Mounting Moviegoer Misbehavior? Our Survey Says It’s a Myth

Theres nothing more annoying in a movie theater than sitting near someone who whips out their phone during the film to scroll through TikTok with the sound on, to boot.

Still, the recent rise in discourseacross social mediaandthink piecesthat indicate more moviegoing audiences seem to be misbehaving, with post-lockdown societal problems cited as a factor, warrants further analysis.

Exclusive survey data YouGov shared with Variety Intelligence Platform makes a rather counterintuitive suggestion:Audiences are no more disruptive than theyve always been.

More than half of U.S. adults who have gone to the movies in the last 12 months said they havent noticed a change in disruptive behavior, according to the survey, fielded this week among 1,171 recent moviegoers out of a total sample of 2,459 U.S. adults. Further, 18% said audiences are actually less disruptive now.

Still, nearly three in ten said disruptive behavior has increased either a little (19%) or much more (10%).

For such complainers, phone use appears to be a bigger culprit than talking over the movie.

What also appears true is that as far as summers at the box office go, 2023s was beyond peculiar. Multiple tentpoles from previously sturdy franchises including the DC Extended Universe, Indiana Jones and even Mission: Impossible underperformed, as unexpected hits lacking big-name talent such as Sound of Freedom defied expectations to become hits.

Butwhat may have been strangest about the summer of 2023 at the box office was the simultaneous success of Warner Bros. Barbie and Universals Oppenheimer. Both films brought out more people than usual to theaters, especially folks who had otherwise stopped going, with nearly a quarter of Barbie viewers saying they hadnt been to the movies since before COVID.

Furthermore, respondents were mostly indifferent about the possibility of disruption, suggesting that most audiences won't be dissuaded from still going to the movies.

Overall, 41% of those surveyed said they havent experienced or heard about disruptive behavior, while only a quarter said such behavior makes them less likely to go to the cinema.

Likewise, most respondents still dont buy the idea that lockdown led to a widespread forgetting of manners in public settings, including how to behave in movie theaters.

As outrageous as the tales in some articles have been, disruptive audiences appear to be part and parcel of the moviegoing experience, a cinema norm that clearly predates COVID. Streaming platforms havent gone anywhere, so those who detest the presence of others in a space like the cinema have had an alternative option for years now.