Pulling back the curtain on the peculiar customs and enduring superstitions that help define life backstage.
You may not have realized it, but there's little chance you've heard anyone whistle inside a theater. In the old days, sailors often worked the ropes backstage, bringing to show business codes like command whistles. So a whistle meant as a compliment, or to get a person's attention, might have landed a piece of scenery on someone's head.
Theater is full of these customs -- many arising, like most rituals, from hazy origins. Still, show people hold on to them. In an industry that hopes to conjure the same wonder every night (with wildly different results), there's comfort in tradition, especially if it reaches back decades or even centuries. Some, as the 56-year-old Broadway wardrobe supervisor and costume designer Patrick Bevilacqua says, are "rituals of consistency" -- the private fist bumps or helpful Listerine sprays during a backstage quick change, which must be "choreographed within an inch of its life" to keep the show running smoothly. Others are spiritual; according to the actress Lea Salonga, 53, "any practice where everyone can see each other as human" is necessarily grounding.
Some are individual: The actor Hugh Jackman, 56, last seen as the lead in "The Music Man" on Broadway in 2023, buys scratch-off lottery tickets for each production member every Friday; occasionally, someone wins a few hundred dollars. Some are secretive, like stealing costumes after a show closes, while others are blared through the house, as when stage managers announce on loudspeakers before a performance, "It's Saturday night on Broadway," a reminder that the wearying workweek is almost over.
Length dictates quantity: Longer-running productions are more likely to develop more idiosyncratic traditions. This means that in New York, Broadway is more ritualistic than Off, and musicals outmatch straight plays for the same reason. The 64-year-old actress Amra-Faye Wright, for example, has for about a decade been painting murals each season backstage for "Chicago," the second-longest-running musical in Broadway history, which opened in 1975 and has been up since its 1996 revival. All agree that London is more laid-back, despite having some quirks, such as everyone in the cast and crew banging on the windows facing the National Theatre's interior courtyard on opening night; or the Baddeley cake, an intricately decorated and frosted dessert that varies from show to show but has been served with punch at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, every Jan. 6 since 1795. It's named after Robert Baddeley, an actor who played minor roles there and who in his will bequeathed funds for the annual festivity.
As the 43-year-old British director Michael Longhurst says, most are "a mix of the practical and superstitious." Actors tell one another to break a leg -- maybe because "good luck" is gauche; maybe because they're an understudy wishing a principal would just bow out; maybe because a theater's "legs" are the thin drapes that frame the stage, which you'd cross if receiving an ovation; or maybe just because they know it's a phrase they ought to keep alive.
It's like when the actress Patti LuPone, 75, was given some of Ethel Merman's jewels by the wardrobe supervisor Adelaide Laurino to wear in the Broadway musical "Evita" in 1979. She didn't just steal them because ... well, who wouldn't? She stole them because, as she says, "these will be passed down, but [the recipient] won't be given the information that will be lost to time."
Cards From the Neighbors and a Telegram From Bette Midler
It's grueling work to get a play ready, which is why there's a collective sense of celebration when a new show opens. For the past few decades, the casts and companies of Broadway productions have signed cards bearing their shows' logos, then sent them to the newest show on its opening night. What were once couriered over were later faxed and are now sometimes sent as PDFs that are printed out by stage managers. While some shows keep them up throughout their run, most are displayed about as long as Christmas cards.
Aside from these well wishes, companies can expect gifting tables backstage full of presents from their producers and admirers and from one another. These can range from bottles of Champagne and homemade cookies to elaborate offerings like branded bomber jackets, tote bags and alarm clocks. Before the pandemic, Tiffany key chains featuring a show's artwork would often be distributed in New York. The American actress Marisha Wallace, 39, who works mostly in London, says that British openings are not "as extravagantly gifted because U.K. people aren't really gifters." She learned this when she showed up to "Dreamgirls" in 2016 with T-shirts and personalized mugs for everyone, only to receive cookies in return. (Brits do, however, enjoy closing-night gifts.)
Personalized presents, as always, are the most appreciated. Salonga, who will return to Broadway in the Stephen Sondheim revue "Old Friends" next spring, remembers her first starring role (at 9 in 1980 as Annie in the musical's Manila premiere), when her aunt gave her a small brass elephant. She now collects these figurines in her dressing room, pointing them toward the stage for good luck. The actress Tracie Bennett, 63, still marvels at the books -- some filled with recipes inspired by the production -- that Denis O'Hare, 62, gave to his co-stars in Sondheim's posthumous Off Broadway show, "Here We Are," last year at the Shed in New York: "He didn't need to do it," she says, "and that's the point!"
