FAQ

Showhouse got a little more complicated than I planned. Here's what everything does, so you don't have to guess.

Put Showhouse on your home screen

If you had the old Ghostlight icon, add Showhouse and delete the old one (press and hold it, then remove it). The old icon still works if you keep it. You may need to open showhouse.live in your phone's browser first to add it.

It opens like a real app and skips the browser bar. Takes about ten seconds.

• iPhone: open showhouse.live in Safari (not Chrome). Tap the Share button, scroll down, tap Add to Home Screen, then tap Add.
• Android: open showhouse.live in Chrome. Tap the ⋮ menu at the top right, then Add to Home screen (some phones say Install app). Tap Add.
• Computer: you don't need to, but Chrome and Edge have an install icon in the address bar.
• Can't find it? Use Send feedback at the bottom of any page and tell me what phone you have.

Who can see what

• Ratings and reviews are public to everyone in Showhouse. Always.
• What you've seen, want to see, and are going to is visible only to your friends. Strangers see your name, your city, and your public ratings and reviews. Add friends so you can see their plans too.
• “Just me” hides the night you went. Your rating and review stay visible to members.
• Private notes are yours alone. Judge freely.
• Admins can see the member list so they can fix things when they break. That's it.

How friends work

• Open Friends, search a name, and tap Add friend. They get a request. If they accept, you're friends. It goes both ways.
• Friends show up in “who's going,” in the Friends' plans filter, and in your Plans. You can also add each other to a night out.
• Not feeling it? Tap No thanks. They won't get a notification. You can also remove a friend any time.
• There's no list of every member to browse. That felt creepy. Search by name instead.
• Anyone who invited you is already your friend. So is anyone you invite.

Home, decoded

• Theater, Comedy, Dance, Opera: tap a kind to pick it, tap it again to clear it, and pick as many as you like. Nothing picked shows everything. Theater is plays and musicals. Comedy is comedy and improv. Showhouse remembers your choice. The Filters button has a Show type list (plays, musicals, opera, dance, comedy, other) if you want exact types.
• Next 4 days, Friends going, My list: one-tap views at the top. Next 4 days is today and the next three, for any show whose run includes one of those days. Friends going shows what your friends have planned. My list is what you're going to and want to see.
• Filters: under Whose shows you can pick Everything, My theaters, Following, My list or Friends' plans. You can also pick one theater or several, change the season or sort order, hide shows already on your list, limit to shows with awards (a nomination or honor for the show, or a recent win by its writer or director; Winners only narrows it), or look at shows that have closed. Accessible performances are a setting under Settings, Accessibility.
• The sections: Playing now, Opening in the next 30 days, Later this season, and Dates to be announced.
• Tonight card: when you have a night planned for today, it sits at the top with the venue and your seats. About 15 minutes after the show should be over it turns into How was it?, with stars to tap. Seen it early? Tap Rate now.

Where things live

• The tab bar on a phone: Now playing, Search, Add, Friends and Me.
• Menu: Reviews, Best of, Deals, My season, Settings, About and FAQ. Admins also see Admin.
• Me: your coming-up nights, your diary, your want list, Discounts you offer to friends, and Settings. Members with an artist or theater page also get My artist page and Auditions.
• Awards: on Best of, under Honored last season, tap All awards.
• Following: in Settings, with each theater or person and whether alerts are on. Tap one to change it.

My theaters vs. follow

Starring a theater is a bookmark. It gives you a one-tap view of what's on there. Following is a commitment. It tells you about new shows from a theater, director, actor or writer, and it asks whether to put their upcoming shows on your want list too. Star lightly. Follow on purpose.

Everyone you follow lives on the Following list in Settings, and the Following button on Home shows just their shows. New ones also turn up in the bell and in the monthly email, and in the weekly one if you turn it on.

