http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AudienceMurmurs

Cabinet men: harrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphharrumph

Governor: I didn't get a "harrumph" outta that guy!

Hedley Lamarr: Give the governor a "harrumph!"

That Guy: Harrumph.

Governor: You watch your ass. Blazing Saddles harrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphI didn't get a "harrumph" outta that guy!Give the governor a "harrumph!"Harrumph.You watch your ass.

Something very shocking has happened in front of a large audience! It's so shocking that the audience must immediately discuss amongst themselves how utterly shocked they are by proceedings. Of course, we, the actual audience, don't hear what they're saying— we just hear a low murmur.

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May be preceded by an audience-wide Gasp!!

Often happens in a courtroom, when a lawyer or witness has revealed a big twist in the case ("A murmur went through the courtroom..."). It also appears in general crowd scenes (parties, bars, restaurants, stadiums) as ambient noise.

In the business, this is sometimes called "rhubarb," "walla," "watermelon," and "peas and carrots," after the theater trick of using those words because (in theory) they sound like real conversation when mumbled indistinctly. In TV and movies, most recordings are actually of little snippets of pocket dialogue— unfinished phrases related to whatever is going on in the scene. This adds realism to the story, while saving the writers the effort of coming up with complete sentences for bit characters to say.

See Studio Audience. Compare Saying Sound Effects Out Loud. If the camera shows the actual audience the in-universe audience reaction, it's a Reaction Shot.

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Examples:

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Anime

When a riot breaks out in Legend of Galactic Heroes, the crowd can clearly be heard shouting "Riot!" in English.

This happens in Sai's Back Story in Hikaru no Go during a public game of Go. After his opponent accuses him of cheating (the opponent was actually the one who cheated) and Sai denies, the whole crowd begins to whisper.

Comedy

From Stan Freberg Presents the United States of America: King: But you better sight land soon. There's rumblings of mutiny!

Columbus: Really?

King: Come over here and listen.

Columbus: Alright.

Crew: RUMBLE RUMBLE RUMBLE. MUTINY MUTINY MUTINY.

Columbus: I see what you mean. But you better sight land soon. There's rumblings of mutiny!Really?Come over here and listen.Alright.I see what you mean.

In a bit discussing PM's Question Time, Eddie Izzard renders the background murmurs in Parliament as "Toilet paper! Toilet paper! Toilet paper in our time!"

Riders In The Sky's novelty album Riders Go Commercial features the fake ad "Geezer Training Course" to become a background extra in Western films. Part of the class is learning to mumble "rhubarb" and "peas and carrots."

Comic Books

Crowds in Asterix generally mutter "rhubarb rhubarb rhubarb".

Issue #34 of Marvel's What If? series (first series) was a series of one-page spoofs of the Marvel Universe. One such example was "What if anyone who had been an Avenger had remained an Avenger?" So naturally, just about every Marvel hero shows up upon the call "Avengers Assemble!", with the multi-stemmed word balloon "Watermelon cantaloupe watermelon cantaloupe watermelon cantaloupe" employed to simulate crowd noise.

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Fan Works

Turnabout Storm: The pony courtroom audience murmurs just as Ace Attorney's human one would do; except when they are laughing their lungs out at embarrassing pictures.

In Chrysalis Visits The Hague: This happens occasionally during the hearings, with one problem - the actual gallery is separated from the courtroom by a security window, so the implication of this is that not even the court's own staff can help but comment or react on the revelations.

Detsniy Off Skiwords Ace Attorney fanfics often reference the series canon examples. Apparently, the audience are just constantly saying Ah, yes, yes, yes, yes until Judge bangs his litle hamer thing

Film

Lampshaded in Blazing Saddles about as hard as possible: Cabinet men: harrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphharrumphharrumph

Governor: I didn't get a "harrumph" outta that guy!

Hedley Lamarr: Give the governer a "harrumph!"

That Guy: Harrumph.

Governor: You watch your ass!

Also parodied in The Man with Two Brains; when Michael makes his announcement about "being able to put the brains of brilliant people in the bodies of dumb people", the German audience engages in murmuring of this nature. When he asks his host what they're saying, he's informed that it's just "a general murmur," and they're just repeating 'murmur' over and over. When he challenges them to "murmur all you like!", the response is the audience loudly yelling "Murmur Murmur!" at him.

