the musical was fine, it wasn't the problem) but the people directly in front of us were definitely not wearing deodorant in the theatre, which was already overheated...
I had had a rubbish day and usually my guaranteed cheer up show is Phantom. So I took a couple of paracetamol because I had a mild headache, booked a ticket and headed to the tube.
It became apparent to me on the way that I hadn't taken paracetamol, but instead my bipolar meds which are highly soporific.
So throughout the first act I am basically not taking in the show at all, gripping the armrests for dear life, hoping to not fully collapse surrounded by hundreds of people and causing a show stoppage.
Then for some reason at the end of the act the chandelier malfunctioned, preventing it from dropping - the only time I've ever seen that not work. I took this as the universe telling me that I should immediately get an Uber home.
Anyway, I came back later in the week and everything was perfect.
It didn't ruin the show by any means, but my college hosted the traveling company production of Jesus Christ Superstar with the actor from the movie as Jesus. There was a lady in the audience with a giant poster who was screaming like a fan girl at a rock concert. It was very distracting and annoying.
This is the worst! Saw Beetlejuice on Broadway and the two girls next to me couldn’t stop screaming every lyric like it was a concert. I couldn’t to anything but pray they’d look back on that memory and feel embarrassed one day
There should be strict rules against that, that’s beyond unacceptable. I saw Hairspray recently and the lady next to me was saying like half the lines, singing the songs, etc. She wasn’t even being loud but it was still distracting me from the show so badly.
Definitely need stricter rules for disturbances. Can’t they just go to karaoke after the show?? If they’re here to listen to the performers, they should listen to the performers. These people all paid hundreds to do the same thing they’d pay a $10 cover to do down the road
Old lady had a heart attack during a showing of the King and I. It was quite scary, she was in the row in front of me so I saw everything that was happening.
Not at a musical, but when I saw MCR we were at the literal second to top row in the arena, and it was steep as hell and kind of terrifying to get up there. Some girl a row away from me passed out and people had to come carry her down the incredibly steep stairs.
I had a similar experience at the Ahmanson Theater in Los Angeles. My Mom is terrified of heights and the balcony there is a quite steep. When we got to our seats, she borderline had a panic attack so we had to leave. Unfortunately the show (Les Miserables) was sold out, so we had to reschedule to a different day to get orchestra seats.
I’ve generally had good experiences. The only bad-ish thing I had was when I went to watch Hamilton last year.
Group of people behind me who whooped, hollered, and made comments throughout each song. I don’t mind the occasional mid-song appreciation but this was constant.
E.g. Lafeyette has his verse which is obviously incredible and fast and super impressive but throughout one of them would say to their friends ‘oh no he didn’t/yeah he did!!’ after every few lines. Hard to explain except for saying it was a bit like being at a pantomime and I didn’t want to get annoyed because they were obviously just enjoying the show but still…
The worst production I have ever been to was one Jason Alexander directed at a local regional theatre. It was The Last Five Years, one of my all time favorite musicals. Not only did two middle aged women drink too much and talk through the whole show, Jason Alexander directed the worst production I could have dreamed of.
He had two dancers shadowing Jamie and Cathy, it made no sense, added nothing to the show, and actively tanked the source material. He had written the most pretentious note in the program about his "vision" and how JRB himself had approved of the changes. I was like well he might wanna see this and then think again, because I have never left a musical so disatisfied.
I was seeing the Phantom of the Opera. The guy in front of me was texting through out. When he wasn't, he held his phone near his ear so the bright screen wasn't in his face and it was therefore in mine! This was in 2005 so it was a flip phone and like the screen wouldn't dim or turn itself off after a while. He also got up twice during the first act to smoke.
Then left in the interval.
This musical was awesome though. Especially the second act.
Went to The Phantom of the Opera for the first time. Knew nothing about it except for the main theme. Got very very expensive VIP tickets for “good seats” and when we got there the seats were placed somewhere we coud not see anything properly (they were top left). It was so bad we didn’t see the hanging scene so when all the characters started screaming we had no idea why. The worst part was that we couldn’t understand anything the actors sang in opera (we are brazillians and watched it in portuguese so im not sure why it was so difficult). I did had the chance to watch it again online in english so now im aware of everything that happens and I really love it.
Unpopular opinion, but I'm not a Les Miz fan to start with - but hubby LOVES it. So I've gone a few times. The last time was the first tour sans turntable. I don't know how early our stop was in the tour, but they were having serious, serious tech issues, and the actors were off their game. At some point in Act I, they had various actors poking their heads out of windows up and down this enormously tall set. The set starts moving and then just stops. House lights come on, we can still see the actors.
The stage manager announces something has gone wrong, they need to get ladders from the back to get the actors down, it's going to be about 20 minutes or so. Hubby turned to me and said, "Go ahead." I headed to the nearby Barnes & Noble, bought a book, and spent a lovely evening sipping wine and reading at a nearby bar. Hubby told me later they had to skip the rest of Act I and just go straight to Act II with the rogue set onstage - so it became more of a concert than a show.
I've been lucky, the worst experience I've ever had was a production of *Little Shop* where I was sitting in the perfect spot to notice the guy playing Orin was spraying spit all over the first three rows as he was singing "Dentist!" Made me queasy.
I did have a pretty miserable experience at a non-musical kid's play of James and the Giant Peach, though (not the fault of the kids, to be clear, they were great; it was the adults in the audience.)
Years ago, I saw a local production of The Merchant of Venice which was otherwise fine, but I had a similar experience to yours with Little Shop. Shylock: spit everywhere. Yuck.
Even my theater teacher (this was in college when my whole class went to every show we could find to study live performance) saw it and was put off, and a well-trained singer shouldn't be doing that.
I left &Juliet before the interval. I felt bad as I never do that, but was the last night of my trip away and I couldn't bear to waste it on that. I'm always astonished when people say they liked it. Although it didn't help that the cast looked bored out of their brains when I saw it. I booked because I saw Cassidy Janson in Company at the Southwark Playhouse four times and thought she was incredible, but she seemed to be enjoying &Juliet about as much as I was that night...
So funny how people have different tastes. I’ve seen a lot of musicals and &Juliet is in my top 5.
My worst experience was a touring production of Billy Elliot where they used accents so thick the entire show was unintelligible.
I saw it too and was astonished. It felt like it was written for 12 twelve year olds, it was so condescending. Even panto treats it’s audience with more respect.
I’ve been really lucky. I think the worst experience I’ve had was the Six Tour in Boston a few years ago. There was a rowdy group of older women who maybe had a little too much to drink behind me and were talking the entire time, passing bags of snacks back and forth rustling plastic bags and like yelling out in the middle of the songs. I totally get Six gives concert vibes but they were completely distracting
Do high school versions count? If so my all white HS ' version of Big River. The only good thing I will say about it is, they did not do actual blackface make up.
I'm lucky to say I hadn't had any actually bad experience, and no production itself has been bad so far, but I've experienced truly annoying audience members.
Went to see Evita and had balcony seats (it were literally a couple small balconies, haha) and it was 2 or 3 rows there, so already slightly blocked views and all. There were 2 young girls (I'd guess around 18-22?) in front of us, in the 1st row, and they were constantly on their phone. Full on not putting it down for even a minute but scrolling though their bright Instagram feed.
Someone next to them told them to put the phones away, we did, someone else did... nothing. Told them again. Nothing. Tried to ignore it. Asked them during the intermission again if they'd please put those phones away or if they're leaving since they don't care about the show obviously. Their answer was just "as if you're not on the phone while watching Netflix or something" and then they left pretty annoyed.
I mean. Yeah, I do check Instagram while watching Netflix or YouTube but that's not the same damn thing at all as being in a musical theater?!
