posted on September 26, 2001 12:33:31 AM
For years I have suffered under a curse.
I have never...NEVER...gone to a film or play without having someone or several someones sitting near me who have the dread disease TV-itis.
The main symptoms of TV-itis include the delusion that they are sitting in their own living rooms watching television coupled with an inability to keep their mouths shut. Saying "shhh" doesn't shut them up. Dirty looks don't shut them up. Telling them, quietly, to shut-up doesn't work. Going a bit berserk & threatening them sometimes works--for a few minutes, anyway, for example: I remember when The Addam's Family opened. The people sitting on the other side of my date kept saying (& not in whispers) is that Christopher Lloyd? I don't know, maybe it's Christopher Lloyd. Naw, it can't be him. Wait, you could be right...no, I don't know. Do you really think it might be Christopher Lloyd? I finally leaned across my date & screamed "Yes, it's Christopher Lloyd! Now shut up!!!" They did for a moment, then for the rest of the film whenever one of them started talking, one of the others would hiss shut up! She'll yell again!
This week a friend and I went to see the play Kiss Me Kate. Our seats were perfect--first row center of the mezzanine. Tickets cost $70 each. We'd waited months to see this play. Our anticipation was high--both of us love this play. The lights went down. The orchestra struck the opening notes. The curtain went up.
And the people to the left of us began to talk. The people to the right of us talked.
The people behind us talked. Actually, the man to the right of me, in addition to holding conversations, also felt the need to repeat everything that was happening on the stage.
I developed a tick under my right eye.
And then...
The woman directly behind me *and* the woman sitting on the other side of the man on my right who kept repeating what was happening on the stage, kept...kept...kept breaking into song! #$%&!@#@! *Every* time a new song started in the play (& in a musical this is every few minutes)...these women felt the obligation to start singing along with the cast!!!
My blood pressure rose. My hands curled into claws. Homicidal rage began to rise within me.
Having a word with these people during intermission apparently had no effect, as it all continued in the second half. And then, to my utter disbelief, in the last 30 minutes of the play the man sitting behind us had his watch alarm go off. Twice!!
I am not making this up! TV-itis has been getting worse over the years. People seem to see nothing wrong with holding conversations, taking phone calls, calling to friends, getting up for food 2-3 times in two hours (just how much food do they need, anyway?!?), letting their small babies cry, etc. etc. etc. in a movie theatre or at a play.
Frankly, one of these days I probably will do bodily harm to one of these SOBs. And it will be justifiable homicide.
posted on September 26, 2001 01:13:13 AM
On topic, while I feel like confessing. I admit that I can not stand people. Though I truely truely wish to be tolerant, I literally CREEP OUT in a crowd. FREAK.
Last night someone literally had to drag me to a FREE concert. It was a "grown-up" crowd even, a family oriented thing. In my seat, I was fine...but the concession stand...and the public restroom....OH MY GOSH. It was HORRIBLE.
I don't go to the mall. I will drive 40 miles to go to a store with no line. I would rather DIE than go to a baby shower or wait in a waiting room. We are "putting out feelers" for real estate and I begin every request with THERE MUST NOT BE ANY HOUSE WITHIN SIGHT OF THIS PROPERTY.
And it's not EVERY situation, sometimes I am ok...it's a very selective revulsion.
I know it's not just me, because I know other people who are like this too. Or is it just me...and them?
Oh praise God for the internet so I don't have to see you all "real"! I wouldn't come.
T
posted on September 26, 2001 01:27:16 AMThe woman directly behind me *and* the woman sitting on the other side of the man on my right who kept repeating what was happening on the stage, kept...kept...kept breaking into song! #$%&!@#@! *Every* time a new song started in the play (& in a musical this is every few minutes)...these women felt the obligation to start singing along with the cast!!!
You read my mind -- the episode when George adopts his "opposite" philosophy and stands up in the theater and loudly reads two obnoxious moviegoers the riot act, even threatening to take them both outside and let them have it if they don't shut up.
posted on September 26, 2001 02:29:45 AM
It's wicked to mock the afflicted.
