"
There are many other plays in the course of which genuine food is
consumed on the stage. But some excuse for the generally fictitious
nature of theatrical repasts is to be found in the fact that eating
during performance is often a very difficult matter for the actors to
accomplish. Michael Kelly, in his "Memoirs," relates that he was
required to eat part of a fowl in the supper scene of a bygone
operatic play called, "A House to be Sold." Bannister at rehearsal had
informed him that it was very difficult to swallow food on the stage.
Kelly was incredulous however. "But strange as it may appear," he
writes, "I found it a fact that I could not get down a morsel. My
embarrassment was a great source of fun to Bannister and Suett, who
were both gifted with the accommodating talent of stage feeding.
Whoever saw poor Suett as the lawyer in 'No Song no Supper,' tucking
in his boiled leg of lamb, or in 'The Siege of Belgrade,' will be
little disposed to question my testimony to the fact." From this
account, however, it is manifest that the difficulty of "stage
feeding," as Kelly calls it, is not invariably felt by all actors
alike.
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