Going once, going twice!

Savoynet has been humming lately with stories about distractions from the audience (mobile phones, loud candies, chatty audience members), but this story from Stuart really caught my eye:

Last year I directed Oklahoma! The auction scene is tricky and we rehearsed and rehearsed it to get the bids and responses exactly right - "Two bits, four bits... Come on, isn't anyone gonna give me five bits....." etc. On the second night someone in the audience joined in and began bidding and outbidding the actors! How the cast kept going, I don't know, but it caused a bit of a flap!

Whether the audience member had just got completely involved and lost himself, was suffering from confusion and thought he was at a real auction, or was just plain malvolent and hoping to cause chaos, I never did find out!

Stuart

www.bostonoperatic.org.uk