This has been happening to me for years! I remember one time I promised a friend's son I would take him to any movie he wanted to see. He chose a Van Damme movie--can't remember the title, it was the one involving an ice hockey championship & an assassination plot. I know, I know, but I'd made a promise & had to keep it. The movie started and weird sounds began to come from behind me. Every single time there was a punch, kick, strike or gun shot (which are quite numerous in a Van Damme movie, I can tell you) in the film, the guy sitting behind us would say "yes!" or "Oh, god!' or "AAAH!" "Ooooh! and so on. I finally turned around to check where his hands were because it really sounded like he was masturbating back there. He wasn't, just excited by the action in the film, I guess. It was a logical assumption on my part considering what happened to me at a Marilyn Monroe double feature once, involving the man sitting next to me.
And I can no longer eat peanut butter or even stand the smell of it after an incident at a revival movie house years ago.
It's really weird. So far I have refrained from outright violence due to a desire for continued freedom, but someday... The only time I have physically acted out was the time at a late night showing when the guy behind me fell asleep and began to snore. Loudly. Since he'd coveniently dozed of with his head thrown back & his mouth wide open (the better to accomodate his moose-like snoring, one presumes), I & the friend I was with took turns throwing popcorn kernels into the gaping aperture. He suddenly awoke and rained threats down upon us as the film ended and the audience filed out of the theatre.
Edited cuz I can't spell...
[ edited by bunnicula on Sep 26, 2001 02:30 AM ]
[ edited by bunnicula on Sep 26, 2001 02:37 AM ]
posted on September 26, 2001 02:56:37 AM
After a good ten years between going to the movies, I finally broke down and took my oldest child to see a movie a few years ago.
Within two minutes, I remembered just why I hated going so much....the constant talking (and not in hushed tones), drinks being spilled on me by people attempting to sit down, people kicking your seat, and my personal favorite, the idiot that's already seen the movie and loudly tells the whole audience what's about to happen. It'll be at least 20 years before I go again.
Argh
posted on September 26, 2001 02:58:30 AM
That is why I have mourned the passing of the duel. When you had the right to call out a particularly obnoxious person to cleanse society of them it made people by all accounts more aware of keeping their behavior polite.
If we were allowed to do so I can assure you there are three different people I would be happy to put a ball between their eyes. Would I survive? It would be interesting to find out. One of them is a pretty good shot but a coward. When people did duel often both died.
posted on September 26, 2001 06:35:03 AM
Wow, I don't know where you all are goin' to the movies, but around here the only shows that are noisy are the kiddies matinees and even in those there are usually parents trying to shhhh the kids. Haven't been annoyed at a theater in years!
jt, I'm sure there must be folks who share your feelings. Personally, since I spend so much time in my "computer world" I welcome the opportunity to co-exist with real live people. Did you always feel this way or has this been a result of your leaving your jobs & homeschooling the children? I do know that when I first left my job in the corporate America jungle, I could have gone weeks, perhaps months without seeing anyone, and would have been perfectly content. But thanks to a few persistant friends, I was dragged back into socialization, and enjoy the opportunity to meet new folks & perhaps share a chuckle or a kind deed.
posted on September 26, 2001 08:43:20 AM
bunnicula, I could feel my blood pressure rise just from reading your post. It's bad around here also. I seldom go to the movies anymore. If I do, I'll go to a weekday matinee just because there won't be many people there and I can sit far away from others.
Even when I go to outdoor concerts at Wolftrap, I feel I must choose wisely. The last time I went to the jazz festival there, the women in front of me gabbed throughout the concert. Now I choose something like the Gipsy Kings to hear - they're loud and I can expect everyone to be dancing in the aisles.
posted on September 26, 2001 09:19:58 AM
Bunnicula, I don't know where you live, but if it's near Virginia I'd like to offer you the services of my sister, who is a master at getting people to be quiet at the movies. She has created a new art form out of delivering withering glares at these rude people.
However, I'm surprised that you've never tried what she does on those rare occasions when the glare doesn't work: she goes straight to the theater manager, who then walks down the aisle and stands next to the offenders for a few minutes. All but the most brazen people stop talking at that point. And if they don't, they are asked to leave.
This kind of self-centered behavior has been going on for years but I think it's worse now than it's ever been, and I think it's because of your "TV-itis" theory. I must say that I don't like it if I'm watching TV at home and someone talks, but at least at home I can rewind the movie and hear the part I missed because of the talking!
This is a transgenerational problem. I can't single out any one age group; I've had trouble with teenagers and I've had trouble with 60-year-olds. My own aunt actually spoke out loud in a normal voice at movies and mortified me, which is why I only went to one movie with her in the last 20 years of her life.
