Patti LuPone snatches phone from texter mid-performance

When will people learn not to text during a performance? Hopefully for at least one person, now: in the middle of a performance of Shows for Days at New York’s Lincoln Center Wednesday night, Patti LuPone apparently just couldn’t take it anymore, and reached out and grabbed an audience member’s cell phone right out of their hands.

Back in 2009, the legendary Broadway diva famously berated an audience member for taking pictures during a performance of Gypsy, stopping halfway through the climactic number “Rose’s Turn” to yell, “You heard the announcement—who do you think you are?”

“We work hard onstage to create a world that is being totally destroyed by a few rude, self-absorbed, and inconsiderate audience members who are controlled by their phones,” LuPone said in a statement after last night’s incident. “I am so defeated by this issue that I seriously question whether I want to work onstage anymore.”

Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.

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