A crowd at the Palace Theater in Manchester, UK got REALLY into the musical adaptation of the 1992 film “The Bodyguard.” The stage show features several songs by the late, great Whitney Houston. While some soft singing along may not be entirely frowned upon, this crowd was so uproarious, they stopped the entire show! Twice!
The first disruption came when the first act had to be paused to evict people who were singing over the top of the actors, according to the Manchester Evening News. Later that evening the police were called in to help with another incident. When again some audience members were “singing over the lead during the final song.” This second disruption caused “The Bodyguard” to have to stop ten minutes before the end of the show.
This call resulted in two people being removed from the theater but charges are still being decided. “Officers were called to the Palace Theatre last night after staff reported a number of people in the audience causing a disturbance,” a spokesperson said. “Two people removed by security staff were spoken to by police and a decision about any further action will be made once the evidence has been reviewed.”
Performer Melody Thornton, former singer for the Pussycat Dolls, plays the lead role of Rachel Marron. After the show was stopped she shared a video on her Instagram apologizing for that performance of “The Bodyguard.”
“I wanted to send a really special message to people in Manchester who came to the show tonight to say thank you so much,” Thornton said. “I respect that you paid your money and I am so grateful to everyone who respects the people on stage, who want to give you a beautiful show. For everything that happened tonight – I can’t say, I don’t have all of the details – I’m just very, very sorry that we couldn’t finish the show.”
Co-star Ayden Callaghan (“Hollyoaks”), who plays bodyguard Frank Farmer, addressed the incidents as well via Twitter. In the post, he referred to the behavior of the interrupting audience members as “disgusting.”
“We wanted to carry on but it had become a major incident,” he clarified about ending the show early. “I’m really sorry to what was 99.9% a brilliant audience that a few badly behaved individuals ruined it.”
We hope all future performances of “The Bodyguard” go uninterrupted. Check out Thornton’s video below:
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