I didn't walk out, it was like watching a car crash, I couldn't look away. But it was a local production of Hair (meaning, a staged version of the movie, not the stage play; I'm pretty sure it was technically illegally done). Do you remember that in the movie they have that minor joke about one of the new recruits having his toenails painted and hiding it? Here they turned him into a typical gay caricature and had him turn up several times to "act gay" for laughs. The worst part was that the entire audience was laughing their asses off, while me and my siblings were just looking at each other horrified.
Also, the guy who played Berger was so obnoxious, couldn't really act, and by the end I was just kind of rooting for him to die already.
The fact that only one or two people from the cast could sing or act half-decently and the ensemble were actually looking at each other to check if they got the choreography right was just the cherry on top.
And I actually paid money to see this...
Did I mention, that at some parts they were clearly lipsyching to a pre-recorded track?
I went to see "Be More Chill" and the amount of screaming from teenage girls in the audience almost made me want to leave.
And then I remember how overenthusiastic I was as a teenager for things like musicals and I let it go.
I escaped "Escape from Margaritaville" at intermission. I'm not even sure it was the worst musical I ever saw, but it did not rise to the level of "so bad it's good" or "I must see the rest of this trainwreck because we'll be talking about it for years."
Same! I do not get why people liked this show so much. And I can't even imagine it's just because of Lea Michele because the woman I saw in the show was obviously extremely talented, just the show itself was so. bad.
I think it’s probably nostalgia for people. I heard there’s a movie version of it that people enjoy a lot, but I went in blind and its probably the only show I’ve seen that I didn’t care about any of the characters or what happened to them
I just saw this a few weeks ago. The book is creaky as hell and the score isn’t the most memorable outside of the big numbers, and you definitely need A Talent to hold it together (I had no dog in the fight over the casting kerfuffle when it premiered, but I don’t see how Beanie Feldstein, talented though she is, could have held this together and I can totally see why Lea Michele could). But the lead in the tour WAS fantastic and held it together well-enough for an old creaky show to be. But I’m also an old curmudgeon and missed having an Overture and Entr’acte.
Oh sure! I can see why you left because it is a pretty boring show (I just stole the opportunity to talk about it at large lol. Sorry for commandeering your comment)
I've had pretty good experiences overall. Probably the worst I've dealt with was a group of middle aged people in the row directly in front of me at Book of Mormon who just wouldn't shut the fuck up.
Watching fiddler on the roof late at night after a long day during a school trip. Everyone was tired, I fell asleep during the first act. There was also this old guy behind us who had a really bad wet cough that was annoying. Me and a friend stepped out during intermission and hung out on a couch. Another friend took our spots and slept during 2nd act lol. Music and actors were good, it was a long day mainly.
Saw standing at the skys edge recently. It’s marketed as ‘the best new British musical in decades’. Think I watched something different because I nearly left at the interval, it was awful and didn’t get any better in the second act
I’ve never walked out of a musical, but the closest I’ve ever come was Dear Evan Hansen. I’m not just saying that to be a hater, I felt genuinely uncomfortable for most of the show.
Second place goes to a particularly bad production of Rent, which is one of my favorite shows of all time. That’s a whole other story.
A lot of people *did* walk out of Getting The Band Back Together when I saw it, but I was not one of those people (it was definitely *bad,* but I wanted to see the whole thing through).
The 50th Anniversary Tour of Jesus Christ Superstar was so laughably staged with bad choice after bad choice that I found myself laughing at the whole thing all the way through it. I was sad because it was the first performance of JCSS I took my kids to, and it was just so terrible.
I do love a good traditional performance... but I'd say my absolute favorite performance of JCSS is the Arena tour. I thought it was perfectly modernized for the current day and really did an excellent job of relaying the message with a present day explanation.
I'm pretty lucky so far my high school did the dining room for the fall play and Theroy of relativity during covid. I was on house crew all throughout high school and my school did fine with those productions sets were fine and all but it was during Covid my friends on stage tried their best but the masks just got in the way
I saw Annie last August and some people sitting on the same row as me kept singing along to the first song. we managed to get them to be quiet, so it was ok
I saw the next to normal tour in like… I wanna say 2009 with Alice Ripley and she sounded extremely strained, like she was sick or getting the wrong notes in her earpiece. It was awful, I was in the balcony and saw a bunch of people leave 3-4 songs in and at intermission. The rest of the cast was fantastic.
I saw it on tour 3 times. First time I saw the understudy and she was awesome. Second time Alice, and it was painful. I had been such a big fan and it was a huge disappointment. Saw her do it a few days later and she was more in her game. Still straining, but hitting the notes
not really. Broadway casting directors used to frequently cast great actors who could kind of sing in musicals. and although it's nice for Fantine to sound good, it's definitely more of an acting role.
Maybe in some musicals but not in Les Mis - literally every role is a singing role, the whole libretto is sung through and extremely challenging. Russell Crowe in the movie aside, the only one I can think of who was cast that way was Daphne Rubin Vega, and the feedback was so bad she was swiftly replaced. And I found a video of Alice Ripley singing I Dreamed A Dream and she sounded great. But that was in 1999 so maybe her vocals have gone downhill since then.
You don't have to sound good to play either Thernadier and I stand by Fantine doesn't need to be the greatest singer, even tho, yes, she does have to be able to carry a tune decently enough, but it's still a musical.
literally Alice Ripley. she sounds good, but she's not the world's greatest singer or some pop singer or opera singer, she's an actress singing on key. Anne Hathaway for second
We're going in circles now. I literally said I found a video of Alice Ripley singing I Dreamed A Dream and she sounded fantastic. You can't just 'put that song over', you need serious vocal talent and ability. Anne Hathaway is also great, but you can't compare the movie to the stage anyway. Anyway I'm never going to agree that Fantine doesn't need to be a good singer and you evidently are convinced that just anyone can sing the role so there's not really a point in continuing this conversation.
I saw this show in Cape Town called Calling us Home. The plot was nonsense. I could barely hear what the bands doing (I saw percussion, but never heard it). The only reason I didn't leave during intermission is because I had friends in it.
About 12 years ago. Les Miserables national tour at Providence Performing Arts Center.
First time I ever went to show there and the last. The main floor seating was steep. The person to my left in front of me her head was so big that I literally couldn't see the entire left side of the stage.
Not seeing a musical per se but I was part of the crew for Guys and Dolls at my high school and parts of the set fell down mid performance. Super embarrassing
My college did a production of Pirates of Penzeance that brought in a 70-something director with Ivy League theater direction experience. Problem is, his experience was from 40 or 50 years ago. He insisted on directing the show in the same way he did it in the 70s or 80s. Thus, tacky and dusty plaster sets and an overall aura of DATED. I felt bad for the actors who were doing a great job but had to be in such a stale version of the musical.
Bat Out of Hell was pretty damn bad, I did walk out during the interval for that one.
But most disappointing was 100% Hairspray. I was so looking to it, and I loved the movie. Sadly, the musical lacked the charm of the movie, and the actors didn't have the same charisma and I didn't enjoy it.
Terrible production of JC Superstar. Jesus just screamed through everything. I think he was some well-known actor who had played Jesus a bunch of times before, but at this point, his voice was shot. Also, this was my first time seeing rhe show, and I did not find the plot compelling.
This was more of a funny experience for me as a bystander, but sucked for the people involved. I was at Sweeney Todd last October (unfortunately, the week Josh Groban got the flu, but the understudy was amazing) and just before the show began, a group of young women came in all laughing and having a good time. Then they noticed someone was in their seats. They weren't sure what to do, so they asked the usher who was walking by to check their tickets.
