Crisps shouldn’t be allowed in the theatre

I wouldn't want to spend a lot of money just to listen to people slurp, scrunch and rustle their way through a performance either.

The op isn't being unreasonable, it's just good manners and consideration which a lot of people are lacking in.

I went to see something yesterday and there were three kids and two parents behind me. The two parents talked the entite way through the performance and the three kids had individually wrapped bags of sweets that they not only opened loudly but sat fiddling with the bags the entire time. I turned around a couple of times and the parents paid no attention whatsoever so they clearly didn’t care one bit. The lady next to me got so annoyed she went to go and get them plastic cups at the interval and suggested they unwrapped them 😂.

yes it’s a public space but my god if you’re the kind of person who lets this happen just know that everyone hates you as you ruin it for everyone else.

I would be mortified to think I was ruining someone else’s experience that they had paid for but some people couldn’t give a shit

Nice and helpful!!

We were at our small local theatre (to see Pride and Prejudice (*sort of) which I highly recommend) like all old theatres the seats are very close together and not much room between rows and I was on an aisle very close to the front. The woman behind me felt so close I could feel her breath on my neck and she chomped her way through a bag of crisps for the entire first half. I'm sure the actors could hear her-we were very near the stage.
So rude.

😂😂😂 you are very bloody rude.

performance and audience shouldn’t feel like a mausoleum. But keep up that attitude that’s why so much theatre can’t get any young people in and is suffering. Their audience continues to harbour people with nasty attitudes such as yourself

Me and my son go to the Opera a lot. Just local performances, nothing fancy but it's the same there as well. Noisy, selfish bastards talking and chomping their way through it all. Why can't people wait for the interval? Me and my son have our bag of revels and coffee then. People are so inconsiderate and aren't taught manners anymore, I think.

Popcorn at theatres is definitely a new thing - I’ve been going to theatre shows for over 30 years and it’s only in the last 5 or so that I’ve been aware of popcorn being eaten. It’s crazy - theatres should stop selling it as people are too fucking self absorbed to realise you don’t scrunch popcorn and munch it all the way through a quiet play.

Your attitude that it makes the play less dull is utterly ridiculous - if you find theatre so dull with out stuffing your face then don’t go and leave it to those of us who enjoy it 🙄.

Yeah it is ridiculous. Actually there was a man with a pack up in a rustly plastic bag at the RSC in Stratford. I remember each Pringle. I complained and was fobbed off. I asked him to stop at the interval and he didn’t but was at least quieter.

i think it’s crazy theatres sell them ! Ok ice creams, fine, not noisy
but Crisps what the heck !!!

Agree OP
i know theatres and cinemas make money on the sale but it’s takes from the show.

I totally agree! If people really can't go an hour without exercising their jaws then they should sell 'quiet' little cardboard boxes of non crunchy food in these places. Like the ice cream or non wrapped sweets. Too much plastic anyway.

Blame the venue for both selling and allowing food. Not the people. If it was banned then they wouldn’t do it

Could not agree more. It's so rude, to everyone. It's live performance, not the cinema. And so slobby. Do you need to eat every five minutes?The last performance I went to, not cheap, was spoiled by the adults behind me who had a bucket of popcorn, a share-sized bag of sweets, and a drink, each. It was like trying to watch the performance in a barnyard with all the slurping and munching. People have no manners anymore.

Most big theatres do make a pre-show announcement about switching phones off - makes no difference, several phones will invariably bleep with text messages. I think they should all install phone blocking devices to block signals.

As for eating - the actors are far enough away that they won’t hear people eating but it’s very annoying to other audience members around you to rustle sweets, etc. Part of the problem is that theatres sell sharing bags of sweets at a big mark-up, so they are implicitly encouraging consumption! Lots of theatre bars also sell crisps, so again, people will take these back inside the auditorium and munch away.

I agree it’s very annoying but theatres cause a lot of it!

I totally agree with you OP!
It's infuriating. We were at the opening night of a play v recently. It's a quite, serious piece of theatre & there was some idiot down the row from us rustling LOUDLY in a bag of crisps.

After a few minutes I heard someone hiss 'for God's sake stop making noise with that bag'

But the person with the crisps persisted & continued rustling away till they were finished eating & then crunched the bag up. I couldn't see in the dark v well but I could most certainly hear it all!

Then we had the people yo-yo'ing in & out of the toilet.etc

It was v disruptive

I'm a regular theatre goer but had about 10 years off with DC.

Pre-DC no one ate during a performance, snacks were strictly for the interval. Post-DC people munch through without a care in the world.

I was at the theatre once and a girl started eating an apple. WTF. Also her and her mate were talking for most of it. So rude

I go to a lot of theatres and they’ve all sold crisps, nuts, icecream and alcohol. A few sell things like sandwiches and sausage rolls etc

Don’t blame the people, blame the venue. If it’s such an issue they can ban food

I like silence from the audience. I want to hear the play, that's what I have paid for. Most theatres don't sell crisps in my experience. If I want to eat something I have a bag of chocolate raisins, ready opened. Pour raisins into your lap and Robert is your mother's brother, no noise. But I rarely indulge this fetish.

Great stuff

I agree with you. Crisps and sweets in wrappers are a no-no. The interval is for that. I don't like them in cinemas either. I've come for the performance, not an intimate interlude with someone else's snacks.

At least people in the cinema are more spread out so you don’t tend to hear them although the last time we went one family was up and down to the toilet every 10 minutes. I thought just go sit down by the side for fuck sake.

It's not just that, it's people drinking and then needing to be up and down to the toilet which means that the row has to get up to let them out. A performance was ruined for me recently because of this, the tickets were a Christmas present.

Someone probably suggested ice cream years ago because it’s quiet to eat. Now it’s sell anything to make some money