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He was the man who had everything. Land. Power. Grapes. A lot of grapes.
Horrible Histories, describing Nero

To demonstrate the excess and luxury of wealth, a character will be shown reclining and being fed some small tasty food, usually grapes. The character can be reclined on a couch, a throne, a stack of luxurious pillows, or even the lap of an attractive servant. Frequently included in the scene are live performers, such as belly dancers or musicians, and servants shading or fanning the reclining character. Bonus point if the character demands that the grapes be peeled. Goblets and plates should be gold or silver. If part of a Drunk with Power plot, expect the feeders to be unwilling and, once status quo is restored, resentful. In some cases, strawberries, chocolate or other delicacy may be substituted.

The poor man's version of this trope involves being pampered by a loved one, especially if that loved one is (or would like to be) romantically entangled with the recipient. See Through His Stomach.

A Luxury Trope, usually used in settings related to Ancient Rome, Ancient Greece, "Arabian Nights" Days, and Western depictions of the Golden Age of India. Contrast Poverty Food. Unrelated to The Grapes of Wrath.


Examples

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     Anime and Manga 
  • One Piece: God Eneru has a whole bowl of fruit besides his throne, along with several servant girls which serves him and peel the fruit for him.

    Comic Books 
  • Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics): Knuckles embarks on a quest to retrieve the Sword of Acorns. At one point he falls under the spell of the Enchantress, who enslaves his body and forces him to serve her peeled grapes.

    Films — Animated 
  • Fantasia: During the Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony segment, where the male and female centaurs are all pairing up, there's a shot of one of the happy couples together where the male is reclining against the female while she feeds him grapes. The scene can be watched here.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • The Avengers (1998): Emma Peel rescues Steed and brings him to her apartment. As he's lying on a couch, she offers him a grape as a reference to this trope.
    Mrs. Peel: Grape? I bought them specially.
  • Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: Prince Pondicherry is being fed chocolates by (presumably) his wife while inside a palace made entirely out of chocolate, overlapping this with Chocolate of Romance.
  • A Clockwork Orange: Alex imagines being fed grapes by naked women.
  • Death Race 2000. Nero the Hero has his navigator feeding him grapes as he pulls up in his racecar before his adoring fans to start the Transcontinental Road Race, then he complains about the grapes blocking their view of his handsome profile.
  • From Hell: A version of this trope is used whereby Dr. Gull uses grapes (injected with a narcotic) to entice the girls with. Fresh fruit would have been a luxury to the East End poor and grapes were considered especially exotic and desirable because they had to be grown in greenhouses (importation not then being commercially feasible). They were also a perfect vehicle for deliverable the correct dose of drug with.
  • Im No Angel: Referenced with the Mae West line "Beulah, peel me a grape."
  • The Man Who Could Work Miracles: On the first night of his powers, Fotheringay is testing his abilities to work miracles. The scene cuts to him reclining on his bed eating a massive bunch of grapes. The camera then pulls back to show the entire bed is covered in exotic fruit.
  • Der Philosoph: One of the three women in Georg's harem pulls out a bunch of grapes and feeds him one during the Dance Party Ending.
  • Rosita: The king of Spain serves Rosita a bowl of a fruit before he attempts to seduce her. Rosita, having grown up poor and often hungry, is at first reluctant to try the fruit. After pacing around she gives in.
  • A Tale of Two Cities (1935): As Monsieur Gabelle tells a bunch of fat aristocrats that they need to treat the poor people of France better if they don't want a revolution, one of the fat aristocrats lazily munches on a bunch of grapes. Worse, he has a pet monkey, and he feeds the monkey grapes.
  • Thor And The Amazon Women: Harry Baird is fed some bountiful grapes by Janine Hendy.
  • Thor: Ragnarok: While impersonating Odin, Loki watches a play in his own honor while leaning on a couch and eating grapes, with five young female Asgardians at his side. That bastard!

