Don’t go to the theatre, Dame Judi Dench has told “sensitive” fans, in her response to pre-performance trigger warnings.
The warnings, which inform audiences about potentially distressing content, including abuse, violence and loud noises, have become a point of contention in the industry in the last few years.
“Do they do that?” Dench said in an interview with the Radio Times. “My God, it must be a pretty long trigger warning before King Lear or Titus Andronicus!”
The Oscar-winning actor, 89, added: “I can see why they exist, but if you’re that sensitive, don’t go to the theatre, because you could be very shocked. Where is the surprise of seeing and understanding it in your own way?”
Her comments come after Gregory Doran, the former artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare company also warned anxious audience members to avoid plays so that they would not be upset by distressing content.
“How do you do [content warnings] for Titus Andronicus?” Doran said. “You just don’t come. Don’t come if you are worried, if you are anxious – stay away.”
Content warnings have split the theatre community, with some likening them to warnings about strobe lighting, which can trigger seizures, while others say they diminish the power of art and literature to shock and discomfit.
Others who have spoken out against them include Christopher Biggins and Ralph Fiennes, who suggested modern audiences had “gone too soft”. “Theatre needs to be alive and in the present. It’s the shock, it’s the unexpected, that’s what makes the theatre so exciting,” Fiennes added.
Discussing her 1980s sitcom A Fine Romance, Dench also reflected on what else had changed in the industry since she first started out – including actors using mics on stage and self-taped auditions. “[It] puts you at a distance … it takes you further away from the audience,” she said. “The way we communicate seems to be getting more and more remote.”
Last month, Olivia Colman joined the chorus of Hollywood stars expressing their distaste for self-taped auditions, saying she wouldn’t “have gotten where I am if I’d had to do self-tapes”.