Don't get me started on the subject of cell phones and their misuse. If it weren't so irritating it would be funny. I can't imagine what so many people have to say that can't wait. Why do they feel compelled to walk up and down the street, lobbies, grocery store aisles and everywhere else with cell phones glued to their ears? I have a cell phone so I'm not against them; I just think we need to use them where it's appropriate and not intrusive, i.e. in private. There has to be a bit of the exhibitionist in a lot of these people; why else would they not care if I were hearing their private conversations? I'm not eavesdropping; I simply can't avoid hearing what they're saying. It's amazing to me.
posted on September 26, 2001 09:37:10 AM
"Did you always feel this way or has this been a result of your leaving your jobs & homeschooling the children?"
Rancher, Always in my personal life even from a child. Professionally, with a big yellow ledger in hand, I am fine.
T
posted on September 26, 2001 09:38:35 AM
Gee, thanks bunni. I had to take a tenormin to stop my blood pressure from rising so early in the day. But I hear ya. I dont do the movie thing....Im like terri, I cant stand large crowds. When I watch rental movies, I make sure I take it to my room, so I can HEAR it. If I watch it with the inlaws, or a friend of mine, they are busy cracking up LOUDLY, or asking questions LOUDLY, or in general, are just what you were complaining about. Irritates me no end, so I watch movies alone.
posted on September 26, 2001 10:41:25 AM
I've been staying away from movie theaters for the same reason for years.
And many restaurants because of kids.
Apparently having manners has gone out of style. We are mannerly in my home even when we argue (no name calling, and we apologize afterward). On my worst days I feel like leaving my home means entering a jungle of cretins. On my better days I pretend it's some kind of bizarre theater production.
posted on September 26, 2001 11:09:12 AMI & the friend I was with took turns throwing popcorn kernels into the gaping aperture
ROTFL!!!
wisegirl is right, if you complain to the theater manager it's likely the culprits will be warned or kicked out. A group of my friends was once ejected from a movie theater for yakking through Chariots of Fire.
jt - I often avoid people, too, but it's more out of a self-conscious stress than any kind of revulsion. I used to be terribly shy and wouldn't speak to people even when they spoke to me first. Thank goodness I'm not like that anymore, but I have days when I just want to avoid people altogether. Even walking through the grocery store and having to make eye contact with anyone or navigate around people with kids and carts is stressful. Other days I'm fine and enjoy striking up a casual conversation with the person next to me in line. But I'll usually go out of my way to avoid encountering people.
posted on September 26, 2001 11:30:15 AM
When I walk into a movie theater, I feel like I'm mapping out a survival strategy for the next two hours.
First, I factor in that no matter where I sit, no matter how few people are in the theater, someone will sit down right smack in front of me. I went to see Angel Heart at a matinee many years ago. I went alone. There were four people in the theater, including myself -- and someone still sat in front of me.
Even when the lights go down and the sound comes up, there's no relief when the seats in front of me are unoccupied. Because I know that someone is going to come along in the dark, whispering, laughing, hissing shhh-shhh to their friend, and plop down right in front of me. It may happen 5 minutes after the movie starts, maybe 10, sometimes even 20. But it will happen.
So once I resign myself to that fact, I make other considerations. Where, for example, am I least likely to encounter a group of boisterous teenagers (who apparently go to the movies in groups of ten or fifteen nowadays), half of whom consider themselves real comedians and have been watching too much (or perhaps too little) of Mystery Science Theater 3000.
I look for other people who seem like reasonable adults (if you pay careful attention, you'll see that they tend to cluster together -- it's like we're all thinking the same thing).
Once I find the adults, I size them up wondering who among them looks inconsiderate enough to absent-mindedly kick the back of my seat during the film.
I steer way clear of anyone over the age of 60 because the majority of them don't understand pop culture references in the movies, or how computers and other electronic gizmos work, or even how to follow a plot, and invariably they ply their partner for explanations during the film -- and since apparently their hearing's going, they ask in loud tones and expect the answer to be delivered at equal volume.
Finally I take my seat knowing that despite all my careful analysis, it's all going to turn to sh*t anyway because the world's full of idiots and there's just no stopping them.