LuPone, a self-described "instinctual archivist," keeps many opening-night tokens in a curio cabinet at her Connecticut home, including an "Evita" death mask and an egg filled with small wooden statuettes of the actors from the 1987 revival of "Anything Goes" and mounted on a music box. The 46-year-old actress Mandy Gonzalez, now appearing in the Broadway revival of "Sunset Boulevard," has long kept two significant gifts: a Western Union telegram sent by Bette Midler, for whom she used to sing backup, the first time Gonzalez originated a role on Broadway, in 2002's "Dance of the Vampires"; and an iPod engraved with a message from Yoko Ono for the 2005 premiere of the musical "Lennon."
Another backstage tradition was started by Alyce Gilbert, 81, who in 2007 became the only wardrobe supervisor to be honored with a Tony, along with the late dresser Bobbye Sue Albrecht. Gilbert's first Broadway show was the memorable run of "A Chorus Line" at the Shubert Theatre in 1975. When Bob Fosse's "Dancin'" stole several of that production's members three years later, she and Albrecht procured a glass candy jar, spelled "Dancin'Wardrobe" on its lid with stick-on letters and took it next door to the Broadhurst. "It was the first time anyone had sent something that was really for the wardrobe department," Gilbert says. Almost five decades later, she's sent a jar to most musicals, and some plays, on their opening night. Filled with peppermints -- they're good for the throat and, unlike chocolates, won't stain costumes -- the jars remain in the wardrobe department for all to enjoy; crew members take them home, or to their next show, upon closing. Bevilacqua, the wardrobe supervisor for Broadway's "The Great Gatsby," says that collecting them has become an industry badge of honor.
You Must Touch the Robe
One of Broadway's most regimented traditions has an impressive musical theater pedigree: In 1950, a chorus member on "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" took a robe from a fellow chorine and sent it to a friend who was opening that night in the ensemble of "Call Me Madam," starring Ethel Merman. The recipient later added a cloth cabbage rose from Merman's costume to the pale pink robe and gave it to a chorus member in the next opening musical, "Guys and Dolls," and an informal ritual was born. Since they traveled so quickly from contract to contract, Broadway dancers were often called "gypsies," so the similarly itinerant garment was called the Gypsy Robe until 2018, when members of the union Actors' Equity Association voted to rename it the Legacy Robe.
Equity had taken over the robe's distribution long before then, codifying the rules when it became obvious it was being improperly handled or accounted for, awarded based on popularity or bogged down by heavy additions such as shoes. These days, the robe is presented on the opening night of a Broadway musical to the ensemble member with the most Broadway chorus credits. An elaborate ceremony -- which occurs half an hour before curtain, with the entire company (and past recipients) invited to attend -- is led by the robe's previous caretaker, who recites an Equity-written speech before revealing its new keeper. Once outfitted, that person circles the stage counterclockwise three times as each cast member reaches out to touch the robe for good luck. Then there's a dash through the theater as the recipient visits each dressing room to bless the production.
The performer Jeffrey Schecter, 51, held back tears while receiving his second robe when a revival of "Once Upon a Mattress" opened this past August. Katie Webber, 43, who presented him with the robe that she'd received for "The Great Gatsby," says the tradition not only honors the performers who form the backbone of any Broadway musical but also speaks to the profession's unsteady, nice-work-if-you-can-get-it nature: "The longer I'm in this business, the more I'm shocked I'm still working."
The wardrobe supervisor oversees the application of their production's panel to the robe, which often bears the name of its recipient and includes signatures from all cast members. Bevilacqua says he likes to incorporate costume trims so that "in 100 years, people can see these were the fabrics we were using." Once a robe is filled up, it's archived by Equity, although a few of the 35 or so robes have been retired to the Lincoln Center Library for the Performing Arts, the Museum of the City of New York and the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History. The robe that Schecter recently received had denim patches representing the down-home sensibilities of the previous season's "Shucked," and there was also a black panel from the 2023 "Sweeney Todd" revival on one of the robe's floor-length sleeves with a line on it from the show in blood-red yarn: "At last, my right arm is complete again."
Falling Pigs, Dollar Fridays and Other Diversions
All productions must find ways to make coming to work every day fun and surprising. The wardrobe crew on the 2024 Tony-winning play "Stereophonic" started an odd tradition in which cast and crew members take turns dropping a five-inch-long silicone pig down the four flights of the John Golden Theatre's stairwell when the actors receive their five-minute "places" call before the second act. Many people begin lending libraries of favorite books. During his ongoing stint in the musical "Hadestown," the actor Jordan Fisher, 30, also created his own more unique communal space: a stageside calibration station that acts as a type of shrine to which the company contributes crystals, stones, toys and flowers. According to Wallace, many London companies play a game in which everyone affixes a baby picture to the wall and then attempts to guess who's who.
