West End crowds encouraged to use phones in the Instagram age

WEST END theatregoers have been told that they can film the finale of shows on their mobile phones to give people the chance to post clips on Instagram and social media.

Audiences at the Sister Act musical at the Dominion Theatre are being encouraged to get out their cameras and film the last song of the performance.

A message, broadcast at the start of the show, states that while filming the rest of the show is prohibited, people are allowed to record the finale.

Kevin Wilson, who has been a publicist for West End shows for more than 30 years, said that “almost every musical” now allowed audiences to film the finale.

He was publicist for the hit musical Six, a modern retelling of the lives of Henry VIII’S wives, which was one of the first to allow filming.

He said that the idea came about after one of the producers went to South Korea and saw that audiences there were allowed to film certain sections of shows.

He said: “I was against it at first, but now almost every other musical producer has allowed the final medley to be filmed because it is free advertising and it doesn’t take away any part of the performance, it’s just the finale.”

Mr Wilson said the practice helped to stop people surreptitiously filming the performance and disrupting the actors.

He said:” in a world of Instagram and social media, this is a very good middle ground. Nobody objects to it. People want to put stuff on social media, and this gives them the chance.”

Sister Act is a musical based on the 1992 film of the same name, and originally opened at the West End in 2009.

The current run at the Dominion, which began in March this year, is directed by Bill Buckhurst and features original music by the Tony and eighttime Oscar winner Alan Menken and lyrics by Glenn Slater.

The issue of phones in theatres has long been discussed by actors, with some actively stopping performances to call out members of the audience using devices.

In 2014, Kevin Spacey broke character in the middle of delivering a monologue to scold an Old Vic audience member whose phone was going off during a performance of the one-man show Clarence Darrow, shouting: “If you don’t answer that I will”.

In 2013, James Mcavoy confronted a spectator at the Trafalgar Studios, where he was starring in Macbeth, who was filming the play on his mobile.

Last year, photographs of James Norton, who appeared nude in a performance of Hanya Yanagihara’s A Little Life at the Harold Pinter Theatre, were leaked to Mailonline.

Audience members watching the acclaimed production are reportedly warned before it begins that photography is strictly prohibited.

The backlash to the incident prompted calls for West End theatres to lock away audience members’ phones during performances.

Sister Act and the Dominion Theatre were contacted for comment.