I ABSOLUTELY love attending anything at Gammage Au...

I ABSOLUTELY love attending anything at Gammage Auditorium! Everything about the experience used to be very upper-class! The venue, itself, is an architectural beauty designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, and I just love being there!! I LOVE broadway musicals and because ASU is a 30 minute drive from home, I could get to one and get back in the same evening without being away too long. I see one or two shows per season and always come away feeling euphoric! That is, until the last run of Wicked.

Sometime (not sure exactly when) ASU started selling adult beverages and snacks and allowing patrons to consume them during shows! WHAT. THE. HECK!! This is not Chase Field! This is not a cheap movie theater! This is an experience that in some cases costs upwards of $250 a seat! How have we fallen so low as a society that we have forgotten proper etiquette for attending a live performance?!

I attended a performance of Wicked on May 3. This particular show is one of my favorites and my husband gave tickets to my fifteen year old daughter and I for our birthdays in late January. I had highly anticipated this night for three and a half months! We arrived in time, checked in and found our seats. The other audience members trickled in. I noticed right away that the two ladies on my right were each holding TWO full adult beverages. The lady on my left came in toting a huge glass of the smelliest beer I had ever smelled. They were drinking and laughing and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves.

The show started and so did the obnoxious behavior. The two ladies on the right talked loudly through the entire show! The volunteer hostess, Diane, admitted late people THREE times after the show had started. All of them tromping on our toes and momentarily blocking our view. One lady came down the aisle and said which seat are you in? to every person in the aisle. During intermission, I went into the restroom and was in a stall next to a woman who was vomiting over and over. The smell was awful!

After intermission the ladies on my right came back with four more full glasses, and it was pretty obvious that they were getting intoxicated. The gentleman on my left turned his phone on and continually checked texts and the weather and every once in a while his disability strobe light feature would go off and flash bright lights over the whole section. The lady in front of me turned her phone on and Shazam-ed the live music as it was being performed.

During the Munchkinland scene with the corn stalks, the lady on my right yelled OH MY GOSH!! THEY RE IN KANSAS!! And then spilled her beer all over the floor and the patron in front of her, causing the guy in front of her to jump and knock into the person next to him, which caused a loud disturbance. Both of those ladies were laughing loudly through the entire show.

When the show was over and we got up to leave, there was trash all over the floors! Cups full of ice left in the traffic areas to be kicked over, Cheeze-it crackers and wrappers strewn under the seats! This beautiful building, which holds so much significance to so many, is being abused and mistreated by patrons who feel that their own enjoyment and entertainment is more important than having manners and proper etiquette for the setting which they are in! As a child, I was taught that even chewing gum in a theater is bad manners. There were a lot of children in attendance, did anyone think about them? And what about all the intoxicated drivers released on the streets of Tempe after the show?! How many accidents are they causing??

Don t get me wrong, I still LOVE Gammage and I adore live preforming arts, but my experience at Wicked was HIGHLY hampered by a current policy. I can imagine that ASU is making a HUGE amount of money from selling concessions in the lobbies, but I would plead for this policy to be changed! There is a time and a place... and this is NOT it!! The experience was NOT as enjoyable and the desire to go back is not as strong. Frank Lloyd Wright would be disgusted. This is NOT a ball game! Don t treat it like one!!