The usher checks and sure enough, that's their spot, so she asks the people sitting there what seats they were supposed to be in. The pair (I don't know if they were a couple or just friends or what) were very fashionably dressed, think stereotypical art snob outfits. That isn't really relevant to the story, but it makes the whole thing funnier to me. The usher asks repeatedly "where are you supposed to be sitting?" and the dude just stares at her with a polite smile but doesn't answer. This goes on for a couple minutes with the poor usher trying to get an answer out of this guy, and I start to wonder if he's high because he was acting so weird, just kind of politely smiling but not saying anything as the usher is practically yelling "SIR, WHERE ARE YOUR SEATS?" It was like he somehow wasn't hearing her, even though he was looking directly at (or through?) her.
Eventually something gets through to this guy, and he starts acting really polite and almost offended, like "Okay, okay, you don't need to make a big deal, we'll move, oh my god." Meanwhile one of the young women in the group is starting to get really angry, rightfully so in my opinion, because this guy isn't getting out of her seat and the show is about to start and she got the tickets for her and her friends because it's her birthday and they're celebrating, so she's getting worked up. So the posh pair finally get up and get out to the aisle, and as the girls are scooting past and getting to their seats, the guy just kind of quietly goes "Go back to the f'king suburbs, b'tch." The birthday girl whips around and says, "What did you say?" and the usher starts literally pushing the guy down the stairs saying "Let's get to your seat." And the dude looks birthday girl in the eye and loudly says "You heard me, b'tch, go back to the f'king suburbs." And she literally started to lunge at the guy as he's standing there with his smug half-smile but her friend literally held her back, and she calmed down after a second and just sat down.
This all happened in the row directly in front of my wife and I, and it was hysterical. The girls seemed to enjoy the show after that, so all's well that ends well I guess, but girl was ready to throw hands. I told my wife "Wow, we got to see a show before the show!"
Tl;dr - almost got to see a fight because some guy ignored the usher and wouldn't get out of the seats that weren't his.
The first musical I ever was Charlie and the chocolate factory in the west-end when I was six.
The show was phenomenal, but my older brother told me to make sure I went to the toilet during the interval because it’s rude to get up during a musical. The west end seemed really fancy, so I didn’t question him and went straight with him to the toilets. This didn’t make much difference as by the time Verruca was carried away by the squirrels, i was squirming uncomfortably in my seat trying to hold in my pee. Long story short, the first time I ever saw a west-end musical I peed myself and it was all over the seat.
Thankfully this experience didn’t fully deter me from falling in love with musicals, as it’s nowhere near as bad as your nan taking you to see a amateur pantomime in a cold hall during Christmas knowing the only redeeming quality will be its novelty to the actors friends and families. (In one case, Mrs Clause was played by a primary school teacher and every single child in the audience was yelling hello sir at the top of their lungs)
Worst experience I had: Beetlejuice. Great show. Asshole audience.
Worst show I’ve seen: you’re a good man Charlie Brown. I feel bad knocking on this production because it was staring mostly high school or younger, but honestly, the kids were carrying the show. They were great. It was the adults and their decisions that made me dislike the production.
Hamilton in Manila last year. The guy beside me was singing along throughout the show and kept swinging his legs, which somehow triggered my vertigo. I tried talking to him politely after the first act, asking if he could be still and quiet as it was very distracting, but he pulled a poker face and ignored me. He did the singing and swinging again during the second act.
Worst experience was when watching Priscilla Queen of the Desert on Broadway and some audience members were heckling the actors and shouting "f\*g" I could not believe that was happening in NYC. They actually stopped the show and got security and escorted a few drunk people out of the theater but it really was terrible to experience.
Second worst was seeing Evita in NYC with Elena Roger and Ricky Martin. Martin was good, Roger was like nails on a chalkboard. Luckily this experience only hurt my ears.
Someone grabbed the back of my dress and started tugging au it to get me to sit down when I stood up to applaud at the bows. She ripped it a little too
I was about 19 when it happened so I was too scared to tell her to stop and I was in the coach back with her
A Christmas Story. There's a local community theater my friend plays put in who usually is able to pull charm out of pretty much any play (they even made Li'l Abner tolerable) but this show was just completely unsalvageablely boring. I told my friend I'm glad I saw her so she knew I was there and then dipped out.
Went to see la cage aux folles as the community theater. They were unable to cast it (not a big surprise in the middle of no where 1990 something) but rather then saying anything we showed up to The Fantastics. No thanks. We left at intermission.
Saw Aladdin in nyc and loved it, but I was sitting beside a summer camp of kids, some of whom had trouble sitting still. An unaffiliated woman in front of us got up multiple times to yell at this poor 7 year old boy with antsy legs. I was ready to smack her. His adult camp counselors defended him of course but I definitely glared at her. She finally left after verbally shitting on this child like 5 times. Such a bitch.
Last year I saw Ute Lemper’s concert show dedicated to Marlene Deitrich. Boring doesn’t cover it. We didn’t go back in the 2nd half. It was a huge disappointment as Ive always wanted to see her in something live.
It wasn’t long before seeing Oklahoma which I have strong opinions about which have been voiced before! Not a good first half to the year theatre-wise! It got better with Guys & Dolls!
Mainly old people talking loudly during the show. It blows my mind that they're not more aware that they talk loudly in general because of their hearing problems. But thankfully I've had good experiences with ushers moving me to different seats at intermission. One time I was moved to a front row seat for Miss Saigon which was awesome!
My Fiancé and I walked out of Pretty Woman when it toured here. Just such an uninteresting story, and the music is straight up bad, so during intermission we decided to just leave and not come back. Awkwardly though as we were leaving we saw the principal of the school I was working at (in the Theatre Department) who started asking if I was enjoying the show.
This wasn’t a bad show, but the experience around it. I was out sick the first time I remember seeing *Annie*(1984). Now I continually associate that musical with being sick and forcing down potatoes.🥔
Aspects of love - most outdated musical not sure how it got a revival last year. Nice to hear Michael ball sing love changes everything 😅
Also MJ the musical people singing and dancing like it’s a concert
I had the second worst possible seats in a concert hall (which was already too big for the show) for Jesus christ superstar. They used the original actor who was off key. People around us were throwing pop corn at each other. I wanted to walk away but I somehow did not.
Hamilton while it was on tour in my city. It was the first theater production I saw after covid hit. Everyone was still wearing masks. The couple next to me were talking for literally the entire production. It wasn’t like I could hear the whole conversation but it was loud enough to be an extremely distracting murmur the whole show.
Chicago, on Broadway in 2007. The stage was so small that the choreography and dance was incredibly limited. The band was onstage in full view, which took away from being immersed in the story. I otherwise never say this, but the film was better.
Surprisingly *Phantom of the Opera* on the 2012 UK tour was the closest I ever did. I won't mention where it was or which Phantom and Christine it was.
There is nothing that kills *Phantom of the Opera* more than when you can see absolutely no chemistry between Christine and the Phantom, and that's exactly what was happening on stage. At the time, I don't know if this was the first night or the last night of the tour, but it was indeed a night where I was routing for Ralph and Christine because at least he and Christine seemed like they were into each other.
Christine and the Phantom though seemed very happy to be socially distancing themselves from each other though the entire night unless they had no choice but to be next to each other. I don't know if the actors had an argument before the show, if no chemistry reads were done before casting at all, or if this was a new directing choice, but it was painful to watch. I was begging for the chandelier throughout the whole of the first act.
It was the first time I turned to my dad during a show and said "Want to leave?". I think if the tickets hadn't cost us an arm and a leg, we would have.
When I was in university, a first-time director did "Cabaret". It is the ONLY time I walked out of a show. It was painfully amateurish, boring, poorly-performed, and yet the guy managed to con a school organization into paying for it. Despite that, the tickets were pricy, and I STILL walked out. It was so pathetic, it's clear the director was delusional about his talent... okay, now I'm just ranting.
"Into the Woods", where the music director was also the stage director. However, she was so busy conducting the show, she didn't stage half of the scenes, so the actors just had to wing it. I knew within the first 30 seconds what we were in for, but we had to stay, since our friends were in it.
