Just out of curiosity, what happened to that cane to take people off the stage who are awful? To me that’s a more humane way to remove people from the public performance arena who shouldn’t be there, instead of the other custom of the public throwing orange peels, eggs, etc at the performer or listening to a certain well-known judge launch a diatribe of exactly how terrible a performance was. Some (not all) customs and practices should come back into being. Thanks and have a good day.
Well, the cane thing is kind of a Vaudville type device, so I assume the custome died with Vaudville. No?
Yeah, probably. I was just thinking it was used in the past in really any general performance event, but now that you mention it Vaudeville was what it was associated with. I’ve seen it in old television clips but obviously not in modern times.
I think they still use the cane in Sigapore for particularly poor performances.
It’s called the hook.
They still use it at the Apollo theater in Harlem!
Definitely from vaudeville.
It was asked a few years ago, and I answered with a cite from 1907.