Trigger Warnings
ON THE EVENING OF APRIL 14, 1865, WELL-known actor John Wilkes Booth entered Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C. during a performance of Our American Cousin, presented his calling card to an usher at Abraham Lincoln’s box, was permitted entry, and fatally shot the President at point blank range.
Last February Variety reported that during the climactic duel in Hamilton in San Francisco, a woman in the audience had a heart attack, and the commotion around her led some audience members to believe an actual shooting was in progress. At least one audience member yelled “Gun!” and attendees rushed to the exits. In the melee, three people were injured, including one person who suffered a broken leg.
Six months later and on the other coast, there were no injuries, but hundreds of people were terrified when, just before 10 p.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 6, according to a Twitter post from the NYPD, passing motorcycles backfired and “sounded like gun shots,” causing panic in Times Square and interrupting performances inside several
