Cooing baby kicked out of Kenneth Branagh’s Tempest performance
Posted by TheTelegraph
Cooing baby kicked out of Kenneth Branagh’s Tempest performance
Posted by TheTelegraph
12 Comments
**From The Telegraph:**
A cooing baby was kicked out of a performance of Shakespeare’s The Tempest starring Sir Kenneth Branagh.
Audience members demanded refunds after the infant disrupted the first hour of the play at the Royal Shakespeare Company’s theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire.
At the interval, the theatre told the mother of the baby to watch the rest of the play on television screens in the adjoining café.
Sian Morgan, 53, said the infant was awoken by the storm which opens the play that centres on magic and shipwrecks on a remote island.
“Thank goodness there was never any actual screaming or crying but it was gurgling and cooing and chirping very loudly throughout,” she told the Daily Mail.
“It never let up. They were sitting in the highest tier, the second circle, but it’s a very compact theatre so everyone in the room could hear it – no doubt including Sir Kenneth and the rest of the cast.”
The baby’s interruptions “never stopped” and “by the end people were audibly tutting and turning around to show their displeasure”, she said.
During the interval, attendees complained to ticket sellers and the ushers to demand refunds if the baby was allowed in for the second act.
But the mother was “completely unapologetic”, Ms Morgan said.
“I heard her saying, ‘She’s only a baby – and she’ll probably fall asleep soon anyway’,” she said.
“It did seem extraordinarily entitled to be honest – a weird arrogance when it was plain she had massively overstepped the mark.
“Finally some very stressed manager type did gently insist that it wasn’t fair on other audience members for them to return for the second part but she could watch it from the cafe on TV monitors.”
**Read more here:** [https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/06/09/baby-disrupts-kenneth-branagh-tempest/?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_reddit&accesscontrol=facebookchannel_open](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/06/09/baby-disrupts-kenneth-branagh-tempest/?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_reddit&accesscontrol=facebookchannel_open)
People need to stop treating theatres like their own private living rooms
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Sure, take a baby *to watch a live performance of a play called The Tempest.* Only good things can come from that parenting choice.
Good. I was there. Baby was a total dick.
It depends on the size of the baby, but they literally kick some out like a football… …
The Brit pearl clutching makes me feel quite homesick
If you can afford the tickets for this, you can assuredly afford a babysitter or even a favor from a friend…
“Cooing” seems to be downplaying this tremendously. Be more courteous to others.
Normalize banning parents accompanied by children from adult spaces. No one should have to accommodate you just because you decided to make a poop machine. Take responsibility and find a sitter.
I thought the article was calling Kenneth Branagh a cooing baby haha, sounds about right
Breaking news: Babies are loud
ngl I don’t know what baby cooing is, I’ve heard it phrased that way, but is it really bird noises?