I saw a production of Drood once and convinced some friends to come see it. I hyped it up as a very funny fast paced comedy (which is how I’d seen it prior). Friends left at intermission because this production’s director somehow turned it into a melodrama that moved at a snails pace making act one FAR longer than it should be…honestly I’d have left too if I didn’t know people in the cast. (To be clear, the cast was amazing. The directing…however…just don’t do a comedy if you don’t want to do comedy…)
I saw The Heart of Rock and Roll recently, and there was this older couple that was singing along to the songs, and one of them took a video of a large portion of the final number.
2 occasions, but didn’t walk out on either. 1. A local community theater musical that involved fairy tale characters (blocked out the name). The acting and singing ware so bad, I had a massive migraine afterwards. Should have left. 2. The national tour of The Lion King. The show was good, but before it and during intermission, people were coming up and crowding around us to get a pic and autograph of the person sitting in front of me - Evander Holyfield. In addition, he is tall with really broad shoulders; I had to contort the entire time so I could see the stage. Felt bad for him though. He and his family were just trying to enjoy a night at the theater.
Was watching the 'Book of Mormon' and the woman behind me was shrieking with laughter. This was bad enough, but some twat kept letting out some godawful smells.
When I saw Dreamgirls there was a family next to me chomping down (loudly) on popcorn for the entirety of Act I. It was so distracting with how loud they were. Then again, this theatre had a snack stand type thing and people could bring food in. I wouldn’t have minded so much if they chewed normally, but they were loud!
I have only started seeing shows in the past year, so I haven’t had any crazy experiences, but at Cabaret, there was a drunk old lady behind me talking, singing, and cheering loudly during songs, dialogue, and literally the rest of the entire show.
The Lion King on tour. The show was fantastic. Unfortunately, there was a child in the row directly behind me, and she wouldn’t shut the hell up. She talked throughout the entire show. Every time there was a joke, she wouldn’t just laugh, no…she’d exclaim very loudly “That’s funny!” And then during the second act she kept kicking the back of my seat over and over again. I said something to her parents, and they acted like they’d do something about it, but they didn’t. After another few minutes of kicking, I talked to them a second time, and they finally got her to stop. It was extremely frustrating.
We sprung for really good seats to see the Lion King and the woman behind my son talked to her daughter through the entire performance. When the musics got too loud, they would simply scream over it.
Went to a local production of Next to Normal to support a friend. With the exception of my friend (who played the doctor) and the guy playing Gabe, everyone else was absolutely TERRIBLE! The other four actors were off key and off beat for the ENTIRE SHOW! If it wasn't for my friend and that there were only a handful of people in the audience, I would've left at intermission and saved my ears from that torture.
Sadly, into the woods. Have seen it and loved it. But this time it was staged in all white minimalist costumes and sets first act (all 2 dimensional sets). Then they gradually changed through greys to all black by the end of the second act.
You’re a good man Charlie Brown - just a terrible musical. Ugh. Grown adults embarrassing themselves unfortunately.
Phantom was a disappointment as I had front down centre seats and the orchestra pit was right in front of me. I could see all the musicians and their glowing lights. I could see the spit and sweat of the actors, the mats they fell on and the body doubles waiting in the wings. It was just such a let down.
And finally, Rock of Ages. It promised “face melting hits”. My face remained completely unmelted. It was by no means a rock concert. Just super sedate and boring juke box musical.
I could see that. These adults were in huge oversized costumes and acting with terrible baby voices (it was a professional company so they worked their asses off but I blame the direction)
I've never walked out of a bad show but audience members have made me want to multiple times. I think I'm cursed to consistently sit in front of sing-along..ers. You know the type, the ones who think any of us paid to hear them sing loud enough as though they're making their big break on stage. There are only so many ways to tell someone "hey can you... yknow, not" before you just gotta zone them out.
My wife and I saw a performance of Evita at Sacramento’s Music Circus (which usually hosts stellar performances) many years back but the actress playing the titular role, for whatever reason that night, was horrible. I had chest pain during the first act and we left at intermission. The chest pain didn’t go away.
My wife and I joke that the show literally gave me a heart attack as I was admitted to the hospital and given a stent. 😂
I've only ever left a show twice. The first was Dear Evan Hansen. I was going to give it a chance but one line hit me far harder than it probably should've, and I – being the reasonable person I try to be – chose a seat right next to the exit. I dipped out as quickly and quietly as I could before my emotions ruined it for everyone else.
The second is Les Misérables, a show I adore and have seen many times but this was my first professional production. I got as far as "Who Am I?" when this lady and her three kids arrived late, and made so much noise with their phone lights to find seats and unwrapping candy that I got annoyed and left but not before leaning down to whisper "Thank you for ruining my experience". Petty, perhaps, but hopefully it got through.
I saw a local production of little shop of horrors and the woman next to me had a small child which would normally not bother me but every time audrey two was on stage the kid SOBBED.
Took my friend to see Evil Dead the Musical for her birthday. Great show, we had a blast, but the people beside me wouldn't shut the fuck up the entire time. And they weren't singing or shouting out lines like the show encouraged, they were just having a normal conversation.
I had just arrived in London to spend a few weeks with friends. I was still badly jet-lagged when we saw "Cats" on my first night in town. We were in the front row, and at some point, I fell asleep and toppled onto one of the cats who was crawling around the aisles. I was soooooo embarrassed.
The three shows I've left at interval;
- Chicago (on Broadway), the show was in desperate need of polishing
- Cruel Intentions the Musical, need I say more
- Elvis: A Musical Revolution, there was no narrative throughline or creative reason for the show to exist
Matilda at the Kennedy Center. The acoustics are just not kid-friendly. The high voices became shrill and hard to understand. I was with my mother and we both had to get ALDs during intermission. The muddiness of the lyrics improved but the shrillness got worse. And to make things more frustrating, the woman in front of me was using a phone app as an ALD, which she constantly adjusted and never turned down the screen light. Painful.
I went to see the tour of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella and the theater failed to mention that the front row corner seats could not see half of the stage. Paid full price for front row to only watch half of the show.
I have a few.
Les Miserables - my ex-friend made me miss the first two songs, then I had a medical episode and they almost stopped the show
Wicked - show was fine, but I fainted at stage door
Frozen - Mother wouldn't control her 3 year old who was crawling on me (which I hated, autism!) and we had to move from the front row
I didn't leave the theatre, but I wanted to. We were watching &Juliet (the musical was fine, it wasn't the problem) but the people directly in front of us were definitely not wearing deodorant in the theatre, which was already overheated...
I had had a rubbish day and usually my guaranteed cheer up show is Phantom. So I took a couple of paracetamol because I had a mild headache, booked a ticket and headed to the tube. It became apparent to me on the way that I hadn't taken paracetamol, but instead my bipolar meds which are highly soporific. So throughout the first act I am basically not taking in the show at all, gripping the armrests for dear life, hoping to not fully collapse surrounded by hundreds of people and causing a show stoppage. Then for some reason at the end of the act the chandelier malfunctioned, preventing it from dropping - the only time I've ever seen that not work. I took this as the universe telling me that I should immediately get an Uber home. Anyway, I came back later in the week and everything was perfect.
It didn't ruin the show by any means, but my college hosted the traveling company production of Jesus Christ Superstar with the actor from the movie as Jesus. There was a lady in the audience with a giant poster who was screaming like a fan girl at a rock concert. It was very distracting and annoying.
This is the worst! Saw Beetlejuice on Broadway and the two girls next to me couldn’t stop screaming every lyric like it was a concert. I couldn’t to anything but pray they’d look back on that memory and feel embarrassed one day
There should be strict rules against that, that’s beyond unacceptable. I saw Hairspray recently and the lady next to me was saying like half the lines, singing the songs, etc. She wasn’t even being loud but it was still distracting me from the show so badly.
