Thread: How to deal with heckles?

ive been lucky i havent had any heckles so far. but i will remember all this for when i do. x

Really pleased to see this thread...

I've not had any problems with hecklers in the past (that I've heard) but I'm moving into compering and stand up and have been worried about what to say back!

There's nothing worse than someone who engages with heckler for a long time - it excludes the audience and messes up the flow of the show- so it's fab to have some ideas of quick one liners and techniques!

xxx

Dance wise...

It depends on the space.

If you can walk in the crowd I like to target the noisy louts with your act prop. Eg I did my cleaning lady act which is more dance based cabaret rather than strip tease. I heard some guy say 'when she gunna stop fannyin' around and show us her tits?'

(This was in my early days of burlesquing-I don't perform at venues that allow those sort of artistically ungrateful kinds of people in...there should be respect.. but I digress)

I hopped off stage all cutesy and smiles and used my mop as a faux pole then proceeded to grind and shimmy around him lapdance styley. Soon quietened down. Was quite fun to do and the rest of the audience loved it too!

On a traditional stage, use the heckles like someone has just supercharged you with more energy. If you put you heart into your show you won't give a damn bout the negativity!

Hope this helps
Love love
x

All advice has been noted, thanks lovelies for your input.

I never thought of something as simple as eye contact but I guess that while you're unable to verbally shoot down the heckler that could be a fantastic thing to use. I also love Coco's idea of just taking the heckle as fuel to be even better onstage (in the same way that I purposely get extra sickly-sweet polite when people don't say "please" & "thank you" - they never know how to react to that!).

Fankoooo!

x

I think it's really horrid that any bastard would want to heckle anyone, and I'm sure it would throw me big time! (And as a school teacher of young offenders, You'd think I'd be used to nasty shout outs!)

I think I'd probably go for ignoring them if I'm dancing because it would involve a break in the routine if I responded. But I agree that eye contact, just a look, can be a very powerful thing - ask anyone who teaches kids!

I was at a comedy club in edinburgh at the weekend and there were one or two hecklers, and, quite frankly, they came across as complete dickheads! The comedians took the piss out of them of course, but even without that, they still looked and sounded like morons!

They are shouting at you beacuse they don't have the balls or the creativity to be up there themselves and probably feel threatened and outside of their comfort zone... doesn't make it any easier when they have said something horrid to you tho.

Apparently it takes 10 nice things to be said to you to cancel out the effect of 1 horrid one. So you could get other people to say nice things till you feel better. Post on here and everyone will be so supportive that you will hopefully forget whatever the silly old git said! x

I find that winking and blowing a kiss works well when it comes to startling people who make nasty comments in life in general. I have yet to encounter a heckler while I've been onstage *touch wood* but that's what I would do if it happened, haha.

[QUOTE=Glorian Gray;123728]
I think hecklers often perceive this distance between the performer and them, which allows them to be unkind, and letting them see that you are actually in an interactive social circumstance through eye contact or whatever sometimes can remind them that its not the same as shouting at the TV. QUOTE]

Such a valid point... Just by looking confidently at them - even blow them a kiss or doing something equally cheeky is a good way to remind them that whatever they have said to you will not make any difference to you or your act...

the oddest heckle I ever recieved was when I was drumming in an all-girl band. This punk (it was 20 years ago!!) shouted "get your bacon out" (no, we didn't know what it meant, either) and as his "chippolata" was hanging out of a rip in his trouser seam, i told him "put yours away" to which he noticed his accidental exposure and backed off into the darkness to the soundtrack of everyone heckling and laughing at him. Quite a mighty backfire of a heckle...

X

I've only ever been heckled once so far and that was at a private do. I just carried on and completely ignored the heckler. Don't know if that's the right thing to do, but he certainly gave up when he realised no-one was paying any attention to him.

x

Such a valid point... Just by looking confidently at them - even blow them a kiss or doing something equally cheeky is a good way to remind them that whatever they have said to you will not make any difference to you or your act...

the oddest heckle I ever recieved was when I was drumming in an all-girl band. This punk (it was 20 years ago!!) shouted "get your bacon out" (no, we didn't know what it meant, either) and as his "chippolata" was hanging out of a rip in his trouser seam, i told him "put yours away" to which he noticed his accidental exposure and backed off into the darkness to the soundtrack of everyone heckling and laughing at him. Quite a mighty backfire of a heckle...

X

I love this comeback .

I'm also with the cheeky wink and blow them a kiss brigade - seems to work a treat. x

my lovely friend Taylor Mac quote Flawless Mother Sabrina, who said: 'people who heckle just want to be part of the show'.

it's a dangerous strategy but it can be very effective. the sheer weight of an entire audience can be turned against a heckler very effectively.

i once had a very drunk woman who talked loudly through a lot of acts and heckled a few times. i finally stopped the show, pointed out that she clearly wanted to be on stage, dragged her up, gave her the microphone, stepped back and watched her get redder and redder and redder with everyone laughing at her.

brutal, but effective.

i also had two drunk Polish girls, who spoke hardly any english, at a show in Plymouth, talking loudly all the way through. nobody in the very repressed, British audience did much to discourage them although there was a tiny bit of 'ssssshing'. they were oblivious (drunks as lords). i did eventually point out that people had paid good money to listen to me, not to them, and that seemed to galvanise the audience. being reminded that they'd paid for a show and it was being ruined was enough to make them more interventionist. the girls were eventually kicked out of the theatre, but it was a long lull in the show.

the CRUCIAL thing is - never ever let them get to you. never show that you're pissed off. hecklers are dumb fucks who revel in negative attention, so if they see they've got a rise out of you, they'll feel like they've achieved something.

and there is, very occasionally, such a thing as a good heckle - one that adds to the show and gives you something to spark off. i think sometimes the bad heckles are the price we have to pay for interactive nature of cabaret.