So by now I think everyone with an internet connection and a pulse has seen the video of Hugh Jackman calling out a theatre patron for having his cell phone on and not answering it during a preview performance of "A Steady Rain", starring Jackman and Daniel Craig. If not, try this link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HopA_Oh46M&feature=player_embedded. Or just go to youtube and look up Jackman and cell phone or something like that. The upshot of it is, they were attempting to do a play, and some yokel didn't turn off his cell phone, and when it started to ring, apparently decided that answering it was far ruder than letting it continue to ring over and over again. When i first saw this video, I scrolled down and read the comments underneath it to see what the general population of the internet felt about this, since I knew what all the actors I knew would feel about it (That, incidentally, is YAY!!!!) Across the board, the regular folks (if you can count people who comment online about videos as regular) felt that the actors were justified. But there were actually people who attempted to defend the moron in the audience and castigate the actors for not being "professional" enough to ignore the phone. Even some publications were accusing jackman of a "hissy fit". Let me take these statements in reverse order. What Jackman and Craig did was not a hissy fit. You want a hissy fit, rewind to the great Christian Bale bawl-out. THAT'S a hissy fit. These two guys didn't drop character, did not rip the guy a new one, and at no time insulted or said anything derogatory about the person at all. From what I can hear on the video, they didn't even swear. They asked him repeatedly to answer the phone, and waited until such time as he actually did before continuing on with the show. They didn't say, "Hey, dumbass, I know that you're too much of a mental incompetent to have remembered that you were told at the beginning of this show to turn off your cell phone, but now that it's actually ringing and disturbing everyone around you, do you think you might have enough intellect to realize you should either turn it off or answer it? I mean, don't let us disturb you, but just for shits and giggles, do you think you could act like a considerate human being and not the walking pile of stupid you happen to be?" THAT would also qualify as a hissy fit. Consider yourself schooled, fourth estate.
As to the other statements which, though of varying levels of clarity, conciseness, and correct punctuation, boiled down to saying the big bad movie stars should shut up, suck it up, and just do their show while leaving the poor guy alone because heck, he might have been a doctor or someone important, all I can say is.....NO! No to the concept that anyone should be allowed to disrupt a production like that. To those who claim he may have a been a doctor, I say, I doubt it, since he let that damn thing ring a looooooooooooong time, so even if he were a doctor, that particular call couldn't have been that important. And a doctor can feel a phone on vibrate going off in his pants. I also say NO to the people who think that a actor should suck it up and soldier through an idiot with a cell phone the same way they soldier on through coughing, sneezing, or any other disturbance. On the face of it, that is a compelling argument. Actors in live theatre do have to deal with certain distractions as a part of the genre. But the difference between someone coughing or sneezing and someone letting their cell phone ring is one of control. It's hard to control a cough or a sneeze. It is not at all difficult to control whether your cell phone is audible. That's why the announcements tell you not to take flash pictures and to turn off your cell phones instead of telling you you aren't allowed to cough or sneeze during the performance.
And the fact that people are attempting to excuse what this guy did brings me to why I really am happy that Jackman and Craig did this. It's a question of respect. And not just respect for the actor, though that is primarily where I see it from. It's respect for the people around you who have also paid their money to see this, and have somehow managed to comply with the requests and the rules. Yet you, Mr. "I can't turn off my cell phone" feel you are not bound by these rules and requests. What, you're that special? I guarantee you, you're not. You might be short-bus, wear a helmet so you don't hurt yourself when you bang your head against the window, my mommy says I'm special special, but you aren't special enough to be allowed to flout the rules the rest of us manage to abide by. But I want to speak, for a moment (okay, several) about the lack of respect this shows for the two men onstage. As a professional actor, I can tell you firsthand that my career gets (to quote Mr Dangerfield) no respect at all. Sure, if an actor becomes big and famous, we idolize them, but what he does for a living isn't respected. The success and the things that brings with it--THAT gets respect, but not the career itself. Because if it did, then the Tonys would be as big as the Oscars. Regional theatres would be as packed as movie houses even if Wolverine and James Bond weren't playing there. Acting is a career that everyone thinks they can do. Tell people at a party what you do for a living and you get, "Oh yeah, I did some acting in high school/college." "That must be fun." "I thought about doing that, but y'know, I had to get a job." What amazes me is that when you get right down to it, we do the one thing that, while everyone thinks that if they appeared onstage at any time in their life they are an actor, scares the living hell out of people. We get up in front of people and talk. ANd that always ranks as the scariest thing anyone can think of. It outranks death. Public speaking is more terrifying than dying to people. And we do it every day. Actors also live an incredibly unstable life, with employment hard to come by and short-term even when it is present. Most people would not be able to handle the level of insecurity that is attached to this career choice. And few if any truly can understand the amount of energy and effort that goes into a performance. It's just "playing" to most people. We in this country (speaking generally) have little regard for the arts. But then, let's face it, we have little regard for culture of any kind that isn't growing in a petri dish (and even that culture some of us are unsure of--I mean, that might be some of that science stuff that keeps messin' things up. I mean hell, you start growing fungus in a dish, the next thing you know the homos are gettin' married and evolution is being taught in schools!)
THis was brought home to me tonight while I was at rehearsal for "Murder In Green Meadows". The space we rehearse in also is utilized by a drama instruction program for kids, and their class was letting out as we were arriving. And I saw all these kids running around practicing scenes, and their parents showing up and beaming at the kids, proud smiles glowing. And I realized that the issue at hand was that, in this country at least, (I can't speak for others since I've only lived and worked in this one) acting is something we all think is so cute for kids to do; we oooh and aaaah and take pictures of our kids in the school play and talk about how wonderful they are and how great they looked and what talent they all have. But at a certain age, we expect them to stop it, or to relegate it to the back burner in favor of something more successful, more stable, more respectable. We don't respect what actors do, because as far as we can see, it's what our kids do. And why should we respect grown men doing something that little Janie can do at age 6? Now, I'm not saying my job is as important as a brain surgeon, or a policeman or fireman. It's not. But if you really stop and think about it, what do you think your life would be like without the arts in it? And I don't just mean fine art hanging in a museum somewhere. I mean, actors and musicians and painters and comedians and jugglers and singers and even (god help us all) mimes. Think about what your day would be like if all that went away. Think about what kind of country this would be if what seems to be happening in our schools and our communities actually does happen and arts funding is cut so low that hardly anything can survive. Think about how many hours of your day are actually filled with the arts; of your children's day. Think about exactly what it takes to put together something just to entertain you, to lighten your mood and to brighten your day. Think about the amount of work it takes to make you laugh for a half hour on television. Or to move you emotionally in a movie or a play. Think about how you feel when you see that movie or listen to that music or see that sculpture or play. Think about that, and turn your damn cell phone off.
