A Broadway Show Is Not a Meet and Greet With Stars From ‘The Pitt’!
It seems like HBO’s The Pitt, the prestige medical drama from ER star Noah Wyle, is always in the news. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad. In the case of this particular instance, it’s definitely not great, and it highlights so much of what is wrong with bad fandom etiquette today.
Isa Briones, who plays Dr. Trinity Santos on the show, recently made her Broadway debut in the Bobby Darin musical Just in Time as Connie Francis. Taking over the role from Sarah Hyland, she starred opposite Glee star Matthew Morrison and will now perform alongside Jeremy Jordan (Smash, Hazbin Hotel).
A Broadway debut is a huge achievement, and Briones has been working hard to nail it. However, some of The Pitt fans continue to remind the world why they have given the fandom as a whole a bad name. Recently, Briones took to Instagram to remind theatergoers that they should not, in fact, be talking to performers unless asked to.
“do not talk to the performers while they are performing on stage (unless you have been asked to). and don’t talk to me on stage and call me Dr. Santos. I’m not Dr. Santos. I’m not even Connie Francis. I am Isa Briones, one of the actors in the show you have paid to enjoy. So watch it respectfully. You are not a kid at disneyland. You are an adult man at a Broadway show. Act like it,” she said in an Instagram story.
This shouldn’t be news or a PSA, but it seems like this is the world we currently live in. The story quickly took off on X, with a user posting a screenshot and saying, “Has everyone just collectively lost their minds? Did COVID do this? And brain drain? And illiteracy?”
“Look at how often we see people on their phones at the movies. Theater etiquette is being lost because there is a desire to treat it as a concert and not a whole and entire thing you don’t engage with unless prompted,” another user commented.
We need to undo bad habits before it’s too late
Social media, alongside COVID, have irreparably damaged theater culture, both with movies and live performances. The rise of platforms like Instagram have made fans feel far too comfortable with stars, and the rising public toxicity of fandoms have made them feel like they are entitled to say and do whatever they want because it’s their opinion.
Theater etiquette itself is becoming increasingly endangered. Cell phones go off, people talk to each other and talk to the performers like the show is asking for audience participation. That is not what theater is about! We need to respect the actors onstage and the work that they are putting in eight times a week.
So, please. Maybe don’t do this? Go be weird at home.
(Featured image: Warrick Page/HBOMAX)
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