Keller Auditorium — Attraction in Portland

Well, I was extremely excited to see Wicked at the Keller Auditorium…so much so that I bought tickets for my wife and I seven months in advance. When we got to the auditorium we were a bit early so we sat at the top of the auditorium fountain and watched some skaters do their thing, which was fairly entertaining! Before the lines got too long we decided to go get in one of them. We didn’t have to wait all that long before we were able to enter the venue. Once we got into the lobby we thought maybe we should get a drink and a snack…. Fifty-two dollars later we both had a salted soft pretzel, and a semi cold twelve ounce can of Jack Daniel’s Ginger Ale! My wife tapped the screen like WTF, and I thought that I might have needed glasses, but before I could even comprehend the amount of money that I am about to pay for what I was getting, the pretzels were salted and both the drinks were on the counter and opened….not opened by either my wife or me, but rather opened by the cashier!! TELL ME THEY DON’T KNOW THAT THEY ARE RIPPING YOU OFF! Now I know that places like this make money on the snacks, but come on, we spent six hundred dollars on two tickets to see the show! That being said, we weren’t allowed to bring the pretzels into the theater, but we could bring in the drinks. So standing in line to enter the theater we had to eat our pretzels, or throw them away! Don’t get me wrong, everybody that we encountered to this point was very friendly… but come on fifty-two dollars and I can’t even bring in the food that I bought at the venue! Ok, whatever! When we got into the theater, minus our pretzels, but with our now warm drinks in hand we had no problems finding our seats. The theater was actually pretty cool! Once in, we had probably less than twenty minutes to wait for the show to start. WOO HOO! The show is starting, and the stage looked amazing! THE PROBLEM IS, IS THAT I WAS UNABLE TO UNDERSTAND REALLY ANYTHING THAT WAS BEING SAID, I WAS ABLE TO CATCH EVERY THIRD WORD OF EVERY FITH SENTENCE! EVEN WORSE WICKED IS A MUSICAL, AND WHEN THE ACTORS/ ACTRESSES WERE SINGING I WASN’T ABLE TO UNDERSTAND REALLY ANYTHING! Here is the thing, when a person is learning to act they are taught to project their voice, and that is exactly what they did! THEY PROJECTED THEIR VOICES DIRECTLY INTO A MIC THAT WAS TURNED UP WAY TO LOUD, SO I WAS ABLE TO HEAR THE ACTOR/ACTRESS, BUT THEN A SPLIT SECOND LATER, WHAT THEY WERE SAYING….OR EVEN WORSE SINGING CAME THROUGH ON THE SOUND SYSTEM WHICH JUST MADE ANYTHING BEING SAID OR SUNG A JUMBLED MESS!!!! I’m sure everyone did a good job. I WOULDN’T KNOW, ABOUT FOURTY-FIVE MINUTES INTO THE SHOW I LOOKED AT MY WIFE AND TOLD HER THAT I WASN’T ENJOYING MYSELF AT ALL AND SHE AGREED….SO WE GOT UP AND LEFT! THE FUNNY THING IS, ON OUR WAY OUT OF THE THEATER, WHEN WE ENTERED THE LOBBY, WE WERE BOTH ABLE TO UNDERSTAND WHAT WAS BEING SAID, AND COULD EVEN UNDERSTAND WHAT WAS BEING SUNG! VERY DISAPPOINTED! WHAT A RIP OFF! STICK TO SMALL THEATER, IT DOESN’T COST AN ARM AND A LEG, AND THEY DON’T THINK THEY NEED TO DEPEND ON A SOUND SYSTEM!...