     Literature 
  • The Bliss Bakery: Someone exploits people who have been temporarily turned into zombies to feed him grapes.
  • The Call of Earth: Dol feeds Meb grapes just prior to them having sex for the first time.
  • The Curious Sofa: The protagonist is constantly shown holding or eating from a bunch of grapes.
  • Discworld:
    • Pyramids: The hero is a prince who has a number of scantily clad young women to peel grapes and feed them to him, although he doesn't approve of this. He even asks that they don't peel the grapes, as the skin contains more vitamins.
    • Small Gods: The Tyrant of Ephebe mentions that slaves will come in shortly with grapes, and that it's quite hard to stop it from happening. Om also thinks Vorbis is the type to indulge in this kind of thing behind closed doors, but Brutha assures him that no, he really isn't (which only makes him that much more dangerous).

     Live-Action TV 
  • Batman (1966): In "I'll Be a Mummy's Uncle", one of King Tut's female accomplices feeds him grapes while fanning him.
  • The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1981): During the Guide entry about luxury planets, showed a typical luxury-planet-owner reclining on a couch surrounded by scantily-clad women, who were feeding him individually-plucked morsels. Being cleaned by kisses, breast-rubbing, and so forth may be sensual, but it wouldn't make the grape taste very good. The guy promptly yawns and feeds the thing to his dog. Watch!.
  • I, Claudius: This happens a few times. At least once it was Subverted, as Claudius was being poisoned by his wife feeding him food from her own plate.
  • The Office (US): Lampshaded and implied when Dwight is eating grapes by lowering them into his mouth in a similar fashion. Micheal makes his usual "That's what she said" joke and has to explain it to Dwight. He mumbles a vague explanation that invokes this trope.
  • Rome: Marc Antony has a prostitute in a gauzy toga feed him a slice of pear while he's hearing petitions as a tribune of Rome. The moral-to-a-fault Lucius Vorenus is not impressed.
  • Star Trek: The Original Series: In "Bread and Circuses", Spock and Dr. McCoy are in a cell worrying what has happened to their captain, who has been taken away by Proconsul Claudius Marcus. However the Proconsul is an Affably Evil fellow who thinks Captain Kirk should have some pleasure before he dies, so the scene cuts to Kirk being fed grapes by a Beautiful Slave Girl.
  • Three's Company: "The Goodbye Guy" has the roommates mistakenly thinking that Mr. Furley is depressed and plans to do himself in. Their efforts to bring him out of his fog and convince him that life is worth living include feeding him grapes, Roman-style.
  • Subverted in Loki when Mobius asks Loki if they have candy on Asgard and he can only reply "Grapes... nuts.".

     Music 
  • "Peel Me a Grape", written by David Frishberg, sung by Blossom Dearie, Dusty Springfield, and Diana Krall, among others.
  • The music video for the Cake song "Rock and Roll Lifestyle" includes an image of the rock-and-roller eating grapes off a platter.
  • The music video for Queen's "I Want To Break Free" features them.

     Tabletop Games 
  • Magic: The Gathering: In "Wilds of Eldraine 5: Broken Oaths", while sneaking into the castle of the witch Eriette, Ruby speculates that she's probably in the throne room having people feed her grapes. Kellan asks why she would be doing this, and Ruby answers that she's not entirely sure, but it seems like in this situations the villain always default to the grapes.

     Theatre 
  • Pippin: Just after Pippin mentions "fresh fruit" in his monologue about enjoying the simple things in life, a girl appears with little on her lovely body but a few bunches of grapes. "Oh yes... and women."
  • Twisted: Princess goes on about how she hates palace life and how unfair her life is... then yells for grapes and is immediately fed by her servants.

     Video Games 
  • Crash Tag Team Racing: Referenced in one of Doctor Neo Cortex's "starting line" quotes, in which he mentions that he wants to be "hand-fed grapes and drink lots of creamy soda" after he wins the race.
  • Ghost Trick: Commander Sith is shown to have a machine in his private quarters devoted to feeding him grapes with a mechanical arm, which is regarded as just one of many ways his country's use of technology is "just plain off".
  • Mario Party 4: The Bowser minigame Fruits of Doom. Bowser, who is sitting on his throne, reads off a list of fruits he wants to eat (quite quickly at the end), and the gang has to bring him those fruits; grapes are among the possible requested fruits. First person to bring Bowser a fruit he never asked for or one more of a kind than what he wanted gets grilled.
  • Undertale: In Undyne's hang-out session, she says that Alphys' friend (all but stated to be Mettaton) once came over to hang out and spent the whole time lounging on Undyne's piano and feeding himself grapes.
    Undyne: I don't like that guy, but I admire his lifestyle.

