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Theater goer uses his phone during play, gets called out by Jesse Tyler Furgeson, then brags about it on Twitter
- Thread starter Dalek
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Hahahahahahaha oh you're serious? Damn! Gonna write your username down in case I'm in need of some crazy analogies for a comedy bit, because holy hell you're good!
Ok so I'm gonna ignore the terrible second part of whatever point you're trying to make because wow, using far-fetched hypotheticals to make a point is somewhat laughable, actually, and now that we're past that, most of the times when those "uncontrollable" moments due to lack of self-control happen, are those moments in which plenty of people in the theater are actually doing them, so it's more of a collective thing. And man, reaction videos are a thing, if people weren't interested in those there wouldn't be a market on YT for it. For fuck's sake we had a controversy not many years ago when a channel wanted to trademark the React brand and it was huge. I'll leave it at that because, luckily, I'm a very social person and enjoy those spurts of emotion and hype when some moments during a film call for it. Avengers, Dragon Ball and even some parts of John Wick 3 were heightened by said reactions. Maybe what you're referring to are those people who randomly yell or keep calling stuff out when they shouldn't and are actually very annoying (especially those who keep talking to their friends in a somewhat loud voice so the rest can hear them and for some reason be amazed at their knowledge, when in fact people are annoyed), so I miiiiiight give you the benefit of the doubt for that, but I don't think you're referring to those people so I don't know.
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Late, but that play Amanda Seyfried was in was fantastic.
Keep your phone in your pocket during live performances. Come on.
Keep your phone in your pocket during live performances. Come on.
Lol, I knew people would jump on you for this post. I for one wholeheartedly agree with you.
Fuck idiots that pull their phones out in any kind of theater when a show/movie is happening. Swear to god people have brain damage where they have to check Twitter every 10 minutes.
I can't imagine embarrassing myself as badly as you just did with this post.
Live people vs a literal screen are completely different. It's fine for me to masturbate to chris hemsworth but that doesnt mean I can walk up to him on the red carpet and start jerking it.
You must live an incredibly banal life if my post was the height of embarrassment that your imagination could conjure.
There's a difference. In the theatre people are acting on stage. At best as an audience people should try not to disrupt their acting and the play.
In a cinema well, you're watching a recording.
In a cinema well, you're watching a recording.
How the hell is that even remotely the same thing?
A live performance being interrupted can mess up the performance.
A reaction to what's happening in the performance is completely different from being on your phone. One implies investment into the performance, the other doesn't.
One of my best movie-going experiences was during the last Harry Potter film when Neville killed the snake, because the crowd went absolutely nuts. It was great.
We're not interrupting the actors in a movie theater, o' cultured one.
And it's collectively something that takes me out of the movie I'm trying to enjoy. The choice to join in is yours to make, but that doesn't mean I am obligated to appreciate it the same way you do.
Yeah, and I'm not required to watch those videos if I don't want to, whereas I'm oddly being expected to basically enjoy a live reaction video when I'm there to watch the movie, not pay attention to its audience. Not sure how you think that this is relevant to the point you're trying to make.
There's a reason that E3 presentations tend to play the trailers in the presentation for the audience at home without any cheering from the audience mid-trailer, despite those trailers being purely intended to generate hype anyways.
That's a personal opinion. One I don't share but am somehow expected to agree with.
I consider it all equally to be a distraction that takes me out of the experience I paid to enjoy. I've been thankful that many of the movies I go to don't have this happen, including blockbusters that people argue are designed to illicit such responses, but I have been in a movie theatre when it's happened and my experience was lesser for it. I find it happens much less in the fancy adult-only theatres that serves liquor and food, so when I go to the theatre, I pay extra for the reduced likelihood of a distraction or disruption to my enjoyment of the film.
This is not to say I don't have emotional reactions to movies, just that I don't share them with the rest of the audience.
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As an audience member I'd rather have someone looking at their phone quietly than making noise. Both are obnoxious.
Cheering or clapping during a moment meant to elicit that reaction is engaging with the movie. Browsing on your phone is not engaging with it.
As far as it being generational, in my experience, old people are the absolute worst about phones in movie theaters
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Just assuming everyone else around you wants your commentary track.
