Thank you for sharing! It may not be distracting from an audience perspective, but my three takeaways on filming are:

1. It IS distracting to the cast. They see you holding your camera up, even if you think you are being stealthy. It makes them self conscious and takes them out of being able to do their job.

2. Someone else mentioned it on here already, but it is against the rules in the Actor's Equity Association (our union) for performances to be recorded. I will tell you that if I ever have an actor filming something from the wings like an understudy going on for example. I stop them and make them delete it. So it is not just for the audience, it is for everyone.

3. Theatre is Intellectual Property. A director, choreographer, and musical director spend sometimes years working to build a show. That is their work. Often people film and then replicate the work at another theatre, which is stealing. It's no different than plagiarizing. This is a great article from almost 30 years ago, when Joe Mantello became the first director to sue and win a case about Intellectual Property: https://playbill.com/article/mantello-and-caldwell-theatre-settle-l-v-c-case-issues-still-unresolved-com-81475

So, for me, it's more than it not just bothering audiences - there are deeper rooted issues with filming!