Miley Cyrus’ Something Beautiful film premiere at Tribeca on Friday night was for the most part, a celebratory evening as the superstar basked in love from her fans as she unveiled one of her most ambitious projects in her two-decade career.
That is, except for a few rude outbursts from fans who didn’t seem to know the event they purchased tickets for was a film screening, not a performance. “We thought this was a concert, we paid $800,” one fan shouted. “Are you actually going to sing?” another one yelled.
To be clear, yelling at an artist to perform like a court jester in the middle of their film premiere is never warranted, and those who interrupted the discussion should learn better etiquette. Since the event, Miley fans have come to her defense, calling out the behavior as disrespectful. Still, beneath that uncomfortable exchange, last night’s event also provides a window into how confusing the ticketing industry can often be for the unaware fan.
According to several aggrieved attendees who spoke with The Hollywood Reporter or posted online since last night, the issue appears to trace back to listings on third-party resale platforms, which have little connection to Cyrus, the Beacon Theatre, or Tribeca beyond selling re-listed tickets for the event. Following the premiere, several fans took to social media saying they saw advertisements from resale platforms like StubHub and VividSeats that they said suggested Cyrus would be performing. On X Friday night, one fan posted a screenshot of a VividSeats link that said “Miley Cyrus & 2025 Endless Summer Vacation Tour. (There is no such tour, Cyrus hasn’t had an official headlining tour in over a decade.)
It’s unclear how many fans were unaware of the type of event they were actually attending. Cyrus and Tribeca had both consistently marketed the premiere as a film event, not a performance or a concert.
Inside the packed venue, there were almost no empty seats ,and fans responded enthusiastically to Cyrus and the film, cheering as she walked into the audience and took her seat and during multiple points in the performance-heavy visual album. Despite the noticeable interruption, audience members seemed eager to hear what Cyrus had to say, and there were a handful of “I love you”s from the crowd.
Still, exiting the venue, at least one slightly irritated audience member asked nearby festivalgoers if they knew Cyrus wouldn’t be singing. Meanwhile, quite a few others posted complaints online afterward. Three attendees who spoke with THR said they purchased tickets after seeing StubHub and Vivid Seats ads on Instagram that suggested a full-fledged concert.
Reps for StubHub and VividSeats didn’t respond to requests for comment. Reps for the festival didn’t respond to a request for comment and Cyrus’ rep couldn’t be reached.
Kate Fiore, a 27-year-old New York resident, tells THR that her younger sister had flown out from Houston to attend the event together and that they spent a combined $1,700 for their tickets on VividSeats. Fiore says she’d purchased the tickets in April after seeing a VividSeats ad on Instagram, which she said didn’t give any indication that it was a film premiere.
“Had I seen anywhere from that VividSeats ad that this was linked as a Tribeca Film Festival event, I would’ve maybe looked, but what it said was something like ‘2025 tour date one night only,’ and we weren’t the only ones,” Fiore says.
Fiore says they realized what the event actually was once they showed up at the Beacon Friday night and that several of the attendees next to her also had similar experiences, telling her they’d spent $700 or $900 for their seats and thought it was a concert. She said several attendees around her left early in frustration. “No one would’ve spent this much money if we had known. She doesn’t tour, she doesn’t play live often.”
Venues have long voiced frustration about ticket resale platforms as they aren’t directly involved in the event’s planning, which can lead to miscommunication with customers, as evidenced in this case.
“When fans are acquiring tickets from people who had nothing to do with the event, the ability to communicate the important details of the event is potentially lost,” says Kevin Erickson, the executive director of the Future of Music Coalition, a non-profit music policy group that focuses on reform in the ticket and live music business, among other issues.
Erickson says part of the issue is that the state of New York doesn’t allow non-transferable tickets, which he says limits the festival’s ability to stop resellers from gouging fans at major markups. That’s a touchy subject in the business, as critics of non-transferable tickets often argue that policy impedes ticket owners from doing what they wish with their tickets and makes it impossible for fans to easily offload tickets if they can no longer attend an event.
Still, as Erickson says, “You should be able to put on a movie at a film festival without third parties coming in trying to extract all this extra profit.”
Another attendee, a New York resident named Tim (he requested his last name be withheld, citing backlash he’s already received from Cyrus fans posting about the event) told THR that he’d spent $1,200 for two tickets to take his sister to the event after seeing a VividSeats Instagram ad that he said strongly suggested Cyrus would perform.
“The copy in their ad said something along the lines of “one night only” and definitely suggesting a concert,” Tim says, adding that many of the attendees around him had also been expecting a concert. “As soon as we turned the corner on 74th street and I saw the marquee said ‘Tribeca Film Festival’ I said ‘wait, is this a fucking movie?’ I’d pay $600 to see Miley Cyrus perform a one-night show at the Beacon, but definitely not that much for a visual album.”
Tim called the ad that led him to buy his tickets “false advertising.” Like Fiore, he added that it was “almost unanimous from at least everyone by me up in the balcony, who were expecting some type of performance.”
Neither he nor Fiore blamed Cyrus or Tribeca for the issue. “I’m sure Miley had no idea what was going on either, and she was there to deliver something that she put a lot of heart and soul into,” Fiore says. “It’s unfortunate that was the ultimate outcome.”
Tim acknowledged that he should’ve looked closer before purchasing the tickets as he was on a third-party ticketing platform, but he added that consumers shouldn’t have to be taking on risk like that when purchasing tickets.
“I was sitting there cringing in the audience with my sister as the fans were yelling at the stage,” Tim says. “It was very awkward, but it was obvious that there was a clear misalignment in expectations between the event and the fans, which is uncomfortable in a visceral way.”
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