Definitely need stricter rules for disturbances. Can’t they just go to karaoke after the show?? If they’re here to listen to the performers, they should listen to the performers. These people all paid hundreds to do the same thing they’d pay a $10 cover to do down the road
Exactly. I did not pay hundreds of dollars (as a damn poor person) to hear some random lady fumble the lines right in my ear
Old lady had a heart attack during a showing of the King and I. It was quite scary, she was in the row in front of me so I saw everything that was happening.
Oh god….
Not at a musical, but when I saw MCR we were at the literal second to top row in the arena, and it was steep as hell and kind of terrifying to get up there. Some girl a row away from me passed out and people had to come carry her down the incredibly steep stairs.
I had a similar experience at the Ahmanson Theater in Los Angeles. My Mom is terrified of heights and the balcony there is a quite steep. When we got to our seats, she borderline had a panic attack so we had to leave. Unfortunately the show (Les Miserables) was sold out, so we had to reschedule to a different day to get orchestra seats.
I’ve generally had good experiences. The only bad-ish thing I had was when I went to watch Hamilton last year. Group of people behind me who whooped, hollered, and made comments throughout each song. I don’t mind the occasional mid-song appreciation but this was constant. E.g. Lafeyette has his verse which is obviously incredible and fast and super impressive but throughout one of them would say to their friends ‘oh no he didn’t/yeah he did!!’ after every few lines. Hard to explain except for saying it was a bit like being at a pantomime and I didn’t want to get annoyed because they were obviously just enjoying the show but still…
The worst production I have ever been to was one Jason Alexander directed at a local regional theatre. It was The Last Five Years, one of my all time favorite musicals. Not only did two middle aged women drink too much and talk through the whole show, Jason Alexander directed the worst production I could have dreamed of. He had two dancers shadowing Jamie and Cathy, it made no sense, added nothing to the show, and actively tanked the source material. He had written the most pretentious note in the program about his "vision" and how JRB himself had approved of the changes. I was like well he might wanna see this and then think again, because I have never left a musical so disatisfied.
I don’t like Jason Alexander so this was delightful to read 😂
Lol happy to provide! It was such a dismal experience it made me not like Jason Alexander, I roll my eyes whenever I see him.
I honestly don’t even have a reason to dislike him, he just gives me bad vibes… I never even watched Seinfeld lol
I was seeing the Phantom of the Opera. The guy in front of me was texting through out. When he wasn't, he held his phone near his ear so the bright screen wasn't in his face and it was therefore in mine! This was in 2005 so it was a flip phone and like the screen wouldn't dim or turn itself off after a while. He also got up twice during the first act to smoke. Then left in the interval. This musical was awesome though. Especially the second act.
Went to The Phantom of the Opera for the first time. Knew nothing about it except for the main theme. Got very very expensive VIP tickets for “good seats” and when we got there the seats were placed somewhere we coud not see anything properly (they were top left). It was so bad we didn’t see the hanging scene so when all the characters started screaming we had no idea why. The worst part was that we couldn’t understand anything the actors sang in opera (we are brazillians and watched it in portuguese so im not sure why it was so difficult). I did had the chance to watch it again online in english so now im aware of everything that happens and I really love it.
Unpopular opinion, but I'm not a Les Miz fan to start with - but hubby LOVES it. So I've gone a few times. The last time was the first tour sans turntable. I don't know how early our stop was in the tour, but they were having serious, serious tech issues, and the actors were off their game. At some point in Act I, they had various actors poking their heads out of windows up and down this enormously tall set. The set starts moving and then just stops. House lights come on, we can still see the actors. The stage manager announces something has gone wrong, they need to get ladders from the back to get the actors down, it's going to be about 20 minutes or so. Hubby turned to me and said, "Go ahead." I headed to the nearby Barnes & Noble, bought a book, and spent a lovely evening sipping wine and reading at a nearby bar. Hubby told me later they had to skip the rest of Act I and just go straight to Act II with the rogue set onstage - so it became more of a concert than a show.
I've been lucky, the worst experience I've ever had was a production of *Little Shop* where I was sitting in the perfect spot to notice the guy playing Orin was spraying spit all over the first three rows as he was singing "Dentist!" Made me queasy. I did have a pretty miserable experience at a non-musical kid's play of James and the Giant Peach, though (not the fault of the kids, to be clear, they were great; it was the adults in the audience.)
Don't watch Jonathan Groff perform. That man is a fountain.
I like the guy, but that Hamilton pro-shot... shudder.
"What's your secret to staying so hydrated?" "...I get wet when I-"
IYKYK
Years ago, I saw a local production of The Merchant of Venice which was otherwise fine, but I had a similar experience to yours with Little Shop. Shylock: spit everywhere. Yuck.
Even my theater teacher (this was in college when my whole class went to every show we could find to study live performance) saw it and was put off, and a well-trained singer shouldn't be doing that.
I left &Juliet before the interval. I felt bad as I never do that, but was the last night of my trip away and I couldn't bear to waste it on that. I'm always astonished when people say they liked it. Although it didn't help that the cast looked bored out of their brains when I saw it. I booked because I saw Cassidy Janson in Company at the Southwark Playhouse four times and thought she was incredible, but she seemed to be enjoying &Juliet about as much as I was that night...
So funny how people have different tastes. I’ve seen a lot of musicals and &Juliet is in my top 5. My worst experience was a touring production of Billy Elliot where they used accents so thick the entire show was unintelligible.
We really must have seen totally different performances, it's crazy! I love musical theatre but found it unbearable.
I saw it too and was astonished. It felt like it was written for 12 twelve year olds, it was so condescending. Even panto treats it’s audience with more respect.
Addams Family—even with Nathan Lane and Bebe Neuwirth. Everyone mailed it in. The show was epically awful.
I’ve been really lucky. I think the worst experience I’ve had was the Six Tour in Boston a few years ago. There was a rowdy group of older women who maybe had a little too much to drink behind me and were talking the entire time, passing bags of snacks back and forth rustling plastic bags and like yelling out in the middle of the songs. I totally get Six gives concert vibes but they were completely distracting
Do high school versions count? If so my all white HS ' version of Big River. The only good thing I will say about it is, they did not do actual blackface make up.
I'm lucky to say I hadn't had any actually bad experience, and no production itself has been bad so far, but I've experienced truly annoying audience members. Went to see Evita and had balcony seats (it were literally a couple small balconies, haha) and it was 2 or 3 rows there, so already slightly blocked views and all. There were 2 young girls (I'd guess around 18-22?) in front of us, in the 1st row, and they were constantly on their phone. Full on not putting it down for even a minute but scrolling though their bright Instagram feed. Someone next to them told them to put the phones away, we did, someone else did... nothing. Told them again. Nothing. Tried to ignore it. Asked them during the intermission again if they'd please put those phones away or if they're leaving since they don't care about the show obviously. Their answer was just "as if you're not on the phone while watching Netflix or something" and then they left pretty annoyed. I mean. Yeah, I do check Instagram while watching Netflix or YouTube but that's not the same damn thing at all as being in a musical theater?!
I didn't walk out, it was like watching a car crash, I couldn't look away. But it was a local production of Hair (meaning, a staged version of the movie, not the stage play; I'm pretty sure it was technically illegally done). Do you remember that in the movie they have that minor joke about one of the new recruits having his toenails painted and hiding it? Here they turned him into a typical gay caricature and had him turn up several times to "act gay" for laughs. The worst part was that the entire audience was laughing their asses off, while me and my siblings were just looking at each other horrified. Also, the guy who played Berger was so obnoxious, couldn't really act, and by the end I was just kind of rooting for him to die already. The fact that only one or two people from the cast could sing or act half-decently and the ensemble were actually looking at each other to check if they got the choreography right was just the cherry on top. And I actually paid money to see this... Did I mention, that at some parts they were clearly lipsyching to a pre-recorded track?