I want to preface this review with the fact that my understanding is that a new "Keller" is being built in the future and I just hope that someone, somewhere is reading reviews of the current facility and takes some suggestions to heart. First, this is a beautiful old theater. Not like the Schnitz but in a more Kennedy Center vibe... but on a much smaller scale. Admittedly, a few things stuck out to me as issues. First, the layout of the main floor is not great for the immense crowds that are coming in and exiting. Lines for snacks and merch weaved into each other and required ushers to create breaks that were easily swallowed up by a group stepping through to where no one knew where the lines started. Second, the elevator was painfully slow, and I'm not sure if there was a second one on the other side, but it seemed that there wasn't. Third, the bathroom situation, especially on the top level where there are only 4 stalls in the ladies' restroom... well, I feel bad for those who jumped out of line at the last call of intermission. After 15 minutes of intermission, the bathroom line was still snacked around half of the upstairs. When will architects and engineers realize the women need more stalls and larger spaces than men? We go in groups, so often there is someone just standing and waiting for their friend. We take longer than men. It isn't just zip, pull, pee, zip, wash, and out ya go. It's placing the seat liner, a near full undressing (sometimes a full undressing if you're in a jumper or overalls), potty, wiping, redressing, flushing, adjusting purse or clothing, washing, check hair and face, THEN leave... if your friends are also done. Why is NONE of this considered in restroom designs? And even if you do consider it, there will still be a line because we all show up at the same time at intermission, so ensuring the door way is wide enough for people to go in and out past each other is critical. Lastly, and probably the most critical issue was the exiting of the theater. As I was cattled down the stairs with hundreds of other people, I couldn't help but wonder what would've happened had there been a fire. People were congregating on the sidewalk outside the doors so folks in the stairs couldn't get out, short of shoving folks. The cars on the street outside were near running people over as the crowd crossed against the light, which was the only reason any of us could get out at all.

I love the history of this building and the stories those walls must hold... sigh is seen some amazing times and performances, for sure. Sadly, I just think it's reached its capacity for entertaining the masses. It still deserves 4 stars, though, for all it's faults, they truly make the best of a challenging situation, and this night, although a challenge at times, was...

Twice I had problems with Keller Auditorium. A month ago I had purchased Shen tickets and arrived 30-minutes before the show with an E-ticket and had issue with opening the app Stubhub for 40-minutes. I showed the order information with order #, cost, seats and the whole time Keller had a phone number to Stubhub. Keller staff said Stub Hub will send a ticket directly to me in this circumstance. Keller was wrong. After repeating the steps numerous times with Stubhub on the phone I finally got a bar code to use at the box office. The show already began 40 minutes earlier.

Today my son wanted to see a play and the lowest ticket price was at Stubhub. Repeating similar problems with Stub Hub I went to Google to find Kellers box office phone number and the problem wasn’t any different than Stub Hub. Calling the person tells you to call a direct number which they won’t provide, it’s not on Kellers website or on Google, there’s a local number but it too doesn’t go to the ticket sales box office. There is essentially zero way to reach the box office by phone after M-F 5pm. Showing up there is as big a problem because you have to find parking which can be several blocks away just to ask the simple question “Do you have _ tickets for _ and how much are they?”

There are empty seats on the day of shows. You just can’t get a ticket and too often the cost doubles.

At Shen there were six empty floor seats to my right.

The other major issue is the “fee” to sell you the tickets. It’s massive. Never should a ticket seller have a fee based on the cost of your ticket. It’s a chair you’re renting for 3-hours. The chair doesn’t come with accessories based on the show. If I watch a TED talk for $35 or a Shen ballet for $200 it’s the same chair. Buyers shouldn’t pay $12 extra for the fee for a TED talk and $60 fee for a Shen Ballet. It’s wrong guys and that is called price jacking. Another issue I saw is that Stub Hub had a Beetle Juice ticket for sale at $125 and of course with massive website problems I couldn’t not log on. Finally downloading an app the same seat was shown as “sold 4-hours ago”. Well that must have been the fastest 5-minutes I’ve ever experienced. We’ve moved too far away from human experience that humans no longer use empathy in business.

Buying tickets online is a convenience but also fraught with deception. All of the ticket sites show the cost of the ticket then ask for your credit card information then don’t show you the fees and taxes until it charges your card. A $75 ticket could be charged at $150 with undisclosed fees and taxes.

This is an area that...