Bleating cellphones and boorish behaviour have upset audiences at Christchurch's Southern Opera.
Performers in The Magic Flute season at the Isaac Theatre Royal have held their nerve, however, avoiding a repetition of Australian actor Hugh Jackman's fury at a Broadway audience chatterbox last week.
Southern Opera spokeswoman Donna Alley said "quite a few cellphones were going off" on the opening night of The Magic Flute on September 29.
Over following nights, a drunk man allegedly "accosted" a female member of the audience, and another man was reprimanded for using his camera.
"I would have expected after the first one [cellphone ring] people would have scurried into their handbags to turn off their phones, but it was not the case," Alley said.
The performers had behaved as though nothing happened when the ringing started.
"They have noticed, I must say, especially with people answering their telephone and getting up and leaving to have a conversation," Alley said.
One man standing at the back of the theatre had claimed he was using the zoom on his camera to get a good view of the stage.
"In the end, the batteries were removed," Alley said. "Obviously, his glasses weren't functioning properly."
Cameras were dangerous for their flash as startled actors could fall up to five metres from the stage, she said.
Southern Opera had cast the net for a wider audience this year, but Alley said this was unlikely to be behind the ill-mannered interruptions.
Jackman last week turned his frustration at a constantly ringing cellphone on to the New York audience during a crucial scene in A Steady Rain.
"You want to get that?" Jackman told the cellphone offender.
When the ringing continued, Jackman added: "Come on, just turn it off."