Have you been following the tale of Patti Lupone’s shouty episode with a picture-taking audience member? Here’s the audio clip (which is on Youtube, which seems sort of ironic, but whatever):
Obviously this begs the question about questionable behavior during live performances, doesn’t it? That “no photography of any kind” rule includes “no recording devices,” so unless the person who captured this is exceptionally quick to recognize a newsworthy moment, he or she was flouting the very same rules as the snapper. Both are wrong, true, and listening in like this does make us culpable in the act, but it’s still pretty fun to hear La Lupone going off on this lout, isn’t it?
Here’s the interesting thing: Take a look at some of the comments from this blog post about the incident on the Gay TV blog.
First of all, wow, these are some vituperative people, some of whom clearly have no understanding of what they were even listening to, but sure are ready to sling some serious smack about a famous person.
Second, boy, do theatre folk get sanctimonious, particularly about their sacred cows (no insult to the lady in question intended).
Third, I just don’t understand the urge to snap photos–or make recordings–of entertainment events. For what? Was that guy going to try to sell crappy cell phone pictures of Lupone on Ebay? Was the recorder planning to make a cd of the show? (Before he realized he could post the show-stopping episode on Youtube, naturally.) Is there really a market for this kind of thing, or are they planning to gaze/listen to their blurry/mostly inaudible contraband in the privacy of their lonely rooms? Whichever, it’s just kind of sad.
Fourth, full disclosure, I detest people who do stuff like this and have been known to personally, publicly and not-very-nicely request them to desist, so I’m pretty much on Patty’s page here (ha).