We're not doing a two hour podcast, we're occasionally feeling emotions, like the fimmakers wanted us to. Do you get bothered when the people in front of you on a roller coaster put their arms up? Jesus.
Or just wait, I don't know, two days after the MCU film comes out.
This new argument of 'the directors designed this moment/beat for clapping and cheering' is ridiculous. They designed the moments to elicit joy or excitement. Sitting in on a screening, directors even love audiences clapping because they are rewarded with the knowledge that those moments did in fact elicit joy and/or excitement.
But those moments being designed to elicit joy or excitement is not the same as them being designed to provoke clapping or whooping. Those actions are voluntary actions that are completely controllable unless you literally have no self control. Clapping and whooping is not the same as laughing, gasping, crying etc because those are voluntary actions. When you choose to clap or holler at the screen, you're telling your fellow paying patron that only your experience is important and that your ridiculous need to express yourself is more important than their paid experience that you're interrupting.
Believe it or not, people civilly sitting quietly in their seats during setpieces doesn't mean they're not excited during the on-sceeen antics or that they're somehow a killjoy. It means they have self control.
Saying 'those moments are design to elicit clapping and cheers' makes the case that it's an involuntary moment like some raunchy titillation would somehow make it impossible to keep your dick in your pants to your fellow patron's chagrin. It's not appropriate, it's inconsiderate and if you can't control yourself in a movie theatre, you shouldn't be there.
I'll say it again, if you clap and whoop in a cinema, you have zero right to complain about babies involuntarily expressing themselves in theatres. Because they're you.
I do. You wanna whoop it up at a midnight showing among other fans? Go for it. I've been there and enjoy it. Clap after the movie is over? Do it until your heart's content, shit is over. Just understand that it can cross over into boorish, often drunken behavior real quick outside of certain situations and movies. People aren't bumps on a log for being annoyed by it. For every person considerate of others or measured in their behavior, there's a dozen that take it too far and that's why we have PSAs during the previews and ushers to kick people out. Most everybody that feels this way had some asshole completely suck them out of a movie with their behavior. It doesn't come from a place of 'no fun allowed.' Some people just want to chill and not have some dipshit reacting to every little thing on the screen.
A comedy is meant to provoke laughter. Seeing one in a packed house is part of the experience. Same thing with horror movies. There's a time and place for everything, most people don't want to hear you fanboy out on a weeknight well after opening weekend in a half-empty showing. It's not that hard to feel out. It just takes a small amount of consideration for others.
Movies are different. You're not disturbing the flow of the actors by being a distraction.
The stuff that some people pull from their ass on this forum is hilarious. We all know what the intent behind that post was. And anyone here that took that bait should know better.
Audience reactions are a thing. Directors talk about this and sometimes allowing time for a joke to set in because they expect reactions.
A baby uncontrollably crying and random interferences throughout a film aren't the fucking same as an audience being engaged with a movie. And this idea that people are supposed to be emotionless husks during movie moments made to get audiences to react is laughable.
I saw QT's film tonight and was far more distracted by the people loudly whispering behind me than the audience and myself included laughing and reacting to certain scenes in the film.
As far as the kid in the tweets go, phone usage is a no no as far as unspoken rules go. Just wants attention like any social media clout chaser.
If you didn't start wildly running up and down the aisles shrieking when Yoda pulled out his lightsaber, I just feel sorry for you.
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Be sure to also shake the strangers around you in the theater while watching their expressions to make sure they're enjoying the set piece as much as you are.
It absolutely is not. A baby is not reacting to appropriate cues and understands that a moment is over and should return to active listening. They randomly and wildly make continuous noise and can ruin actively quiet or emotional scenes. No one was making a fucking peep during the (insert spoiler here) at the end of Endgame, as it should be.
Certainly there are jackasses who do the same, I'm not debating that. But the vast majority of people cheering are cheering at appropriate moments when the emotion of the film calls for it, and quickly return to silence afterward.
Sculli can have whatever opinions he wants, but most of us are fine with reasonable reactions at a launch or near-launch film.
Do people also clap and cheer when watching movies at home, or is it purely a compulsion that suffer in a cinema?
