Veteran actress Uta Hagen, 81, accidentally stepped off the stage of the Geffen Playhouse and into the audience during an Act Two scene change of the play, Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks, May 30.

The theatre said the show was halted briefly, while Hagen was examined by two doctors who were in the audience. She stood up, got a standing ovation and walked backstage with the doctors and a brief intermission was called.

Although Hagen wished to continue the performance, the Geffen management wanted to be prudent and cancelled the performance and sent Hagen to U.C.L.A.'s Medical Center, where she was given "a clean bill of health," according to a statement. She will perform as scheduled May 31 in the world premiere by Richard Alfieri. Previews began May 29 and performances continue to July 1. Opening is June 7.

The May 30 audience was invited to attend a future performance.

Hagen's career is highlighted with classical and contemporary roles, including Shakespeare, Chekhov, Broadway's The Country Girl and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf and Off-Broadway's Collected Stories, among many other works. Hagen turns 82 June 12. Arthur Allan Seidelman directs the preem of Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks, a two-hander co-starring David Hyde Pierce (of TV's "Frasier"), which is described this way by the nonprofit Geffen in Los Angeles: "After a heartbreaking move from his beloved New York City to the leisurely pastels of the gulf coast of Florida, an acerbic dance instructor's first assignment is a lonely, but feisty minister's wife with a flair for dance. These two foxtrot, tango and tangle their way through an assortment of lessons in this touching and uproarious world premiere play...about love, loss and friendship."