Four blocks from the massive church, the coach bearing Whitney, her father, and her aunt, was at a complete stop, hopelessly caught in the tangle of conveyances and would-be spectators blocking the streets.

In 1811, when he played the part of Lothario in The Fair Penitent in London's Haymarket Theatre, the theatre had to turn thousands of would-be spectators away.

Other would-be spectators stood on tiptoes, craned their necks and relied on portable radios and television sets.

"Don't make me be a bad guy," one of them pleaded as a few would-be spectators pushed forward.

Around twenty would-be spectators of the event are killed when a grandstand collapses.

There had been talk and laughter and brawls and near-riots, and many would-be spectators had been haled off to the dungeons where their exuberance might be permitted to cool against cold stone.

The American orders have been rerouted and Joynt, the OCO '88 news media chief, said that no would-be spectators have lost money.

Most of them appeared to be would-be spectators hoping to get in for the show.

In Hibiya Park in central Tokyo, 12,000 would-be spectators lined up to compete in a lottery for 48 courtroom seats allocated to the public.

Such was the crush of would-be spectators near the empty scaffold that the carriage had to come almost to a halt.