Overworked, overrated and overexposed actor Matthew Horne recently collapsed of exhaustion during a stage performance of Entertaining Mr Sloane in London's West End. But he can rest easy, as he's not the first big-name star who's cause a fracas at the theatre...
Possibly the most famous stage shocker came courtesy of Stephen Fry, who disappeared from his lead role in the slated play Cell Mates only to surface in Belgium several days later. The star later blamed a hypomanic episode, and has since become well known for his willingness to discuss his manic depression.
Anybody attending a show starring Richard Griffiths would be well-advised to keep their mobiles switched off. He famously halted a production of Heroes so he could boot the owner of one persistent ringer out of the performance, bellowing "The 750 people here would be fully justified in suing you for ruining their afternoon."
Theatregoers were appalled by the hammy performance of Richard Dreyfuss at the Old Vic earlier this year. After all, there's no excuse for fluffing your lines when you appear to be having them fed to you through an earpiece – a tactic that left one critic claiming that the actor's lug was the show's real star.
Todd Carty put Mark Fowler well behind him when he joined the cast of touring play The Business of Murder, but he couldn't quite escape the drums of Walford past. The star ended up collapsing on stage, and later claimed that he'd forgotten to take some medication for an ear infection. Boo!
Batty Broadway icon Liza Minnelli has spent her entire life on stage – but despite this she managed to fall off one during a show in Gothenburg. The gin-soaked roly-poly was rushed back to New York for medical tests, but the reason for her collapse was never revealed.
In 2002, Avengers star Gareth Hunt collapsed on stage with a suspected heart attack at the Bournemouth Pier Theatre. However, a bewildered audience assumed that the actor's agony was part of the drama, and continued to applaud.
In 1989, Daniel Day-Lewis made his much-publicised return to the theatre in a production of Hamlet. However, at one point he burst into tears and made for the exit, later claiming that he thought he'd seen his father's ghost. Nobody has employed him to tread the boards since.
Finally, the most notorious on-stage disaster was when much-loved fez-sporter Tommy Cooper collapsed of a heart attack and died halfway through his act at Her Majesty's Theatre in 1984 – an incident broadcast live by ITV.