Spoiler alert: Trigger warnings coming to a theater near you

Following a trend bubbling up from college campuses, theaters across the country are offering increasingly comprehensive and specific trigger warnings.|

DENVER - The warning sign was just outside the theater door.

“Please be advised,” it cautioned, in capital letters. “This production contains: Strobe lighting effects. Sudden loud noises. Theatrical fog/haze. Scenes of violence. Adult language. Sexual situations. Adult humor and content.”

The subject was a play called “Vietgone,” about a Vietnamese couple who meet in a refugee camp in Arkansas during the Vietnam War. The Denver Center Theater Company was proud to present the boisterous comedy, but it was taking few chances about surprising audiences: online, patrons who hovered over an alert on the theater’s website could get pop-up details on the timing of the show’s loud explosions.

Not so long ago, a theatergoer was handed a program, shown to a seat and left to enjoy the show. Then came notices about strobe lights and smoking. But now, following a trend bubbling up from college campuses, theaters across the country are offering increasingly comprehensive and specific trigger warnings.

The phenomenon has led to discussions at theaters large and small, pitting a traditional impulse - ?to preserve art’s ability to surprise, shock and stir - against a ?modern desire to accommodate sensitivities and not alienate paying customers.

“This production may trigger an adverse reaction,” Baltimore Center Stage said of “Wasted,” a play about the aftermath of an alcohol-fueled sexual encounter.

In Sarasota, Florida, Asolo Repertory Theater not only disclosed “potentially disturbing, realistically depicted gun violence” in “Gloria,” which depicts a workplace shooting, but also included plot particulars in a spoiler section on its website.

Philadelphia’s Interact Theater Company went one step further: In addition to warning that “Sensitive Guys” dealt with sexual assault, the company designated a “safe space” in the lobby and invited representatives of Women Organized Against Rape to talk to patrons upset by the material.

Even theatrical war horses are not exempt: For its recent production of “Oklahoma,” St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn handed out a black card when patrons picked up their tickets, warning of gunshots as well as “moments of darkness and violence” and offering guidance for those who feel compelled to walk out.

Trigger warnings have, of course, become part of the college experience, surviving mockery and concerns about censorship to win acceptance, if not broad approval. Now demand for those warnings is spreading among the wider public. “People who have grown up with warnings now expect them,” said Becky Witmer, managing director of ACT Theater in Seattle.

The development also reflects the shifting content of contemporary drama - as mass shooting deaths have risen in the United States, for example, more plays are depicting such events.

But Shakespeare was plenty violent, too. “What’s different now ?is that there is genuine consideration given to the unseen and ?unknown potential for harm when someone is traumatized in ways that could have been avoided,” said James Bundy, dean of the Yale School of Drama.

Not everyone likes the idea, though, and some arts leaders maintain that theater should be unsettling and provocative.

“We have a generation coming of age that expects to be protected from discomfort, and a lot of companies succumb to that,” said Susie Medak, managing director of Berkeley Repertory Theater. “To me, it’s a frustrating trend - what’s the point of experiencing art if you don’t expect to be surprised?”

Her theater does not provide trigger warnings but instead advises those with concerns about specific forms of content to call the box office and ask.

Although trigger warnings are often thought of as a phenomenon of the political left, theaters in socially conservative parts of the country are also embracing more descriptive content alerts.

“In our market, strong language and sexual innuendo tend to be the leading causes of negative patron reactions,” said Katie Perkowski, marketing director for the Alabama Shakespeare Festival. She said that some audience members had even walked out of “Annie” because Daddy Warbucks said “damn.”

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