Times may be hard, but there is still joy to be found, even after a long week. Sit back, relax, and enjoy a moment of emotional release. Welcome to Playbill's Feel Good Friday feature.
Broadway actor Josh Grisetti may have packed his trunks and moved to Southern California for a professorship at California State University, Fullerton, but he's still got stories to tell. (Professors have the best stories, after all.)
In a recent TikTok, Grisetti told about the time he added a little line about Patti LuPone as he exited the stage in the Broadway musical It Shoulda Been You. The audience loved it, but he still got written up in the show report for his ad lib. He also got an email from the show's director, David Hyde Pierce. See what happened in the video below.
@joshgrisetti “I don’t care what Patti LuPone says…!” 📱 #broadwaytiktok #musicaltheatretiktok #pattilupone #broadwaystories @sweaty oracle ♬ original sound - Josh Grisetti
LuPone's infamous "Stop taking pictures right now!" was, of course, during her 2008 turn as Rose in Gypsy when the performer stopped the show to reprimand an audience member for photographing her. But the 2015 phone story that Grisetti is referring to happened during an Off-Broadway production of Shows For Days, which was uptown a bit from the Brooks Atkinson/Lena Horne Theatre at Lincoln Center Theater's Mitzi E. Newhouse.
During a performance, LuPone spied a woman texting throughout, so she walked over to the audience member and, without saying a word, took her phone away from her. (It was returned after the show.) It made headlines. Two nights later, LuPone got even more press as she walked out on stage and addressed the audience before the show, saying, "I'm here to ask all of you to whip out those cell phones, turn them off, and come to the theatre."
We love a good Patti LuPone story...almost as much as we love the legend herself.
READ: Feel Good Friday: Emmy Raver-Lampman and Daveed Diggs Had a Baby!
Have a great weekend! And check back next Friday for another feel good feature.