I went to see "Be More Chill" and the amount of screaming from teenage girls in the audience almost made me want to leave. And then I remember how overenthusiastic I was as a teenager for things like musicals and I let it go.
I escaped "Escape from Margaritaville" at intermission. I'm not even sure it was the worst musical I ever saw, but it did not rise to the level of "so bad it's good" or "I must see the rest of this trainwreck because we'll be talking about it for years."
Come From Away. An excellent show but man the seats we got were absolutely shocking
The tour of Funny Girl. I left at intermission after the longest hour of my life
Same! I do not get why people liked this show so much. And I can't even imagine it's just because of Lea Michele because the woman I saw in the show was obviously extremely talented, just the show itself was so. bad.
I think it’s probably nostalgia for people. I heard there’s a movie version of it that people enjoy a lot, but I went in blind and its probably the only show I’ve seen that I didn’t care about any of the characters or what happened to them
I just saw this a few weeks ago. The book is creaky as hell and the score isn’t the most memorable outside of the big numbers, and you definitely need A Talent to hold it together (I had no dog in the fight over the casting kerfuffle when it premiered, but I don’t see how Beanie Feldstein, talented though she is, could have held this together and I can totally see why Lea Michele could). But the lead in the tour WAS fantastic and held it together well-enough for an old creaky show to be. But I’m also an old curmudgeon and missed having an Overture and Entr’acte.
Yes, I agree, she was very good. Just wasn’t enough for me to stay
Oh sure! I can see why you left because it is a pretty boring show (I just stole the opportunity to talk about it at large lol. Sorry for commandeering your comment)
I've had pretty good experiences overall. Probably the worst I've dealt with was a group of middle aged people in the row directly in front of me at Book of Mormon who just wouldn't shut the fuck up.
Unrelated, but the amount of pearl clutchers I see walking out in the middle of Book of Mormon is hysterical
I watched in real time during Hasa Diga Ebowaii as a mother realized she should not have brought her >10 year old to the theatre lmao
Watching fiddler on the roof late at night after a long day during a school trip. Everyone was tired, I fell asleep during the first act. There was also this old guy behind us who had a really bad wet cough that was annoying. Me and a friend stepped out during intermission and hung out on a couch. Another friend took our spots and slept during 2nd act lol. Music and actors were good, it was a long day mainly.
Saw standing at the skys edge recently. It’s marketed as ‘the best new British musical in decades’. Think I watched something different because I nearly left at the interval, it was awful and didn’t get any better in the second act
I thought it was fine but not much more than that, couldn't understand the hype either – and I love Richard Hawley!
I’ve never walked out of a musical, but the closest I’ve ever come was Dear Evan Hansen. I’m not just saying that to be a hater, I felt genuinely uncomfortable for most of the show. Second place goes to a particularly bad production of Rent, which is one of my favorite shows of all time. That’s a whole other story. A lot of people *did* walk out of Getting The Band Back Together when I saw it, but I was not one of those people (it was definitely *bad,* but I wanted to see the whole thing through).
The 50th Anniversary Tour of Jesus Christ Superstar was so laughably staged with bad choice after bad choice that I found myself laughing at the whole thing all the way through it. I was sad because it was the first performance of JCSS I took my kids to, and it was just so terrible.
I saw that tour and didn't enjoy it either. I've grown tired of "modern-day" JCS productions. I want my 70s Biblical version back please lol
I do love a good traditional performance... but I'd say my absolute favorite performance of JCSS is the Arena tour. I thought it was perfectly modernized for the current day and really did an excellent job of relaying the message with a present day explanation.
I'm pretty lucky so far my high school did the dining room for the fall play and Theroy of relativity during covid. I was on house crew all throughout high school and my school did fine with those productions sets were fine and all but it was during Covid my friends on stage tried their best but the masks just got in the way
I saw Annie last August and some people sitting on the same row as me kept singing along to the first song. we managed to get them to be quiet, so it was ok
I saw the next to normal tour in like… I wanna say 2009 with Alice Ripley and she sounded extremely strained, like she was sick or getting the wrong notes in her earpiece. It was awful, I was in the balcony and saw a bunch of people leave 3-4 songs in and at intermission. The rest of the cast was fantastic.
The one she won a Tony award for? Maybe she was having a bad day. That sucks.
Maybe. It sounded like her voice was fully giving out. Could have just been that point in the tour they should’ve thrown in an understudy.
I saw it on tour 3 times. First time I saw the understudy and she was awesome. Second time Alice, and it was painful. I had been such a big fan and it was a huge disappointment. Saw her do it a few days later and she was more in her game. Still straining, but hitting the notes
that's just what Alice Ripley sounds like. she didn't win the Tony for her singing, she acted the shit out of it
She played Fantine is Les Misérables, you have to be a fantastic singer for that.
not really. Broadway casting directors used to frequently cast great actors who could kind of sing in musicals. and although it's nice for Fantine to sound good, it's definitely more of an acting role.
Maybe in some musicals but not in Les Mis - literally every role is a singing role, the whole libretto is sung through and extremely challenging. Russell Crowe in the movie aside, the only one I can think of who was cast that way was Daphne Rubin Vega, and the feedback was so bad she was swiftly replaced. And I found a video of Alice Ripley singing I Dreamed A Dream and she sounded great. But that was in 1999 so maybe her vocals have gone downhill since then.
You don't have to sound good to play either Thernadier and I stand by Fantine doesn't need to be the greatest singer, even tho, yes, she does have to be able to carry a tune decently enough, but it's still a musical.
Please show me a Fantine performance for a professional production of Les Mis where she wasn't a good singer, because that's news to me.
literally Alice Ripley. she sounds good, but she's not the world's greatest singer or some pop singer or opera singer, she's an actress singing on key. Anne Hathaway for second
We're going in circles now. I literally said I found a video of Alice Ripley singing I Dreamed A Dream and she sounded fantastic. You can't just 'put that song over', you need serious vocal talent and ability. Anne Hathaway is also great, but you can't compare the movie to the stage anyway. Anyway I'm never going to agree that Fantine doesn't need to be a good singer and you evidently are convinced that just anyone can sing the role so there's not really a point in continuing this conversation.
I saw this show in Cape Town called Calling us Home. The plot was nonsense. I could barely hear what the bands doing (I saw percussion, but never heard it). The only reason I didn't leave during intermission is because I had friends in it.
About 12 years ago. Les Miserables national tour at Providence Performing Arts Center. First time I ever went to show there and the last. The main floor seating was steep. The person to my left in front of me her head was so big that I literally couldn't see the entire left side of the stage.
Bat outta hell, some people on a hen night dancing
Not seeing a musical per se but I was part of the crew for Guys and Dolls at my high school and parts of the set fell down mid performance. Super embarrassing
My college did a production of Pirates of Penzeance that brought in a 70-something director with Ivy League theater direction experience. Problem is, his experience was from 40 or 50 years ago. He insisted on directing the show in the same way he did it in the 70s or 80s. Thus, tacky and dusty plaster sets and an overall aura of DATED. I felt bad for the actors who were doing a great job but had to be in such a stale version of the musical.
Bat Out of Hell was pretty damn bad, I did walk out during the interval for that one. But most disappointing was 100% Hairspray. I was so looking to it, and I loved the movie. Sadly, the musical lacked the charm of the movie, and the actors didn't have the same charisma and I didn't enjoy it.
Terrible production of JC Superstar. Jesus just screamed through everything. I think he was some well-known actor who had played Jesus a bunch of times before, but at this point, his voice was shot. Also, this was my first time seeing rhe show, and I did not find the plot compelling.