The last time I went to the movies was about three or four weeks ago. Saw The Others, an atmospheric ghost story. Well, at least it was supposed to be atmospheric. The teenage girl who squeezed herself into the seat in front of me took care of that. She came with two girlfriends and proceeded to amuse them by simulating loud farting sounds during the film, by pressing her mouth against her palm, filling her fat cheeks with air, and blowing. Not once but ten or fifteen times. It reached a point where even her friends stopped laughing -- which only prompted her to do it more in a futile effort to rekindle her companions' mirth.
I had the impulse to lean forward and whisper into her ear, If you do it again, I'll slit your throat. But I knew I'd be the one to get in trouble.
You can't win. As long as the theater management does nothing to curb these yahoos, we're at their mercy. By their inaction, the theaters are giving the morons a free license to ruin the experience for everyone else.
posted on September 26, 2001 11:42:04 AM
Marge Simpson haunts all theaters, you know. Shes always there...smack dab in front of you. Always. Forever. That blue high piled hair in your face. Doomed.
posted on September 26, 2001 11:48:14 AM
Sounds like Movie Rage.
I say hire one of those OJ lawyers and then let loose.
mobile phones in a cinema, that's a good one. A conference center near here has devices that cause them to lose their signals. I keep suggesting that cinemas build them in but they will NEVER listen. A couple of days ago I sat next to a man that was deffinately old enough to know better that spent at least the first 15 minutes sending and reading messages (or playing a game, I have no idea which)
There are huge signs all over the cinemas here with a red circle, a mobile phone, and a red slash through it. Yet people still call and get called.
I can deal with talking because it's not very long lasting here or very loud, but mobiles send me off the deep end.
posted on September 26, 2001 11:49:08 AM
Some years ago, my boss took me along with her on a business-related trip to NYC. As a thank-you, I bought us tickets to a musical. She sang along. I was mortified. What could I do? We'd been friends and co-workers for many years, but though I wanted to smack her, I really couldn't! I was hoping someone else would...
posted on September 26, 2001 11:54:29 AM
The pain is all the worse when you consider that you just paid $9 per ticket to subject yourself to it. People are supposed to have a good time at the movies, but not at everybody else's expense.
Once when I was in college a friend of mine recruited me to go to the movies with him and a girl he liked who was visiting from Maine. This girl had brought a friend with her, so my friend roped me into going along to even things out. The girl I got stuck with, her name was Joyce, wouldn't shut up. She was a hairdresser back in Maine, I recall, and maybe that's why she had the gift of gab. Joyce yammered throughout the film. It was a late-night Chuck Norris flick, so there was a surplus of drunken testosterone in the audience. I could feel people giving us dirty looks, directed mostly at me because people were figuring I was her boyfriend and I ought to shut her up. I wanted to announce, Excuse me folks, I have a girlfriend, but it ain't her. I'm just doing a favor for my friend. I implored Joyce to please be quiet, but once those gums got flapping not even God could put the brakes on them. Finally someone in the back row fired a half-full beer bottle at me. It shattered on the back of my chair, raining Lowenbrau down on us. I looked over at my friend, and said "I'm out of here.[/i] And I left the three of them sitting in the theater. As I walked past the back row where the bottle-chucker presumably sat, I half-whispered, "I don't blame you."
posted on September 26, 2001 12:26:43 PM
Rainey, Maybe "revulsion" wasn't the correct word. I don't really hate people. It's more like there MUST be an agenda. When I worked in hotels, I would make 20 cold calls a day then pull of a banquet for 300 without a hitch. Then my date would pick me up and take me to a social by someone's pool with 12 people and I would just die. There was no "plan", no neatly organized thread topics, might as well cut right to "your place or mine" (What?) because this smiling finger sandwich thing is a complete waste of time.
As for market segments, oh PLEASE give me industrial-manufacturing, military, airlines but NEVER social-fraternal or associations.
Maybe it's just a patience issue. People are great as long as they don't just stand around.
T
posted on September 26, 2001 01:37:16 PM
To those who said "why not talk to the manager"...HA!!! I am in Southern California. Movie theatres here have no ushers & haven't for years. The movie theatre managers, if you can track them down, aren't interested unless there's an ax-killer in action in the theatre--then they *might* come in.
posted on September 26, 2001 01:56:33 PM
jt - agreed about the "agenda as a must."
Take me to a party with games and I love it. But take me a party with nothing to do but stand around and talk and I'm a stick on the couch. And a bored one at that.
