Deadline: The producers of Broadway’s Hadestown and Jujamcyn Theaters have apologized to an audience member with hearing loss whose use of a captioning device, provided by the theater, drew repeated onstage reprimands from one of the musical’s stars who mistakenly assumed the device was recording the performance.
12 comments:
Its crazy that an actor called somebody out mid performance for recording. I haven't seen Hadestown so maybe there is a moment in the show where something like that could be possible but I would imagine that would be a job for the Ushers and the House Management and actors should put some more trust that those people are doing their jobs in the best capacity. I think from the stage it has got to be hard to see the difference between a phone and the subtitles device so it would be messy to try to decipher which is which. I hope the theatre talks to the actors about this issue and making sure there is a conversation that happens on why its a bad idea to try to call out audience members publicly. I'm happy they came out with a statement about how this was a terrible incident and a great inequity but I am interested in what steps they will take to actually make a difference and ensure this does not happens again.
I myself have trouble hearing and understanding what is being said at performances a lot of the time, but it is not bad enough to have to use any kind of captioning device during a live performance. I hope that if it ever does get bad enough where I need a captioning device that this does not happen to me because this really is the worst case scenario. I think that one way to avoid this situation is to make sure that all of the actors know what the captioning methods for the theater that they are performing in looks like. Another way is to simply not let the actors call out audience members in the middle of a performance. I can imagine that it is distracting for everyone when an actor calls out an audience member, the other actors, the crew, and the other audience members even. I just think that the whole thing could have been handled in a better way.
I chose this article because it had an unbelievable title, and an equally unbelievable story. I can't even begin to imagine the embarrassment that Coleman must've felt during the incident, being called out in front of so many people. And too, I can't believe that White had the audacity to call out an audience member during the show. I can understand that White may have been upset if she thought that the captioning device was a recording device, but she handled the situation in such a poor manner. I would imagine that White could've told a crew member who could've relayed the message to an usher or other front of house staff to take care of the matter. The article doesn't really go into whether or not the production has taken action on White's behavior, but I hope that they have. This is a terrible example of what a theater experience is supposed to be, and it should never happen.
I’ve read about this from a few different sources and I still think it’s wild that this happened during a broadway performance. I agree with some of the other comments stating that it’s shocking that this actor was close enough to see some sort of device and felt the need to call this person out in front of a whole audience full of people. I think that Broadway ushers and house managers are much more aware of recordings happening and are able to stop people quickly and without much alarm when they see that it is happening. It makes me ask a lot of questions about the actor and the level of concentration they had on the stage versus out to the audience. I hope that this actor speaks out about their actions and that theaters across the country learn something from this awful incident. I think that all people in the theater should be aware of what devices the theater gives out for all people to use during the show.
Having been to shows where audience members were "sneakily" recording the performance or even just blatantly on their phones, I can understand the frustration from the performer. Regardless of what we believe an actor should be aware of on stage, I speak from experience when I say that what happens in the first few rows can be seen from the stage. Actors are not robots, they are humans, and their concentration can be easily broken. While I don't agree with it, I can understand the impulse to call out an audience member for poor behavior. Actors are put in a vulnerable state every time they take the stage, it's understandable that they might lash out if they don't feel respected. That said, I don't think it's their job to call out audience members. As it was pointed out, there are others whose job it is to manage the house. The blame lies with the theatre company who failed to inform their cast about the captioning technology used in the theatre. Coleman is correct that this is a learning opportunity, and perhaps other companies will take measures to ensure that everyone under them employment is aware of any captioning technologies provided.
I remember seeing this on twitter and thinking about how horrible both parties must have felt and how awkward this whole situation is. We preach that theatre should be accessible to all but then situations like this happen because there isn’t any education on things like listening devices. I understand from the actor’s point of view that seeing a device being on in the front row could be very annoying, but maybe some other actions could have been taken instead of directly calling it out on the stage. Personally, as a performer, I would have let someone backstage know so they could tell an usher to talk to the audience member. Then after this situation, I would have tried to personally reach out and apologize for causing that situation. I hope Lillias White is able to learn about the captioning device and personally apologizes to the audience member. I think this an eye-opening situation for the public to realize that sometimes screens aren’t always smartphones.