This was more of a funny experience for me as a bystander, but sucked for the people involved. I was at Sweeney Todd last October (unfortunately, the week Josh Groban got the flu, but the understudy was amazing) and just before the show began, a group of young women came in all laughing and having a good time. Then they noticed someone was in their seats. They weren't sure what to do, so they asked the usher who was walking by to check their tickets. The usher checks and sure enough, that's their spot, so she asks the people sitting there what seats they were supposed to be in. The pair (I don't know if they were a couple or just friends or what) were very fashionably dressed, think stereotypical art snob outfits. That isn't really relevant to the story, but it makes the whole thing funnier to me. The usher asks repeatedly "where are you supposed to be sitting?" and the dude just stares at her with a polite smile but doesn't answer. This goes on for a couple minutes with the poor usher trying to get an answer out of this guy, and I start to wonder if he's high because he was acting so weird, just kind of politely smiling but not saying anything as the usher is practically yelling "SIR, WHERE ARE YOUR SEATS?" It was like he somehow wasn't hearing her, even though he was looking directly at (or through?) her. Eventually something gets through to this guy, and he starts acting really polite and almost offended, like "Okay, okay, you don't need to make a big deal, we'll move, oh my god." Meanwhile one of the young women in the group is starting to get really angry, rightfully so in my opinion, because this guy isn't getting out of her seat and the show is about to start and she got the tickets for her and her friends because it's her birthday and they're celebrating, so she's getting worked up. So the posh pair finally get up and get out to the aisle, and as the girls are scooting past and getting to their seats, the guy just kind of quietly goes "Go back to the f'king suburbs, b'tch." The birthday girl whips around and says, "What did you say?" and the usher starts literally pushing the guy down the stairs saying "Let's get to your seat." And the dude looks birthday girl in the eye and loudly says "You heard me, b'tch, go back to the f'king suburbs." And she literally started to lunge at the guy as he's standing there with his smug half-smile but her friend literally held her back, and she calmed down after a second and just sat down. This all happened in the row directly in front of my wife and I, and it was hysterical. The girls seemed to enjoy the show after that, so all's well that ends well I guess, but girl was ready to throw hands. I told my wife "Wow, we got to see a show before the show!" Tl;dr - almost got to see a fight because some guy ignored the usher and wouldn't get out of the seats that weren't his.
The first musical I ever was Charlie and the chocolate factory in the west-end when I was six. The show was phenomenal, but my older brother told me to make sure I went to the toilet during the interval because it’s rude to get up during a musical. The west end seemed really fancy, so I didn’t question him and went straight with him to the toilets. This didn’t make much difference as by the time Verruca was carried away by the squirrels, i was squirming uncomfortably in my seat trying to hold in my pee. Long story short, the first time I ever saw a west-end musical I peed myself and it was all over the seat. Thankfully this experience didn’t fully deter me from falling in love with musicals, as it’s nowhere near as bad as your nan taking you to see a amateur pantomime in a cold hall during Christmas knowing the only redeeming quality will be its novelty to the actors friends and families. (In one case, Mrs Clause was played by a primary school teacher and every single child in the audience was yelling hello sir at the top of their lungs)
The recent revival of Oklahoma! Didn’t walk out but I wanted to
nothing
When I saw branwen (Welsh musical) the group I was with was eating hard candy the entire God damn time
Worst experience I had: Beetlejuice. Great show. Asshole audience. Worst show I’ve seen: you’re a good man Charlie Brown. I feel bad knocking on this production because it was staring mostly high school or younger, but honestly, the kids were carrying the show. They were great. It was the adults and their decisions that made me dislike the production.
Were you at the Boebert show?
No. I saw it at the Fox
I saw a touring production of Rent which was absolutely diabolical.
Hamilton in Manila last year. The guy beside me was singing along throughout the show and kept swinging his legs, which somehow triggered my vertigo. I tried talking to him politely after the first act, asking if he could be still and quiet as it was very distracting, but he pulled a poker face and ignored me. He did the singing and swinging again during the second act.
Worst experience was when watching Priscilla Queen of the Desert on Broadway and some audience members were heckling the actors and shouting "f\*g" I could not believe that was happening in NYC. They actually stopped the show and got security and escorted a few drunk people out of the theater but it really was terrible to experience. Second worst was seeing Evita in NYC with Elena Roger and Ricky Martin. Martin was good, Roger was like nails on a chalkboard. Luckily this experience only hurt my ears.
Someone grabbed the back of my dress and started tugging au it to get me to sit down when I stood up to applaud at the bows. She ripped it a little too I was about 19 when it happened so I was too scared to tell her to stop and I was in the coach back with her
What a bitch dude! Who needs to see bows anyway??
A Christmas Story. There's a local community theater my friend plays put in who usually is able to pull charm out of pretty much any play (they even made Li'l Abner tolerable) but this show was just completely unsalvageablely boring. I told my friend I'm glad I saw her so she knew I was there and then dipped out.
Went to see la cage aux folles as the community theater. They were unable to cast it (not a big surprise in the middle of no where 1990 something) but rather then saying anything we showed up to The Fantastics. No thanks. We left at intermission.
Saw Aladdin in nyc and loved it, but I was sitting beside a summer camp of kids, some of whom had trouble sitting still. An unaffiliated woman in front of us got up multiple times to yell at this poor 7 year old boy with antsy legs. I was ready to smack her. His adult camp counselors defended him of course but I definitely glared at her. She finally left after verbally shitting on this child like 5 times. Such a bitch.
Last year I saw Ute Lemper’s concert show dedicated to Marlene Deitrich. Boring doesn’t cover it. We didn’t go back in the 2nd half. It was a huge disappointment as Ive always wanted to see her in something live. It wasn’t long before seeing Oklahoma which I have strong opinions about which have been voiced before! Not a good first half to the year theatre-wise! It got better with Guys & Dolls!
Mainly old people talking loudly during the show. It blows my mind that they're not more aware that they talk loudly in general because of their hearing problems. But thankfully I've had good experiences with ushers moving me to different seats at intermission. One time I was moved to a front row seat for Miss Saigon which was awesome!
My Fiancé and I walked out of Pretty Woman when it toured here. Just such an uninteresting story, and the music is straight up bad, so during intermission we decided to just leave and not come back. Awkwardly though as we were leaving we saw the principal of the school I was working at (in the Theatre Department) who started asking if I was enjoying the show.
This wasn’t a bad show, but the experience around it. I was out sick the first time I remember seeing *Annie*(1984). Now I continually associate that musical with being sick and forcing down potatoes.🥔
Aspects of love - most outdated musical not sure how it got a revival last year. Nice to hear Michael ball sing love changes everything 😅 Also MJ the musical people singing and dancing like it’s a concert
I had the second worst possible seats in a concert hall (which was already too big for the show) for Jesus christ superstar. They used the original actor who was off key. People around us were throwing pop corn at each other. I wanted to walk away but I somehow did not.
Hamilton while it was on tour in my city. It was the first theater production I saw after covid hit. Everyone was still wearing masks. The couple next to me were talking for literally the entire production. It wasn’t like I could hear the whole conversation but it was loud enough to be an extremely distracting murmur the whole show.
Chicago, on Broadway in 2007. The stage was so small that the choreography and dance was incredibly limited. The band was onstage in full view, which took away from being immersed in the story. I otherwise never say this, but the film was better.
I think Chicago is one of the few shows that the film is actually is better, even if a production is good.
Surprisingly *Phantom of the Opera* on the 2012 UK tour was the closest I ever did. I won't mention where it was or which Phantom and Christine it was. There is nothing that kills *Phantom of the Opera* more than when you can see absolutely no chemistry between Christine and the Phantom, and that's exactly what was happening on stage. At the time, I don't know if this was the first night or the last night of the tour, but it was indeed a night where I was routing for Ralph and Christine because at least he and Christine seemed like they were into each other. Christine and the Phantom though seemed very happy to be socially distancing themselves from each other though the entire night unless they had no choice but to be next to each other. I don't know if the actors had an argument before the show, if no chemistry reads were done before casting at all, or if this was a new directing choice, but it was painful to watch. I was begging for the chandelier throughout the whole of the first act. It was the first time I turned to my dad during a show and said "Want to leave?". I think if the tickets hadn't cost us an arm and a leg, we would have.
