Audiences have been getting a right old pasting in recent weeks, since Benedict Nightingale wrote a piece in the Times asking whether the behaviour of theatregoers is getting worse, and suggesting that sweets, crisps and mobile phones have ruined the experience for many people.
That's not been my experience in Edinburgh. Performers may think that they have it tough, with all those short get-in times and difficult conditions, but I think it's audiences who are the real fringe heroes. I don't mean performers who get into shows on performers' passes, or the vast army of journalists and promoters who swan around seeing everything for free. I mean real audiences who actually pay for their tickets – these days, sometimes up to £15 for a bare hour – and, doing so, keep the fringe economy afloat.
Let's face it: it's hard work being an audience member here. Even getting hold of a ticket often involves spending a significant proportion of the day queuing; then you have to go and stand in another queue in order to get inside. Indeed I've often thought that for many fringegoers, the queue itself is part of the experience. The other day, the queue outside the Assembly Rooms was in danger of being washed away by torrential rain. Were people complaining? No – they were extraordinarily patient and cheerful.
Edinburgh audiences are paragons of virtue, at least in my experience – unfailingly polite and attentive, often staying to the bitter end of essentially rubbish shows. Then they clap politely. I've already seen dozens of things, and I haven't heard a mobile phone go off in a single one. Drinks are allowed in almost all fringe venues, but has behaviour been less than virtuous? Undoubtedly, late-night comedy audiences can get a bit rowdy, but the theatre audiences I've seen have been just fine. There has been no evidence of people weeing on the side of the stage, still less any need for bouncers.
It has to be said that much of the venom has been directed at young audiences. But audiences in Edinburgh are much younger than your average London audience – and quite clearly know how to behave. Which begs a couple of questions: are Edinburgh audiences really better behaved than their London counterparts? Or are young audiences not nearly as guilty as some imply?