Adding shows

• Type the title and the date you're going. Showhouse fills in the rest from the theater's website. If it gets something wrong, fix it. Anyone can.
• To change a show after you add it, open the show and tap Edit details. For a theater, open its page and tap Edit details under its name.
• Got a confirmation email? Paste it into “Add from a receipt.” Three tickets to the same show become one visit with three seats. They used to become three shows. That was embarrassing.
• Already have the show on your list and just bought tickets? Tap “Going,” open “Got a confirmation email?” and paste it. The date, time and seats fill in for you.
• Going with friends? Under your Going line, tap Add someone. Add puts the night on their page now, with a note and a Remove for them. Ask first sends an invite they can answer with Join or Not that night. Each person has their own seats. Someone not on Showhouse yet? Copy an invite right there.

How do I take the tour again?

Open Take the tour. It is five short cards. You can also find the link at the top of this page and on the About page when you are signed in.

Talking about shows

• Under every review you can tap Same, Disagree or Thanks, and leave a comment. Thanks is for when you have not seen the show and the review helped. Replies go one level deep so it stays readable on a phone.
• A review shows how many people responded (reactions plus comments) once it has two or more. On your own reviews you always see the count, and only you see it. On Reviews and on a show page you can sort by Most responded.
• Local voice is a small tag beside a member whose reviews readers in one city rely on. Jesse sets it by hand. It does not change anyone's rating or the averages. The Voices chip on Reviews shows just their reviews.
• Comments are public to everyone in Showhouse, like the reviews they sit under. The latest ones show up in a Discussion section on the show's page, so you can jump in even if you haven't reviewed it.
• Talking about the ending? Tick Spoilers and your comment hides behind a tap.
• You can delete your own comments. Admins can delete any.

Claiming a theater or artist page

• Work at a theater, or you're the actor, director or writer on an artist page? Tap “Claim this page.” Tell us who you are and how we can check. An admin reviews every claim.
• Once you're approved, the page says ✓ Verified. Theater managers can mark their official recommendations, and artists can add a bio.
• Claiming does not give you any say over reviews, ratings or comments. Not even a little. The facts are yours to keep right. The opinions stay with the people who had them.

Critics

Show pages can list what critics said, as an outlet, a short label like “Reviewed” or “YAY,” and a link. Never the review itself. Seen one we missed? Add it. Please keep it to the label and the link.

Where the show details come from

When a show is added, we read the theater's own page once and fill in dates, cast and a summary in our own words. Some shows also get one short line quoted from the theater, in quotation marks, with their name and a link back. We only look up current and upcoming shows. Past seasons are whatever members entered. If something's wrong, use Edit details.

Where to look

On the Best of page, “Where to look” lists outside sites that cover your city: review sites, picks, calendars and a few good blogs, with links straight to their theater, dance and comedy pages. They're other people's work, so we link and never copy. Know a good one we're missing? Send feedback.

What we count

To see what's worth improving, we count which pages and features get used, and how many members use them. We never record what you write, rate or look at. Admins see totals, not a trail of anyone's clicks. Page views also go through Vercel's analytics, which uses no cookies.

Auditions

Verified performers and theaters get an Auditions row on Me. It lists open calls with a link to apply, deadlines first, starting with your home city. Theater managers can post their own. If you don't see it, it's because your page isn't claimed yet. Claim it and an admin will take a look.

The bell

It collects deals, friend requests, a friend moving a night you shared, comments and replies on your reviews, a nudge to rate shows you saw a few days ago, want-list shows about to close, and friends going to something on your list. Clear one with the X or clear them all. Cleared stays cleared.

Seasons

Theaters name their own seasons, and they don't all start in September. Best of uses each show's own label, so “2026–27” means whatever that theater says it means.

Rating a show you worked on

Tell Showhouse about your connection when you rate it. The rating still shows, with a note, but it stays out of the group average. Fair is fair.

Your stuff

• Settings has a private calendar link, so your plans can show up in your phone's calendar.
• You can download your whole diary from Settings any time.
• Sign-in is a 6-digit code emailed to you. No passwords to forget.

Why did the name change?

Showhouse was called Ghostlight until October 2026. Some angry lawyers from another Ghostlight company asked us to pick a different name. Your account, friends, plans and ratings came along unchanged, and the old address sends you to showhouse.live.

Something broken, or still confused?

Use Send feedback at the bottom of any page, or email hello@showhouse.live. If it confused you, it's probably my fault, and I'd like to fix it.

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