WASHINGTON (AP) – As movie theatres worked to entice Americans back into seats after COVID-19 lockdowns and labour strikes, the industry marketed blockbuster films like Wicked and the duelling releases of Barbie and Oppenheimer as no less than cultural events.
But when certain movies become “events” unto themselves, sometimes different behaviour accompanies them.
During the theatrical run of Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour last fall, fans danced and belted lyrics in the theatres, sharing their glee on social media. Last year, fans at early screenings of Wicked did the same, to the chagrin of other moviegoers. One video of a woman dressed as Glinda the Good Witch racked up over a million views on TikTok and beyond for announcing to her theatre, “I’m here to hear Cynthia and Ariana sing, not you.”
After a period of growing accustomed to watching movies only from the comforts of home, Americans have been slowly returning to theatres following COVID-19 lockdowns. Along the way, as attendance spikes, the question of how to behave as part of a moviegoing audience has become a topic of passionate online debate.
When asked whether it’s appropriate for fans to sing in the theatre, Wicked star Cynthia Erivo, who plays Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, told NBC that she thinks the practice is “wonderful” and that “it’s time for everyone else to join in”. Dwayne Johnson, who stars as Maui in Moana 2, told the BBC that theatregoers who have spent their “hard earned money for a ticket” should be able to sing.
Online backlash was swift, with one user retorting, “I paid my hard-earned money for a ticket too and I don’t wanna hear y’all attempting to sing so what now.”
It all circles around two questions that, like anything else in the culture, are constantly evolving: When you’re seeing a movie in a theatre, how should you behave? And when can a viewer become a participant?
MOVIE SING-ALONGS ARE A THEATRE TRADITION
Actual in-person disruptions at movie theatres appear minimal. Representatives from Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, a prominent chain known for diverse film screenings and food service, and ACX Cinemas, a family-owned chain based in the Midwest, both say they’ve experienced nothing major.
The instinct to join in is hardly new. “Sing-along screenings have been a principal part of moviegoing going back over 100 years,” said Ross Melnick, a professor of film and media studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. But singing, he said, typically occurs in “designated sing-along environments where it is clear that there’s a collective performance of the audience”.
According to Esther Morgan-Ellis, author of Everybody Sing!: Community Singing in the American Picture Palace American film screenings in the late 1920s and early 1930s were often preceded by sing-alongs. An organist would perform three or four popular songs and audiences were encouraged to join in, often guided by lyrics projected onto the screen. In other cases, the sing-along would be coupled with a short film that included lyrics and a bouncing, on-screen ball that would hop across the words to help audiences keep tempo.
While singing has long been common, other behaviours were once hotly debated. When movies were a new medium, Americans quarrelled over not just the content of the films themselves but the venue at which people viewed them. – Curtis Yee
