Bianca Del Rio: Drag queen shames theatregoer for filming musical
Written by News on 30/12/2019
Drag queen Bianca Del Rio has publicly shamed a West End audience member who filmed a large part of a musical on her phone.
The former RuPaul’s Drag Race winner, also known as Roy Haylock, is currently performing as Hugo/Loco Chanelle in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie at the Apollo Theatre in London.
The comedy queen posted to her 624K Twitter followers: “Dear blonde b**** with glasses, Thanks for distracting the ENTIRE CAST and SEVERAL PEOPLE AROUND YOU as you filmed during all of ACT ONE with your phone in your hand.”
The famously foul-mouthed artist added: “This is not a concert, theme park or even a cruise ship … it’s THE THEATRE! RESPECT IT ! @JamieMusical.”
There have been other incidents of poorly behaved audience members.
Last year, two women in the front row were caught watching England’s World Cup penalty shootout against Colombia on their phones during Titanic The Musical at the Theatre Royal in Nottingham.
The pair were not content with just watching the shootout, but audibly celebrated each goal.
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In 2015, an audience member walked on to the stage to plug his phone charger into a socket just before the production of Hand To God on Broadway started.
Patti LuPone famously stopped a performance of Gypsy when a phone flash went off in 2009, while in 2015 she confiscated a phone from a woman texting in the middle of the play Shows For Days.
Benedict Cumberbatch had to ask fans to stop taking photos and recording videos during his performances of Hamlet at the Barbican in 2015.
More unusually, an audience member watching Game Of Thrones actor Kit Harington in a performance of Doctor Faustus decided to eat a box of chicken nuggets during a show in 2016.
The trend extends offstage, when Helen Mirren, dressed as the Queen, came off stage, went outside and yelled at a group of street drummers to be quiet as they were disrupting the performance back in 2013.
She reportedly said: “Quiet! I’m trying to do a play in here! People have paid a lot of money for tickets.”
The musical Everybody’s Talking About Jamie is inspired by a documentary which followed a teenager who lived on a Sheffield council estate as he overcame prejudice to become a drag queen.
Bianca Del Rio won RuPaul’s Drag Race, a TV competition to find America’s best drag queen, in 2014. She is a drag queen, comedian, costume designer, and actor, starring on stage and in films including Hurricane Bianca.
She was the first drag artist to headline Wembley Arena.
(c) Sky News 2019: Bianca Del Rio: Drag queen shames theatregoer for filming musical
