HOW A CELL PHONE CAN RUIN THE PLAY
Friday night I attended OPUS at 59E59, where Pimary Stages is in residence. It is the only Off-Broadway theater I can think of located on the Upper East Side. As opposed to other Off-Broadway non-profit companies like the Public or Rattlstick that are downtown, and more like Manhattan Theater Club at City Center, the Primary Stages audience tends to be pretty much middle-aged, clean-cut and upper middle class. Friday night's audience was filled only with the company's subscribers and a handful of critics, as this was a press night.
Primary Stages does not yet rank alongside the more powerful Off-Broadway companies, but it's trying to get there and I'll bet that it's prestige and influence will increase substantially over the coming years. After all, they're situated in one of the best new Off-Broadway theaters. I've always been impressed by how, like James Morgan at the York, the company's managing director or artistic director always introduces the show himself and asks the audience to turn off cellphones.
For the most part, Primary Stages' shows reflect what their upper middle class audience wants to see: they see upper middle class people in familiar situations, usually written by familiar playwrights like AR Gurney or Terrence McNally. Some of their plays are mediocre (ADRIFIT IN MACAO, every one McNally has done there) and one was spectacular (IN THE CONTINUUM, a total break from its usual formula).
OPUS, which starts off the company's new season, is a pretty great play. It's hard for me to go into greater detail till I write my review, but it fits entirely within the company's artistic mainstay, though its by an unknown playwright.
NOW, HERE'S NOW FRIDAY'S NIGHT'S PERFORMANCE WAS DESTROYED. The play is about an hour and 40 minutes long. During the last five minutes, the action - all of which has already been pretty interesting - gets totally gripping. But then - CELL PHONE!!!! - and it keeps ringing. It was from a woman sitting a row behind me. She had to jiggle through her pocketbook to find it. And then two minutes later - CELLPHONE AGAIN!!!!
Let me remind you how small this theater is. And due to the emotionality of the moment, this taking place during the play's climax, you can feel the entire audience's anger and hostility toward this one mere woman.
And I kept thinking: how could this happen? This didn't happen in a crowded Broadway theater filled with midwest tourists who had probably never seen a show before, but subscribers who had probably been a part of this theater company for years before.
So, I thought of a way to prevent people from refusing to turn off their cell phones in the future. Let's begin the play with a video of this exact moment, where the rest of the audience stares at this person in anger and resentment.
