OnStage Blog's Most Embarrassing Moments On Stage

Stage Fright is real, and it's natural for every performer to dread the bright lights, especially young performers. You are about to go on stage, the audience is buzzing, and you are terrified you will wilt under the pressure and embarrass yourself on stage.

Young performers especially feel this, and sometimes, the dread of Stage Fright stops them from wanting to become actors.

We feel this, and we’re here to tell all young actors: we have all embarrassed ourselves on stage. Don’t worry; if it happens, you’ll laugh about it, learn from it, and have a great story to tell afterward. We’ve all been there.

We were inspired by this great Reddit thread on embarrassing theatre stories to share our own. We ask our readers to tell their stories in the comments section of any of our social media posts.

Without further ado, here are our favorite embarrassing theatre stories:

Chris Peterson, OnStage Blog Founder/Editor-In-Chief

There was a time in college when I was in a production of "Look Homeward Angel," a very depressing drama. I was playing a doctor who had to pronounce a patient dead in the scene. Well, during tech week, my friend and I got the giggles because of the way I uttered the line "He's dyin'!" in a Southern accent.

During every single performance, I couldn't contain my laughter and often broke up during the scene, which was supposed to be extremely somber. I was half mortified, half laughing because I couldn’t help myself. The audience noticed, and my director was none too pleased. Every time, I swore I wouldn’t do it again, that I had got it out of my system, and then every performance, I couldn’t help but giggle once again.

Lesson learned, don’t ever workshop southern accents during rehearsals of somber dramatic plays.   

Jacklyn Collier, Actor, Acting Coach, Co-Host of The OnStage Blog Theatre Podcast

“I was in the ensemble for a production of Call Me Madam at Summerstock. The dinner was intense, we were doing 9 shows in 10 weeks with no days off. We were all a little sleep deprived and in one show, one of my friends made a hilarious face during one of the dance scenes. Ever the professional, I didn’t want to laugh and break character, but it was so funny that by holding in my laughter, I straight up peed my pants. It was still the first act, and my pantyhose was soaked through. It was mortifying.”

Hannah Crawford, Writer/Contributor OnStage Blog

“Back when I was a youth theatre student I had the opportunity to perform in a religious play. This was one of the main areas I was able to grow and blossom as an actress. I sure did love the spotlight, especially where it concerned a very dramatic moment. I was excited that my character had to trip and fall during the play and twist her ankle. I may or may not have loved being the center of attention for that. Well, opening night came and there I was on the second step ready for my big Broadway moment. 

When the signal from the other actor happened, I started walking, tumbled down the step, and "twisted" my ankle. So, the only thing was that I did it so well that the audience actually thought I legitimately fell and hurt myself. A family friend of mine jumped up from the back row and ran towards the stage to help me up. Yes, the play came to a halt while the director had to come out on stage and explain it was part of the play. To say I was embarrassed would be putting it lightly.

But, hey, at least I know I can act.”

Rachel Wagner, Theatre Critic, OnStage Blog Theatre Podcast Host

I was cast as Margaret in Much Ado About Nothing  in high school. We had an old stage at that was worn down and full of splinters and rough patches. Because I was plus size, even back then, my mother had actually made my dress for the show, and the hand-made hem started to fall apart as the show nights progressed.

One night, I was supposed to give the exciting news about Claudio's redemption to Hero and Beatrice and get off the stage when my dress caught on one of the splinters, and there was a loud tear in the front of my dress.

Fortunately, I had enough layers that nothing too bad was shown, but I was stuck to the stage, and all eyes were on me when I was supposed to be off stage. Eventually, I freed my dress and got off stage with quite a red face. Afterward, many expressed concerns about my dress, and one of my classmates’ mom even offered to repair it since my mother was out of town.

You could say all’s well that ends well. 

Greg Ehrhardt, OnStage Blog Editorial Staff

“The one and only musical I was cast in was for a hybrid production of Taming of The Shrew/Kiss Me Kate in Middle School. By hybrid, I mean it was basically Taming of The Shrew, except with only 2 songs from Kiss Me Kate. At the time, I could memorize the entire Bible if I wanted to (Now in my 40s, I can’t even memorize a 5-item grocery shopping list), so during auditions, when they saw I was the only kid who could run off a monologue without a book, I was immediately cast as Petruchio.

The problem was they didn’t bother having me sing in auditions, and once they heard me sing in rehearsals, well…they had to get another classmate to come on stage and sing next to me while I had to stand there looking tough. Some thought it was a way to share the spotlight; well, I’ll just let them keep thinking that!”

Jacklyn Collier

I was playing Adelaide in a school production of Guys & Dolls, and I lost my voice. It was a little bit workable since Adelaide is supposed to have a cold, but I was so exhausted from croaking out the songs that during the Take Back Your Mink number, I fell on someone’s mink and went down so hard on my butt.

As I got up, I winked at the audience and then sashayed to the back of the stage to join the rest of the Hot Box girls for the remainder of the number. No one broke character, which was impressive because I really bit it.

That’s showbiz, baby.

Chris Peterson

This story was not during a performance, thankfully, but I was in a play called "Don't Drink the Water". It was the final dress rehearsal and nothing was going right. The lines were being messed up; the set wasn't done. Our director had just about enough, and I tripped on stage and fell into a wall that wasn't finished, putting a gigantic hole in it. Our director threw her script in the air and left the building. 

By the way, the performance went fine, which just goes to show you how unimportant the final dress rehearsal can be!

Greg Ehrhardt

Chris won’t ever say this, but he is withholding his actual most embarrassing theatre moment. Even in middle school, Chris was known as Mr. Musical Theatre Guy, and I beat him out to play Petruchio in Kiss Me Kate in the story I described before. Mr. Musical Theatre himself was beat out by me, at the time, known only for being a math nerd.

Worse, Mr. Musical Theatre was cast to play Gremio, a suitor who loses out to Petruchio. Kudos to him, he stuck it out and gave it his all on stage despite playing second fiddle to the Math guy.

Of course, being the ball-buster I am, I still never, and will never, let him live that down that embarrassment.

Chris Peterson

I’ll end with this story. My high school performed The Sound of Music. I was cast as one of the Nazis. I’m Korean, and playing a Caucasian soldier in an army who perpetrated the Holocaust, albeit in a musical.

Even as a high schooler, it did not sit well with me, but I would do my job and get the experience. Then I saw 3 Jewish classmates who were also cast as Nazis.

Yeah, that happened. It was the 90s, and no one thought twice about this stuff then, especially at a prep school. I think only one English teacher protested this; God bless her.

But to all the young thespians out there, don’t worry about being embarrassed on stage. You can’t get worse than that.