Tuesday, April 23, 2019
Children left ‘frightened’ after Matilda cast suddenly dash off stage
Edinburgh Evening News: “No one had a clue what was going on. It was scary and we felt uncomfortable. When the cast runs off stage and you’re told to stay in your seats you can’t help but fear something is wrong. We were sitting there for 20 minutes until the performance continued again.”
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5 comments:
It's sad to hear that many people had such a negative experience at Matilda the other night, and it's also sad to hear that many left the show early (although there were different reasons for that). As someone who has worked backstage for many shows, there will be problems of any size. There are problems that can be fixed without much hesitation, problems that are a little too big but can be solved during a break or what not, and then problems that you have to hold a show for. This isn't out of malice for the audience, and it's usually a stressful time for the crew, much less the audience. These moments have to happen sometimes. If something was wrong with the set I imagine it would be much more frightening for something to go wrong and someone to get hurt by not holding the show, rather than calling an emergency break. As for those people who were demanding an explanation. It's not great to be kept in the dark, especially when you paid good money for something, and it's not delivering. However, I don't think it's really the show's job to give an in-depth explanation, like "one of the turtles came out of the track and we need to re-adjust." I don't really think an audience member cares. They just care about getting what they paid for.
This must have been a very confusing event for children. Having to hold a show is really challenging for all people involved. The people watching the show were surely thrown off and made to feel uncomfortable. What really left me confused was that management did not step in to inform the audience, at least a little bit, as to what was happening, whether it be an injury or technical difficulty. It is really unfortunate to hear how this event changed peoples’ experience so drastically, especially considering how many people stated that they were really excited, the show was fantastic, and tickets were expensive. It sounds like everyone ended up alright, but it is certainly an odd experience to say the least. Whatever went wrong was likely unavoidable and threatened the safety of performers, or they wouldn’t have to be ushered offstage, but, still, the audience deserved a greater explanation or some sort of compensation for the letdown of the experience.
I think the question at the core of this article is how much to tell the audience in the case of needing to stop a show. I think it is very important that you make it clear that the audience is in no danger, by specifying that you are on hold for technical difficulties. Or, if you’d rather, I think it can work to come up with some phrase that fits in with the plot of the show, for example saying that a particular character is causing a problem, which makes it clear to the audience that there is no real danger while being somewhat entertaining. It depends on the tone of the show whether or not that will work. Overall, the important thing is to not make the audience be worried about their own safety, by clearly and efficiently communicating that the show is on hold but there is nothing to be concerned about.
This article was a little disappointing, as it just talked about audience members at a showing of Matilda being upset that the show was stopped twice for who knows why (the article never actually tells us). I clicked on the article because I wanted to know WHY the cast was rushed off stage. Working backstage on shows in the past has made me realize the saying “the show much go on” is really taken to heart in the theatre, and that artists will push through SO MUCH to keep the show going, so for them to stop a show twice, something really, really bad must have been happening. The only time I have seen a show stop was due to physical violence in the actual audience so I cannot imagine what was going on backstage. I have seen actors get food poisoning and throw up in between scenes to keep the show going, I have seen lights go start burning while everyone is on stage and supposed to be frozen, I have seen a lot but the show always goes on.
Whenever a show pauses there can be a sense of unease for the audience. I think that stems from the generality of the term “technical difficulties”. It’s like “natural ingredients” in food. You don’t really know what is going on in there. The term technical difficulties may help increase the theatrical magic, but at what cost. What would telling the audience a more specific description be like. Telling them there is a minor electrical difficulty, or a mechanical issue. Not going to deep to confuse anyone but enough so they know things will be alright. Additionally in a show catered to children could there be a backup plan for distraction- I know if as a child I would NOT be happy waiting 45 minutes in the theatre. Like what if they showed a video? Or play a game? Or even some fun pop music? I understand there would be other implication from this but I think a backup plan should always be necessary.
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