Done really badly in On Deadly Ground, where amidst the standard "rhubarb"ing, utter non sequitur comments come from nowhere supporting Forrest.

Played for Laughs in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring when Bilbo is giving his farewell and says "I don't know half of you half as well as I should like and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve". This is straight out of the book where it describes the response as scattered applause with most of the audience working it out to see if it came out to a compliment. The movie conveys this reaction with mostly blank looks in the audience.

Parodied in Straight Jacket, where the (TV-)courtroom audience reacts to various shocking revelations by turning to each other and audibly murmuring, "Peas and carrots! Peas and carrots!"

In The Day After Tomorrow, when the hero announces his theory that a change in the ocean currents could have caused the disaster, the room full of scientists is murmuring.

The studio audience in Slumdog Millionaire responds with murmur to all of Jamal's decisions.

The Front Page: Lampshaded. After Hildy insists to his fiancée that he's in the press room saying goodbye to his friends, he says "Can't you fellas say something?" They respond with sarcastic nonverbal murmurs.

Literature

Dave Barry has mocked this a few times, as when a murmur ran through a courtroom—then jumped up and bit the judge on the nose.

Terry Pratchett's Discworld: In Maskerade Nanny Ogg, having joined an angry mob in order to divert them from their target, is revealed as the rest of the crowd dissipates to be waving her torch and pitchfork and muttering "Rhubarb... rhubarb..." Another parody occurs in Interesting Times, where a samurai yells "Itiyorshu! Yutimishu!" — "I tie your shoe, you tie my shoe" was the rhubarb phrase specifically given to extras who were meant to sound like they were speaking Japanese.

In the Callahan's Crosstime Saloon books, Jake's narration uses "rhubarb rhubarb" to indicate that everyone is doing this.

In Sophie Sophie Hits Six by Dick King-Smith, the titular Sophie gets into big trouble with her teacher when she follows her dad's advice and plays her crowd scene by shouting, "Rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb!"

In his book about the making of the Star Trek episode "The Trouble With Tribbles" David Gerrold discusses how he was trained as an actor to fake a conversation as an extra in a production. One extra would say "Nadder nadder nadder" and his partner would respond "Grommish, grommish, grommish."

Live Action TV

Radio

Spoof-Victorian comedy The Brothers Faversham had a running gag one episode using this. Whenever something astonishing happened, a crowd would murmur over each other: "Good Lord! - I say! - Unbelievable! - What! - That's impossible!". Unfortunately, the murmurs would die down just as one of them said, very distinctly, "Shit".

The Foundation Trilogy: The sound effect of a grumbling audience is used during Hober Mallow's trial to emphasize the fact that he and his prosecutor are having this courtroom debate in front of an audience.

The Goon Show lampshaded this - audience murmurs were always played by the full cast muttering "rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb". Considering that "the full cast" was only three people, and that they would occasionally intersperse the "rhubarbs" with "custard!", the effect was usually unconvincing.

Theatre

In the script of The Complete History of America (abridged), the announcement of the Boston Tea Party is followed by these lines spoken together: Austin : Peas and carrots, peas and carrots...

Adam : Harumph, harumph, harumph...

Reed : Rutabaga, rutabaga, rutabaga...

In The Golden Apple, when Ulysses is working his Divide and Conquer plan on the citizens of Rhododendron, they divide up into groups which say, "Mutter mutter and grumble grumble."

Video Games

HOLD IT! (Desk Slam!) Happens at every twist in Ace Attorney.

(Desk Slam!) Happens at every twist in Ace Attorney. Happens in Final Fantasy VI during the Opera Scene when your party (and Ultros) crash into the scene from the ceiling. Locke Large Hams an improvisation once he realizes the lead actor has been knocked unconscious, and the guy who owns the opera house decides to Throw It In!, and the orchestra starts up some nice thematic battle music for you.

In Chrono Trigger, the crowd at Crono's trial murmur cheers (at each "guilty") or boos (for each "not guilty") as each juror's verdict is announced.

Visual Novels

Happens during important Starcraft matches in SC2VN, complete with hype and combat commentary.

Web Original

Happens in the original Death Note Abridged by TioH and Dargonakis.

Homestar Runner: Parodied in "DNA Evidence", where Strong Sad calls for attention of a murmuring audience. It's then revealed that the only other person in the room is Homsar, who was somehow making audience noises all by himself.

Western Animation