Kanye West Apologizes for Using Phone During ‘The Cher Show’ Opening

The Cher Show, a musical about music icon Cher’s life and career, opened December 3 on Broadway at the Neil Simon Theatre. According to Playbill, the musical “incorporates 35 of Cher’s songs, from her career-launching 1965 duet with Sonny Bono, ‘I Got You Babe,’ to her 2013 dance album Closer to The Truth.” Among the opening night’s invited guests was Kanye West who, according to Tony-nominee Jarrod Spector, was on his phone throughout the show.

Spector, who plays Sonny Bono, took to Twitter to call out West, addressing him directly over the app. He wrote, “If you look up from your cell phone you’ll see we’re doing a show up here.” All Broadway shows ask audience members to silence and put away their phones before the show starts, out of respect for the actors and fellow audience members. If that wasn’t enough for West, Spector also pointed out that he was on his phone during the show’s first official performance: “It’s opening night. Kind of a big deal for us.”

West did not immediately respond to Spector’s tweet, but he did post a YouTube link on Twitter less than an hour after Spector called him out for being on his phone.

Then, at 10:05pm ET, Kanye West tweeted an apology to “Cher and the Cher show team” asking them to “pardon [his] lack of etiquette,” before calling the show a “master piece.” He made special consideration to note Spector’s role in the show, saying the “dynamics of Cher and Sonny’s relationship made Kim and I grab each other’s hand and sing ‘I got you babe.'”

Patti Murin, who currently stars on Broadway as Anna in Disney’s Frozen, applauding his tweet, writing “JARROD SPECTOR I AM IN LOVE WITH YOU FOR SO MANY REASONS BUT RIGHT NOW THIS IS NUMBER ONE AND TWO AND THREE AND FOUR.” Another user remarked that “Patti LuPone is proud of this tweet,” in reference to that time when LuPone took a phone away from an audience member who was texting during her performance of Shows for Days.