Don’t mess with Patti Lupone.
As CNN reports, the Broadway legend grabbed an audience member’s smartphone because they were texting during her performance at Shows for Days at Lincoln Center Wednesday night.
The Tony Award-winning actress grabbed the cell phone and kept right on performing without missing a beat, according to spectators.
While that was all well and good, Lupone made a statement the following day:
“We work hard on stage to create a world that is being totally destroyed by a few, rude, self-absorbed and inconsiderate audience members who are controlled by their phones,” she said according to CNN. “They cannot put them down. When a phone goes off or when a LED screen can be seen in the dark it ruins the experience for everyone else — the majority of the audience at that performance and the actors on stage.
“I am so defeated by this issue that I seriously question whether I want to work on stage anymore. Now I’m putting battle gear on over my costume to marshall the audience as well as perform.”
Of course, the Twitter-verse loved this, with words like “badass” being bandied about:
Who doesn't love @pattilupone #postheadline pic.twitter.com/t44DSJAd8u
— Isaac Mizrahi (@IsaacMizrahi) July 10, 2015
According to Gothamist, Lincoln Center has a policy that theatergoers should shut their cell phones off before a performance that is enforced the “best they can.” The phone was returned after the performance.
While Lupone has a reputation for confronting audience members who are disruptive — in 2009, stopping a performance of Gypsy to yell at someone taking pictures — I’m totally with her on this one. Why are you even there if you’re not paying attention? Put your damn phone away.
