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Alex B Cann Column - 20th Feb 2025

Since the pandemic, there seem to have been a few incidents of bad behaviour at live events. I'm left wondering if audiences have forgotten how to behave, or perhaps they do remember the rules, and simply don't care. That's entirely possible.

Back in April 2023, the Palace Theatre in Manchester cut short a performance of The Bodyguard due to 'disruptive customers', who repeatedly sang over the cast and 'caused a disturbance'. Those attending the show had been asked not to sing, and there were even signs around the venue reminding them, but a determined few refused to stay seated, and decided that people who had paid a lot of money to be there would much rather hear them murdering I Will Always Love You than the professionals on stage. Ridiculous behaviour.

A performance of Macbeth starring David Tennant was delayed for 15 minutes in December 2024 due to a disruptive audience member, who refused to wait until a suitable junction in the performance to return to his seat after going for a bathroom break. One witness told The Times: "He was insisting on getting back to his seat, and then lots of people kicked off about his disturbance." Staff at the theatre raised the house lights, and Tennant was asked to leave the stage until things were resolved. The man eventually left, and the performance continued.

In the United States, Rachel McAdams was reportedly heckled on the opening night of her Broadway debut in the play Mary Jane, and a survey of 1,500 members of a theatre union recently revealed that bad audience behaviour is on the rise, with many having directly witnessed or experienced it for themselves.

Dr Kirsty Sedgman from Bristol University told The Guardian: "It's a really emotive subject, especially after the pandemic because everyone wants to be together, but they have very different ideas about what that should mean. We're seeing a tension between people who want to have a fun night out, drink a lot and be rowdy, and those who crave that sense of quiet togetherness that theatre director Peter Brook calls 'the good kind of silence'".

The latest drama involves a Peter Kay gig at Manchester's AO Arena, when the comedian asked Keith on security to remove a man who was repeatedly shouting his Phoenix Nights catchphrase 'garlic bread', before also asking them to evict a woman who kept calling his name. The latter says she was upset to be compared to Emmerdale star Lisa Riley during the exchange, which paused the show for several minutes in the same way as the David Tennant Macbeth incident.

For his part, Peter Kay said they had been "disrupting from the very start" and he "did my best to address the situation and made light of it, as any comedian would, but unfortunately their interruptions continued". If you'll allow me a bit of shameless namedropping, I was lucky enough to meet Peter Kay in the days of "That Peter Kay Thing", when he was pretty new to the comedy scene. I was DJing a wedding in Wakefield, and he spent a fair bit of time chatting to me about his love of 80s music. He was friendly, down to earth, and really nice!

Fast forward to now, and I'm afraid my sympathy with those evicted audience members is very limited. If I'd paid a lot of money to be at that show, I've not shelled out my hard earned pennies to hear someone who likes the sound of their own voice bellowing a comedian's catchphrases or trying to be the star of the show. If you can't keep quiet, stay at home in your oneside and watch the DVD with a takeaway pizza.

I'm not saying gigs should be quiet to the point of being able to hear a pin drop, but have some respect for those who are on stage performing. Moreover, hospitality staff work extremely hard, often for pretty underwhelming wages, and too many people forget their manners when dealing with them. I sound a bit puritanical saying this perhaps, but is there a case for limiting the sale of alcohol? I have a bit of sympathy with calls for a two drink limit for people who board flights, so perhaps the same rule could apply in the case of live events?

To be honest, we wouldn't need any such stipulations if people just remembered how to behave, and had a bit of consideration for others. Is that too much to hope for?

More from Alex Cann's Weekly Blog

  • Alex B Cann Column - 26th March 2025

    Last weekend marked five years since the beginning of the first Covid lockdown, announced by gold wallpaper enthusiast Boris Johnson on the evening of 23rd March 2020. In a lot of ways, the days of the 'rule of six' when meeting outside, drones patrolling the Derbyshire countryside in search of walkers contravening the rules, and suitcases of booze being wheeled into Downing Street seem like a lifetime ago. As for the discussion about whether scotch eggs constitute a main meal and that Barnard Castle eye test, the pandemic frequently went from the sublime to the ridiculous.

  • Alex Cann Column - 20th March 2025

    With the cost of a first-class stamp set to rise to £1.70 in April, the sixth increase in the last three years. I'd suggest buying a book of stamps at the current price and stashing them away for a rainy day. Just call me Martin Lewis and be done with it.

  • Alex B Cann Column - 13th March 2025

    The money app Plum has published a list of questions most likely to elicit a negative response at a dinner party. Even though I am fairly unlikely to plan any such occasions any time soon, I thought it might be useful to take you through the list, to spare you any potential blushes, should the Come Dine With Me cameras be filming at your place. Incidentally, why do so many contestants on that show do steak as a main course? I guess it's seemingly straightforward to cook, yet everyone has very particular preferences about how well (or otherwise) it's done, so the potential for mishaps is great.

  • Alex Cann's weekly blog - 9th January

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  • Alex's Weekly Blog - 31st October

    Back in March, celebrity chef Hugh Fearnley -Whittingstall clashed with the health secretary at the time, Victoria Atkins, over what he claimed was the government's failure to tackle the obesity crisis. Measures such as limits on special offers and banning junk food adverts before 9pm were kicked into the long grass until at least October 2025. Separately, reports have suggested that the pandemic made obesity rates significantly worse among children, as unhealthy eating habits and a lack of exercise became the norm.

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