This is such a yikes. I’ve seen so many stories of individuals recording during shows, but I have also seen a ton of bootleg videos making their way onto social media – recently after Lea Michele’s (controversial) opening night in Funny Girl, I saw countless videos of multiple songs on social media the very next day. Let’s be clear that this IS an issue, but this situation was handled horribly. I also cannot really imagine an actor calling someone out in the middle of a show… I can’t imagine why somebody would risk that during their performance, their job. Obviously, I have no idea of what the protocol surrounding these devices is, and I have no idea if this is already a standard, but maybe showing the actors these devices and informing them that individuals may have this smartphone-like-object out during the performance would be a good practice. I feel like the victim of this incident handled it with grace and a desire to educate and inform – it seems like it could have been a lot worse of a situation had she not been so understanding and caring…
This experience just goes to show how far we still have left to go in making theater truly equitable and inclusive for all, both as a viewer and as an industry. I can kind of understand the reasoning from the stage, as I know that especially on Broadway sneaky recorders are a constant problem, and one that affects copyrights and presents a difficult legal challenge for the producers and company behind the production, but I still think its kind of ridiculous that the entire cast and crew were not made aware that these devices were in use to provide closed captioning. Even further than that, why do you have to call it out from the stage? It's Broadway; I'm absolutely sure that the venue had a house crew that would have been equipped to deal with any concerns of that nature, and I personally see that as a far more respectable way to deal with this than actively calling out your audience from the stage, especially when it's now been proven that the performers can be wrong.
I’ve seen posts about this incident circling around social media so it felt important to read up on it. Broadway shoes already have so many barriers to audience members: high ticket costs, physical accessibility issues in older theatres in the busiest part of the city, etc. It’s our job as theatre makers to strive to lessen these, especially when it comes to accessibility. I wonder if there is a world in which more shows incorporate captioning, like in the opera world. This feels like a less obtrusive option that may end up requiring less resources than handing out, maintaining, and explaining how to use these individual devices. There are some shows my family won’t even see since English is their second language and they’re concerned they won’t catch all the words. Because I can also see how a glowing device in the audience can be distracting to a performer onstage. Maybe we just have to be more creative with our solutions.
Theater accessibility is such a huge issue, and I think this entire situation points to that very clearly. Yes, we can all acknowledge that bootleg recording of performances is an issue. That is another problem for another day - this is a conversation around how theater can ostracize so many people because it has been centered around providing entertainment to people who fit in this socially defined idea of “normal” (which, for the record, does not actually exist.) I can’t even imagine Samantha’s horror at being publicly humiliated for utilizing a device the theater gave her to better experience the show. However, I am glad that she chose to share her story, to give the rest of us the opportunity to learn and do better. Like, for example, making sure the entire production knows what the accessibility devices available in the theater are, look like, etc. Yes, the actor made a mistake, but this points to a much larger issue far beyond this one instance.
accidentally published w/out my name:
Theater accessibility is such a huge issue, and I think this entire situation points to that very clearly. Yes, we can all acknowledge that bootleg recording of performances is an issue. That is another problem for another day - this is a conversation around how theater can ostracize so many people because it has been centered around providing entertainment to people who fit in this socially defined idea of “normal” (which, for the record, does not actually exist.) I can’t even imagine Samantha’s horror at being publicly humiliated for utilizing a device the theater gave her to better experience the show. However, I am glad that she chose to share her story, to give the rest of us the opportunity to learn and do better. Like, for example, making sure the entire production knows what the accessibility devices available in the theater are, look like, etc. Yes, the actor made a mistake, but this points to a much larger issue far beyond this one instance.
This article I believe lacks crucial information on the situation. However; I understand since this was an article that came out before everything settled. This story is layered in ways that I feel like many people on social media dare not acknowledge. On one hand, accessibility is a real issue in theatre. Between the lack of sensory friendly performances, limited amount of ASL interpreted performances, and overall wheelchair accessibility in theatre venues. Accessibility is absolutely a conversation we should have. However; it would be quite deceiving to say that this is the only conversation to be had in this debacle. While yes, I do believe Lilias White interrupting performances to tell someone to stop recording was unprofessional. I do think that there are double standards between the reaction she got for this vs the reaction that another star like Patti Lupone gets when she does something similar. Not to mention the amount of shunning she has gotten that has used racial slurs and other racially charged words to demean her. There is a conversation to be had on why people are so quick to bring down a black woman when she makes a mistake.
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