Stage-Door Johnny Meaning

(idiomatic) A devoted fan of live theatre and of performing artists, who habitually spends time in and around theatres.

Example: 1917, P. G. Wodehouse, "Extricating Young Gussie," in The Man With Two Left Feet and Other Stories:
  "You went off and married that—whatever that stage-door johnny's name was—and it broke me all up."
1989 July 25, Terry Trucco, "A London Accent for 'Anything Goes'," New York Times (retrieved 13 Jan 2012):
  "One woman met her husband because of the show," he said. "She was in the chorus and he was a stage-door Johnny."
2009, Rhys Bowen, Tell Me, Pretty Maiden, ISBN 9780312943752, p. 95:
  There is always some stage-door Johnnie waiting to take out a chorus girl.
1994 Feb. 13, Frank Rich, "After 13 Years of Drama and Farce. . . Exit the Critic," New York Times (retrieved 13 Jan 2012):
  The stage was my obsession from age 6. . . . By my early teens, I had become so conspicuous a Stage Door Johnny that the manager of the National Theater, Washington's one Broadway tryout house in the pre-Kennedy Center era, took pity on me and hired me as a ticket taker.

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