this was written by Nancy White, a Toronto singer/songwriter/satirist, for Maclean's Forum, an online service of Maclean's magazine. I thought folks here would find it of interest. Peter Berryman filed a response.

Maclean's Forum Writers In Electronic Residence

Nancy White: Face in Plate Not Your Fault

"Why are Saturday night audiences so bad?" I asked an actor friend. "Or are they? Is it just me?"

Well, of course,it's not just me. Saturday night audiences are notorious for being the worst of the week. Dead, doughy, no sense of humour. I'll get to some reasons by and by.

I decided to talk about audiences and days of the week as a service to new writers of plays, monologues, songs -- any material that gets performed in public. Instant appraisal! Unless you know about the audience thing, you may get really paranoid and confused by the varied reactions to your work.

I'm a singer/songwriter -- yes,yes, I know, what's the difference between a singer/songwriter and a puppy -- eventually the puppy stops whining -- so I'm particularly vulnerable to changes in audiences. When it goes badly for me as a performer, I have to blame the idiot writer. Damn! I've done cabaret shows, a little dinner theatre, clubs, and the odd bit of legit theatre, and audience patterns are almost always the same. It's more than a bit freaky.

I thought I should check in with someone even more experienced than I before giving you the gospel, so I called the glamorous Robin Craig - actor, singer,mother of two, very funny woman. Here's what she told me.

Generally, weeknight audiences are the most fun. Robin says Monday's best of all from the performer's point of view, because many theatres are dark that night and the actors go to the remaining shows. An audience full of actors definitely has a pulse.

Tuesday's crowd is sophisticated,but small (maybe because it's cheap night at the movies) and the show may not be at its best because the actors have had a day off and can be a bit rusty.

Wednesday, according to Robin, is absolutely the best night. She herself tries to go to shows on Wednesday nights. The show usually sparkles, and if there has been a Wednesday matinee, the actors, though tired, will be so thrilled at the contrasting liveliness of the night audience that they'll give an extra-energetic performance.

Thursday, she says, is iffy. It could go either way.

Friday is great, whether you're in a theatre or a club. I think it's because people feel so happy at the start of a weekend, they're like sailors on leave. And Friday there's often a full house. Buzz buzz.

Then comes Saturday. Oh god, date night. Big dinner night. They're too full of food and wine and may even doze off on you. (The face falling into the plate at a dinner theatre is not a pretty sight.) Robin refers to the Saturday night'ers as "a great sweating mass".

My theory aobut Saturday is that that's the night people go out who don't often go out. They're less adventurous, often more monied (Saturday tickets are the most expensive), maybe a little less hip than the weeknight patrons. They're like those people who go to the supermarket only on Sundays and don't use a cart, hence destroying the rhythm of the place.

Robin says the pay-what-you-can matinees on Sundays are always wonderful because they attract less affluent people who are interested enough in theatre to line up in the rain.

Saturday matinees, on the other hand, are not as rewarding for the performers. The audiences tend to be composed of elderly women on bus tours who miss a lot of the dialogue because of hearing loss, and who leave during the curtain call (the biggest insult you can throw at an actor) because the bus driver told them they had to.

So there you go - the week in review. If your play is going over like a parent at a high school dance, check the calendar. It could be Saturday night.

(These rules, by the way, don't apply to one-night stands.)

I'd love to hear your experiences as an audience member, author, or performer. Are there regional differences? Is it the same en français? In Europe? I eagerly await your reply.

And maybe next week I'll talk about why comedy works better in a cold room.

Nancy White. singer-songwriter Toronto/Canada http://rlhess.home.mindspring.com/music/nwhite.htm

"Happiness is having sex with your friends." Ashley MacIsaac ("Atlantic Gig")

Bookings: Campbell Webster Entertainment. (902) 566-3346 cwebster@isn.net Nancy's cd's and tapes are available from 1-800 JOE RADIO ======

  Peter Berryman - 10:40am Nov 18, 1999 EST (2.)

Saturday and Weather

What a fascinating topic! Speaking from the questionable experience of one-night stands, it seems to us that weather has more of an effect on the quality of Saturday's audience than that of any other day, because they have been exposed to a full day of it. Saturdays in springtime are deadly, if the weather is nice, because people are beat from the pageantry of peeling rotten pumpkin shells off the piazza. In early winter, Saturdays are bad if the weather has just changed, particularly if it has snowed that day. Folks are put off by the unfamiliar hostile elements and stay home to nurse their jumper cable burns, or if they come, they are worn out from dragging the snow shovel out from under the Lawn Boy. But blizzard Saturdays in February can be fantastic, with cross country skis propped up against the Milk Duds booth. In general, the first Saturday after a major change of weather is bad, but from the middle of any season to its end, Saturdays are better the worse the weather, unless the Wizard of Oz is on TV. As a matter of fact, it may be that a larger proportion of Saturday nighters are TV hobbyists at heart, and are on the town because there's nothing good on, their couch demeanor giving the room its zombiance. But if they have made the effort to show up, we love 'em anyway, and are willing to switch songs in midstream if they aim the remote right.

Peter Berryman (of Lou and Peter Berryman) http://members.aol.com/berrymanp ==========

  Nancy White - 01:33pm Nov 18, 1999 EST (3.)

Berryman flexibility astounds

Hi there Peter, Some Canadian readers/writers may not know that you are a brilliant writer of hilarious songs from Wisconsin, and hence have probably never had a dead night in a theatre or club. All rules are off when Peter and Lou Berryman take the stage. It's a little freaky that you mention changing songs in the middle if people point a remote at you because not an hour ago my 10-year-old daughter was here and she was showing me the game she played this morning with a friend. one has the remote, the other acts out what's on the different channels. Just like you guys! Yeah, that weather stuff makes a difference except when you're in the real north and people will go anywhere in anything. Last February I had the unexpected pleasure of seeing my piano player tumble head-first into a snowdrift in Elliot Lake. We were walking up a hill to the venue by the side of a ditch and suddenly there he was, gone. He did the first set kind of wet. Lovely audience too. You have brought up yet another topic, why is Saturday night such a lousy tv night? I have agonized over this one for years and can come up with nothing. Do you find that comedy works best in a cold room, by the way? Do the week-night rules apply to kids entertainers I wonder? i want to ask Raffi but I hear that he's like in India or something doing good works.