Audience: The Good, Bad and Ugly

The question of audience is a puzzling one – it is the Professor Moriarty to my Sherlock Holmes. Just when you think you have a grasp of what you think an audience is or should be, the definition escapes and you’re back to square one.

When I am part of a creative team presenting a performance, a good audience is one that sits still, laughs and cries in all the right places, at most is interested and at least feigns interest and is diligent in turning off their mobile phones. The audience applause in these circumstances is like going home with a pat on the back. Good job. Well done. This audience is good on the nerves but by the same token is bad on the soul, allowing all involved to sigh and say “Phew, we got away with it for one more night”. Crucially, it lacks true response. Unless of course it was just a jolly nice play. But who wants to settle for ‘jolly nice’? Not I.

The confusing aspect of audience for me is that my creative-self is forever at odds with my audience-self. The creative part of me often wants an audience that just puts up and shuts up with whatever I dish out to them as a means of bolstering my own self-worth: “I am good”. This is a quality that as an audience member I would never put up with.

At times I have found myself in the ugliest of audiences whose inane expressions (my own included) resemble those watching a seal balance a ball on its nose, much to the delight of the ringmaster who, now to think of it, bears an uncanny resemblance to Jeremy Kyle. The lesson is this: People will watch any old crap and we know it. This attitude from creator and audience alike should not be encouraged as it makes us lazy. The day you go to a performance and this is the best you can hope for is the day we all become lemmings and make Mariah Carey god.

I have, so far, come to the conclusion that the greatest of audiences look bad on the surface. A superficially discontented audience can be a sign of many things and all of them beneficial. Fidgety and talkative can denote both bored and engaged audience members but either reaction calls upon the other party to up their game. Quite simply, the producers must try harder or the audience is required to work harder. On the surface we can be fooled into thinking the prognosis isn’t good but we are wrong. Having to constantly work at something provides the impetus to make and value something of true worth, which in my mind, is the only thing worth having anyway. In short, to challenge ourselves and allow ourselves to be challenged is the epitome of artistic integrity from whichever side of the stage we are looking.

I will now take my bow and thank you for reading. Let the grumbles pursue.