The Stage

Chit chat: Prince Charmless gets his comeuppance

Published Tuesday 5 January 2010 at 11:30 by Tabard

Technology can be a dangerous thing in the wrong hands.

So found Owen Woodgate, a young actor appearing as Prince Charming in Lowestoft Marina Theatre’s pantomime this year.

Woodgate clearly wasn’t much enamoured of the Suffolk seaside town and used his Twitter account to post comments describing the place as a “shithole”, adding: “Everyone is pregnant. No Starbucks. Hoodies dominate the streets.”

In theory, this should have only been visible to people who had signed up as his friends on the social networking site, but unfortunately for Woodgate, a theatregoer stumbled over the comments while searching for information on the actor. Soon, the local papers were informed, the story was splashed over the front page and before Prince Charming could say ‘Oh no I didn’t’, he had a crowd of rather unhappy punters on his hands.

Sensibly, the 25 year old soon revised his opinion of the town, removed said comments and admitted that “his first impressions of the town were way off the mark” and that he was now having a “fantastic time”. Still, one would guess that he might not be back next year - even if they open a Starbucks.