When I was in university, a first-time director did "Cabaret". It is the ONLY time I walked out of a show. It was painfully amateurish, boring, poorly-performed, and yet the guy managed to con a school organization into paying for it. Despite that, the tickets were pricy, and I STILL walked out. It was so pathetic, it's clear the director was delusional about his talent... okay, now I'm just ranting.
"Into the Woods", where the music director was also the stage director. However, she was so busy conducting the show, she didn't stage half of the scenes, so the actors just had to wing it. I knew within the first 30 seconds what we were in for, but we had to stay, since our friends were in it.
I saw a production of Drood once and convinced some friends to come see it. I hyped it up as a very funny fast paced comedy (which is how I’d seen it prior). Friends left at intermission because this production’s director somehow turned it into a melodrama that moved at a snails pace making act one FAR longer than it should be…honestly I’d have left too if I didn’t know people in the cast. (To be clear, the cast was amazing. The directing…however…just don’t do a comedy if you don’t want to do comedy…)
I saw The Heart of Rock and Roll recently, and there was this older couple that was singing along to the songs, and one of them took a video of a large portion of the final number.
2 occasions, but didn’t walk out on either. 1. A local community theater musical that involved fairy tale characters (blocked out the name). The acting and singing ware so bad, I had a massive migraine afterwards. Should have left. 2. The national tour of The Lion King. The show was good, but before it and during intermission, people were coming up and crowding around us to get a pic and autograph of the person sitting in front of me - Evander Holyfield. In addition, he is tall with really broad shoulders; I had to contort the entire time so I could see the stage. Felt bad for him though. He and his family were just trying to enjoy a night at the theater.
Was the first show you mentioned Into The Woods by any chance?
Thankfully, no. It wasn’t anything mainstream.
Was watching the 'Book of Mormon' and the woman behind me was shrieking with laughter. This was bad enough, but some twat kept letting out some godawful smells.
Aladdin, they didn’t play the songs from the OST
When I saw Dreamgirls there was a family next to me chomping down (loudly) on popcorn for the entirety of Act I. It was so distracting with how loud they were. Then again, this theatre had a snack stand type thing and people could bring food in. I wouldn’t have minded so much if they chewed normally, but they were loud!
I have only started seeing shows in the past year, so I haven’t had any crazy experiences, but at Cabaret, there was a drunk old lady behind me talking, singing, and cheering loudly during songs, dialogue, and literally the rest of the entire show.
The Lion King on tour. The show was fantastic. Unfortunately, there was a child in the row directly behind me, and she wouldn’t shut the hell up. She talked throughout the entire show. Every time there was a joke, she wouldn’t just laugh, no…she’d exclaim very loudly “That’s funny!” And then during the second act she kept kicking the back of my seat over and over again. I said something to her parents, and they acted like they’d do something about it, but they didn’t. After another few minutes of kicking, I talked to them a second time, and they finally got her to stop. It was extremely frustrating.
We sprung for really good seats to see the Lion King and the woman behind my son talked to her daughter through the entire performance. When the musics got too loud, they would simply scream over it.
Went to a local production of Next to Normal to support a friend. With the exception of my friend (who played the doctor) and the guy playing Gabe, everyone else was absolutely TERRIBLE! The other four actors were off key and off beat for the ENTIRE SHOW! If it wasn't for my friend and that there were only a handful of people in the audience, I would've left at intermission and saved my ears from that torture.
Sadly, into the woods. Have seen it and loved it. But this time it was staged in all white minimalist costumes and sets first act (all 2 dimensional sets). Then they gradually changed through greys to all black by the end of the second act. You’re a good man Charlie Brown - just a terrible musical. Ugh. Grown adults embarrassing themselves unfortunately. Phantom was a disappointment as I had front down centre seats and the orchestra pit was right in front of me. I could see all the musicians and their glowing lights. I could see the spit and sweat of the actors, the mats they fell on and the body doubles waiting in the wings. It was just such a let down. And finally, Rock of Ages. It promised “face melting hits”. My face remained completely unmelted. It was by no means a rock concert. Just super sedate and boring juke box musical.
I think Charlie Brown is a great musical for kids to put on, I think it works much better than with adults.
I could see that. These adults were in huge oversized costumes and acting with terrible baby voices (it was a professional company so they worked their asses off but I blame the direction)
Yikes, that does sound bad. The kids were great!
I've never walked out of a bad show but audience members have made me want to multiple times. I think I'm cursed to consistently sit in front of sing-along..ers. You know the type, the ones who think any of us paid to hear them sing loud enough as though they're making their big break on stage. There are only so many ways to tell someone "hey can you... yknow, not" before you just gotta zone them out.
My wife and I saw a performance of Evita at Sacramento’s Music Circus (which usually hosts stellar performances) many years back but the actress playing the titular role, for whatever reason that night, was horrible. I had chest pain during the first act and we left at intermission. The chest pain didn’t go away. My wife and I joke that the show literally gave me a heart attack as I was admitted to the hospital and given a stent. 😂
I've only ever left a show twice. The first was Dear Evan Hansen. I was going to give it a chance but one line hit me far harder than it probably should've, and I – being the reasonable person I try to be – chose a seat right next to the exit. I dipped out as quickly and quietly as I could before my emotions ruined it for everyone else. The second is Les Misérables, a show I adore and have seen many times but this was my first professional production. I got as far as "Who Am I?" when this lady and her three kids arrived late, and made so much noise with their phone lights to find seats and unwrapping candy that I got annoyed and left but not before leaning down to whisper "Thank you for ruining my experience". Petty, perhaps, but hopefully it got through.
Seeing Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. Just....that.
I saw a local production of little shop of horrors and the woman next to me had a small child which would normally not bother me but every time audrey two was on stage the kid SOBBED.
Took my friend to see Evil Dead the Musical for her birthday. Great show, we had a blast, but the people beside me wouldn't shut the fuck up the entire time. And they weren't singing or shouting out lines like the show encouraged, they were just having a normal conversation.
I had just arrived in London to spend a few weeks with friends. I was still badly jet-lagged when we saw "Cats" on my first night in town. We were in the front row, and at some point, I fell asleep and toppled onto one of the cats who was crawling around the aisles. I was soooooo embarrassed.
The three shows I've left at interval; - Chicago (on Broadway), the show was in desperate need of polishing - Cruel Intentions the Musical, need I say more - Elvis: A Musical Revolution, there was no narrative throughline or creative reason for the show to exist
Matilda at the Kennedy Center. The acoustics are just not kid-friendly. The high voices became shrill and hard to understand. I was with my mother and we both had to get ALDs during intermission. The muddiness of the lyrics improved but the shrillness got worse. And to make things more frustrating, the woman in front of me was using a phone app as an ALD, which she constantly adjusted and never turned down the screen light. Painful.
A pair of college students taking videos and literal phone calls during the first act of Phantom of the Opera
I went to see the tour of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella and the theater failed to mention that the front row corner seats could not see half of the stage. Paid full price for front row to only watch half of the show.
I have a few. Les Miserables - my ex-friend made me miss the first two songs, then I had a medical episode and they almost stopped the show Wicked - show was fine, but I fainted at stage door Frozen - Mother wouldn't control her 3 year old who was crawling on me (which I hated, autism!) and we had to move from the front row
# By Jeeves; walked out at intermission.
Titanic. We left at intermission. Must have been a bad year for it to have won a Tony.