From classical antiquity all the way through to the modern era, in both the traditions of the West and the East, theatre audiences have long been rambunctious, outspoken, and participatory, talking back to the actors, reacting loudly to key emotional beats, and even demanding better performances when unsatisfied. The practice of respecting the performance through silence is a relatively recent phenomenon.
All of this to say: none of y'all would survive a Shakespearean-era play.
All of this to say: none of y'all would survive a Shakespearean-era play.
Well, also because theater houses back then had a disturbing tendency to catch fire and burn down, killing everyone inside. I believe it happened to Shakespeare's first theater.
Haha you know what, I hadn't even thought of that, but it certainly puts a different spin on the remark.
So now just because I don't loudly vocalize my emotional reactions, I'm an "emotionless husk"? That's quite a reach.
Again, if I'm to be expected to be OK with the audience knowingly pulling me out of the movie I paid to see, all that tells me is that some patrons would rather push people like myself out of the movie theatres altogether. Is that the takeaway here, that now every movie is like Rocky Horror where audience participation is an accepted part of the presentation, like it or not? That you'd rather I stayed home and waited for a movie to hit Netflix because I'm not interested or willing to join in on the "fun"? If so, so be it, I'd clearly choose not to participate if that is truly the universally accepted expectation, as would many other people. Though I doubt those directors who everyone says intend for you to loudly proclaim your emotional reactions to certain scenes (and seriously, citation needed) would be terribly happy about losing a chunk of box office revenue so you can continue to cheer and clap.
Were they to exist in that era, wouldn't using a cell phone during a performance be considered an act of derision against a performance for being uninteresting in and of itself?
OK? How does that make it OK? Not everyone participates in the loudness. In fact, it generally enables to shout randomly as loud as they can whenever anything of interest happens. Do you think everyone agreed to sit and hear the movie AND you? Lotta folks need to be self aware as to how obnoxious your cheering is especially when we're sitting next to you.
Sure, but then derision towards a performance was extremely common. The Greeks threw stones at actors they didn't like, and in classical China audiences sometimes put a stop to performances entirely.
In the sense of being unengaged with the performance, well, that too was also common. For a long time the theatre was a social space, and people would just chit-chat while Hamlet was dying. In the early modern period, when theatre became a luxury for the upper classes, and therefore a signifier of status, audience members would attend with the express purpose of being seen at the venue and mingling with the aristocracy. So this kind of egoism isn't new at all.
You are expecting people to not react, to things, sometimes designed to get a reaction out of them. This is what you are demanding out of them. You paid for your ticket and so did they, did you pay more or am I missing something? Lol.
However you decide to act is up to you-- I don't judge a smile, scowl, or a straight face. I didn't call you an emotionaless husk for not "joining in", just read your description of your ideal audience and I felt that fitted your description. Don't act like you all aren't coming in here and patting yourselves on the back for not reacting and perceiving that as some heightened self control or awareness. Some people just want to surrender themselves in the moment and enjoy a movie. Why is that being conflated with legitimately obnoxious behavior, crying babies, and cell phones?
There is literally a scene in QT's new movie with a character watching a movie and having a good time with the audience who is reacting to the movie. It's part of the experience for some. Enjoy it anyway you like. No one is coming after you, but I would ask you to rethink what you're demanding out of people. I highly doubt that people that laugh at a scene in a film fishing for a reaction are trying to intentionally ruin your experience and think to themselves "wow, that person not laughing is an expert when it comes to self control!" I don't like when people brush up on my seat on the way to the restroom or get up to go, but I'm not going to tell them pee in a cup or hold it...
Edit: BO revenue, what? Some of the largest movies year to year are the ones full of people reacting. The rise of streaming and the movie experience being more and more accessible at home has a lot more to do with any shift in BO numbers than people cheering during a movie. Of course, there are levels to it and that can be turned up to obnoxious levels.
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Yeah I find people's addiction to their phones incredibly frustrating. While I'm sure the younger generation is most at fault, I've seen plenty of people in their 30's do it. I have some friends who, while not completely jerks about it, tend to pay too much attention to their phones. My closest friend will still check whatever notifications he gets during a movie, and while he tries to be discreet and generally it's just 2-3 seconds of looking, it still drives me nuts. At least none of my friends are complete jerks like the person in the OP.