But the most widespread -- and lucrative -- activity is Dollar Fridays, a raffle that Bevilacqua half-jokes is "where we make our money." The rules are simple: Someone (typically the production stage manager) passes around a kitty before the Friday evening performance; anyone is welcome to pitch in a dollar or more with their name written on it. Variations occur: Whole dressing rooms can enter as a unit, and famous actors are known to chip in extra. The winner is announced later in the evening -- some productions do it during intermission -- usually by the person organizing it. Certain shows allow participants to use Venmo. "But then," laments the 43-year-old former "Stereophonic" stage manager, Erin Gioia Albrecht, "you can't spread the dollar around the Theater District."
A Bright Light to Ward Off Accidents -- and Spirits
A ghost light is an exposed bulb that the head electrician or another crew member leaves center stage after hours so that nobody falls and hurts themselves in the dark. But for those with one foot in the supernatural world -- and, as Albrecht says, "it's certainly a superstitious industry" -- the light is there to keep evil spirits away ... or to provide friendly ghosts with a pleasant overnight experience. Many believe that every house on Broadway, the West End and beyond is haunted by any number of specters: the theater's original owner, making sure that things are running smoothly; an aggrieved actor, still out for that final bow; a doomed showgirl, cursed to remain in destiny's chorus.
Gonzalez, who starred in "Hamilton" from 2016 to 2022, recalls going into the cavernous Richard Rodgers Theatre to collect her belongings shortly after Covid-19 shut down Broadway for 18 months. "The ghost light was the only light on," she says. "Even though we were in a pandemic, I was proud the tradition stayed -- one day we were going to reopen, and we needed good vibes."
Other Curses and Hauntings
"I don't even mind a poltergeist," says LuPone, who believes she was haunted by Eva Perón's ghost throughout multiple runs of "Evita." In the world of pretend, she adds, "everything that goes along with the theater -- the magic, the superstitions -- just enhances one's performance." But even for nonbelievers, there's charm to be found in eerier traditions. Salonga, who doesn't consider herself "one of those people that attracts supernatural beings," would nonetheless offer a greeting while walking backstage at London's Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, to whichever ghosts might be haunting it, including the so-called Man in Gray, a mysterious figure with a cloak, sword and tricorn hat who supposedly roams around there.
Wallace learned the hard way that even practical customs can turn metaphysical. When Michael Ball, her co-star in the 2021 London Coliseum production of "Hairspray," caught her whistling backstage, he warned of bad times to come. No sailors dropped any beams on her head, but most of the cast soon came down with Covid, forcing the musical to temporarily close. And Gonzalez admits that she's not sure whether "Dance of the Vampires" bombed (it closed just over a month after opening) because of the material or because she didn't touch the Legacy Robe during its ceremony.
Perhaps the industry's best-known bylaw is that, unless acting in Shakespeare's early 17th-century play, one should never say the word "Macbeth" inside a theater -- otherwise you risk ruining the current production. The origins of this are predictably murky. The play traffics in things that might very well incur a hex -- witches, hauntings, grisly murders -- but one possible source could be the simple fact that, in an era when most theater companies operated in repertory (performing a rotating selection of popular works), "the Scottish play," as the piece can be safely referred to, was a guaranteed moneymaker. If your season was failing, it might be time to stage "Macbeth."
The way to lift the curse -- which LuPone enforced during a 2008 revival of "Gypsy," when its director and playwright, Arthur Laurents, accidentally uttered the word during previews, after which a cast member broke their pelvis -- is for the perpetrator to exit the theater, turn three times, spit over their left shoulder, swear, then say a line from another of Shakespeare's works or knock on the theater door to be allowed back in.
Shakespeare, in fact, invites a fair amount of shibboleths. As Longhurst says, "If your repertoire is classical or Greek plays, you begin to connect to the ancient rituals." A few years ago, the director learned of a site-specific one at Shakespeare's Globe in London: All shows there must end in a newly choreographed jig -- or chance a calamity. Longhurst was skeptical when directing a production of John Ford's 17th-century play " 'Tis Pity She's a Whore" in 2014 ("You finish and everyone is dead, and it's like, 'Well, now we get up and do a dance?'") but appreciated the creative challenge and came to see it as a way to counteract the show's grim finale.
That's hardly the only jinx that verges on the comical. Rumor has it that Daniel Frohman, the early 20th-century producer-manager of Broadway's Lyceum Theatre, would wave a white handkerchief from his office overlooking the stage whenever his overacting wife, Margaret Illington, needed to rein in her performance. Some actors, in flashes of ego death, still admit to seeing that hankie today.