Read Front of House: Observations from a Decade on the Aisle for Free Online

the Royale Theatre, the poor conduct of students in attendance completely destroyed a few performances. We had large numbers of high schoolers at every matinee, and they behaved abominably. At one show, the kids were so raucous during Charles Dutton’s dramatic monologue that he refused to come out at curtain call.
    The production staff blamed us, even though we’d done everything possible to calm the kids down. Shortly thereafter, the stage manager gathered us for a meeting in the back of the orchestra. We attended reluctantly; everyone was annoyed and indignant about being blamed for the melee. We didn’t like it when audience members interfered with the show any more than the backstage contingent did.
    Truthfully, we’d done all we could. We’d called security and the house manager, because the situation had been well above our heads. The ushers hadn’t had any clout with those students; they’d known we could neither fail them nor call their parents. Their teachers hadn’t backed us up. Thus, the kids hadn’t felt any compunction to listen to a single word we said to them. In addition, we had been severely outnumbered. When there were about ten of us versus several hundred kids, who did they think was going to win?
    During the show, there was no way we could stop so many kids from talking. When one or two students were noisy, standing next to them or quietly asking them to stop sometimes solved the problem, if they respected the ushers enough to listen and comply. If a handful of kids were antsy, talking to their teachers at intermission sometimes helped, but only if they were cooperative and willing to take responsibility for their students’ conduct. When an entire section was out of control, though, our attempts to intervene always proved futile. The only effective recourse we had was to let security and the house manager know about it. Even security’s options were limited; most of the time they had to wait until intermission to kick the group out. Removing a hundred angry kids during the performance could be far more disruptive than letting them stay, so it usually only happened if things had truly gone nuclear.
    My colleague Jamie slumped indolently against the standing room wall as we listened to the stage manager’s lecture.
    “You need to be listening,” she admonished us.
    “I am listening,” said Jamie.
    “Your body language says otherwise,” the stage manager retorted.
    “What do you want us to do, exactly?” someone asked.
    The question seemed to catch the stage manager off guard. “Well,” she stammered, “Keep doing what you’re doing…I guess.” She was lecturing us because we were an easy target, but she didn’t even know what she expected us to do to stop the problem. The rest of the discussion was much more proactive and respectful on both sides.
    At the next matinee the kids were on their best behavior. Why? The teachers stepped up. The students were brought to us in manageable groups, and they’d apparently really been warned about behaving during the performance. There were many more adult chaperones accompanying them, as well. In addition, we had extra security. Nobody disrupted the monologue, the stage managers were pleased, our relationship with the backstage contingent improved greatly, and the blame game stopped.
    The school groups are still going to Phantom and other shows in force. Les Misérables is back; I’m sure there are teenagers sleeping and texting through “On My Own” even as I write this.

Latecomers

    “I’ll move if someone comes in.”
    Along with “we’re all together,” this is a phrase that ushers hate to hear. I know I did when I was working. It generally comes from a person who has hopped from their reserved seat to a vacant one and is resisting returning to their original place.
    At many shows, audience members try to sneak into other seats as soon as the lights go down; we see their hunched-over forms scurrying down the stairs and aisles