Laughing Man

Last night my husband and I went to see a play called "God of Carnage." It was a Broadway box-office hit in 2009, but then it starred four seasoned actors, one of whom was James Gandolfino, a.k.a. Tony Soprano, always a hoot to watch. Naturally we lowered our expectations somewhat for Portland's finest thespians, but still-- nothing could have prepared us for what happened: The man sitting directly next to Mitch was in possession of a disturbingly loud, raucous, honking, persistent and downright imbecilic laugh, which he employed at random moments during the performance, very few of which were even funny. (I personally smiled a couple of times, and once I may have chuckled, but overall the play was not as funny as even a bad TV sitcom.)

Laughing Man sounded like Paul Bunyan laughing. He was the Jolly Green Giant, the Incredible Hulk, perhaps the Loch Ness Monster of laughing. Each laugh had the effect of a gunshot ringing out, bringing to mind Abe Lincoln slumping over at Ford's Theater. The thing is, Laughing Man looked perfectly normal and even had a date, and she never once told him to "pipe down." (A wife would have.) Fortunately the people in the row behind us were going nuts too, which gave me some solace that at least Mitch and I hadn't been singled out by God for the suffering.

I grew more and more pissed-off, but my husband, Mother Theresa, charitably pointed out that laughs come out of you and that's that, whereas I wondered: can the sound of our laughter be controlled or is it just the way it is, like our height or hair color?

Anyway, let the record show that Laughing Man ruined the evening for everyone, most probably the performers as well. His laugh resonated within the somewhat small theater, and instead of hearing what the actors were saying you heard that laugh, and then recovered from hearing it. Each and every time the booming laugh erupted, Mitch and I exchanged incredulous glances, shocked anew. One time Mitch toyed with the idea of laughing the very same way just to show Laughing Man how awful it was; I advised against it, saying the audience had suffered enough. These whispered exchanges cost us precious dialog, causing us to fall further behind in the story line and thus hindering our enjoyment further, although I guess that was pretty much our own fault.

Just saying--I  would have had a great time except for that guy. From now on, to be safe I am only going to attend dramas, no more comedies. Too risky.