I've been in the audience once where a dialogue that obviously has two similar lines (we'll call Line A and Line B) got screwed up so that when the character said Line B (the second one), the other character said his response from Line A, and so a good deal was repeated.

As for the scariest line flub I personally was involved in: I was in a 24-hr. play, so we wrote, directed, rehearsed and memorized within 24 hours, hence the name.  I'd done them before, I've done them since.  I usually am really good at learning lines, and pretty good at covering, but in this particular scene, we were doing this almost Pinteresque play, where I was being interrogated by this other guy, and HE DRIED.  Completely dead, and since his character is the one who's asking the questions and will reveal to me the crucial details of what happened as a result of something I did, I can't really do anything, since my character doesn't have any information.  So, I just went off the cuff, and wasn't even trying to feed him his next line, just saying whatever I thought my character COULD say until I worked out a way to give him a cue that he could pick up.  We dropped about a page of dialogue, replaced by me stammering through this improv, trying furiously to think of a way to get back to one- any- of my lines somewhere later in the play.  Thanks to the style of the dialogue, it had a lot of built in pauses and sentence fragments, so my cover wasn't nearly as bad as it could've been.

Haha, it depends on how well it's organized, but in general, they go really well.  I like them because the compacted time range and lack of sleep just lets you be really free.  The scripts are often really offbeat.  And the realization that you only have so much time to figure it out gets rid of any sort of restraint that inhibits actors during rehearsals.  I think they work best when there's some theme the writers agree to employ, often a short phrase like "fly on the wall" or "closed curtains" or "on thin ice," all of which are real examples from my experience.  Each writer/ writing team can take it as literally or figuratively as they want.

ETA: From this day forward, "pants business" shall be my Official Favorite Euphemism (tm).

[/QUOTE]

Ahhh, my gift to you, go forth in peace but use this new power wisely and for good.

Originally posted by POB14 Originally posted by eveharrington ETA: From this day forward, "pants business" shall be my Official Favorite Euphemism (tm). Ahhh, my gift to you, go forth in peace but use this new power wisely and for good. Aw, that's no fun. The heck with it, then!

Alright, alright, yell it at small children from a moving car then.

One of my favorite stories was told to me by a friend.

He had been working lights for a community theater production of some (forgotten) early twentieth century romantic melodrama.  Through the course of the play, he roguish hero sins and then redeems himself through many altruistic acts.  At the end of the play there is a climactic swordfight where the hero is fatally stabbed, causing him to fall into the arms of his friend, and there give his "farewell to the world" dying speech.  He then dies.  The friend sadly looks up, out past the audience and gives the curtain line:  "He died... fire darting from his eyes."  At this point the curtain is somberly brought down on the final tableau.

On the given night, there was electricity in the air from moment the curtain first went up.  Before the packed house, each scene engaged the audience more intensely than the previous one, resulting in thunderous applause, as the first act curtain was brought down.

The second act was even better, drawing cheers from the crowd as the curtain was lowered for the second intermission. 

Primed for the third act of the play, the excited cast went on, playing each scene with greater ease and assurance than at any previous performance of the show.  The play had soared and now it was time for the final scene...

The swordfight went flawlessly.  The hero having been stabbed, fell gracefully into his friend's arms and eloquently delivered his final speech.  The friend, then sensing his cue, took a dramatic pause, looked out over the heads of the audience members and gave the curtain line which has been remembered to this day:

"He died... farting."

There was a slight moment of hesitation and then the curtain was slowly let down.

After a confused pause in the audience, one member eventually began to clap, and the others, out of form, followed suit.

A great moment in the theatre.