     Webcomics 
  • The Order of the Stick: In this strip, Miko sarcastically suggests that the gang take in the luxury of being fanned and fed grapes. Haley tries to get that arranged, and is a bit annoyed to find that Roy gets the treatment later.
  • Questionable Content: Dora considers amending her employee's employment contracts to include feeding her grapes, in this strip.

     Web Original 

     Western Animation 
  • Avatar: The Last Airbender: Happens in the finale, although with cherries instead of grapes. Azula is initially enjoying her new power but it soon becomes apparent that she has been brought up to conquer, not to rule...
  • The Beatles: In "Anna", the Dragon Lady lures Paul to her ghost ship where she feeds him grapes on the vine while he reclines in a hammock.
  • Captain Pugwash: After being shipwrecked, Pugwash staggers across the desert but considers himself fortunate to come across a palace where the unseen ruler has the requisite slaves fanning him with long feathered fans...which then part to reveal Pugwash's Archenemy, Cut-Throat Jake.
  • Futurama: Hedonism-Bot seems to have been constructed entirely to be the recipient of this treatment, as he's constructed to resemble a fat man lying down on a couch and spends most of his eating grapes and ordering his servants to do things like coat him in liquid chocolate.
  • Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi: In "Pen Pals", during Ami's Imagine Spot about who she believes to be Pierre, she's shown to be doing this.
  • Jem: This trope appears in "The Queen of Rock and Roll" music video. While being fanned by Kimber, Roxy feeds herself grapes.
  • The Little Rascals: In "Poached Pooch", Darla has to feed Butch a cluster of grapes as part of the Rascals' bargain for Pete's collar.
  • My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: In "Equestria Games", while Cadance and Twilight are explaining to Spike why he's being treated as a Living Legend, a crystal mare feeds him gemstones from a chalice while he lounges on a couch, and a crystal stallion fans him with a palm leaf.
  • The Simpsons: At the end of one episode, Mr. Burns is fed Spanish peanuts in bed by Smithers while recovering from a near-death experience. He orders Smithers to remove the skins of the peanuts individually. This is a direct homage to A Clockwork Orange.
  • The Smurfs (1981): Papa Smurf is pampered by his one-time love Flowerbell who feeds him smurfberries in this fashion.
  • SpongeBob SquarePants: In "Squidward the Unfriendly Ghost", Squidward takes advantage of SpongeBob's and Patrick's belief that he's a ghost and makes them his slaves. At one point, Squidward orders them to give him nourishment; SpongeBob feeds him a grape and a banana, while Patrick shoves a whole watermelon into his mouth.
  • Teen Titans (2003): In "Stranded", Raven meets creatures that she initially finds annoying. However, at the end of the episode they are pampering her by giving her a massage and feeding her grapes.
  • Wakfu: In "The Voice Thief", while the Brotherhood is staying in the Inn's most luxurious room, we see Eva enjoying some grapes while taking a hot bath.
  • Wonder Woman (2009): Hades is depicted as an obscenely overweight slob who enjoys eating grapes, and demands to have them served to him by the damned he has enslaved (notably Ares' son Thrax and now Ares himself).

     Other 
  • Not canon, but this picture, drawn most likely by an extreme fan of Cirno.
  • Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas used to use a cartoon Caesar mascot, for example on its gaming tokens, who was depicted on a lounge chair, being fed grapes. (Caesar was also holding a dagger, just in case.)
  • In Bob Geldof's autobiography Is That It? he recalls an anecdote from his childhood. Because the family almost never ate grapes (they were too expensive), young Bob decided he'd give up grapes for Lent. It backfired, though, when his dad bought grapes for the family.

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