Anti-Smoking Gestapo News - June 11 - Winston Churchill to be portrayed w/o cigars

[Aaron]

[SIZE=3] [/SIZE]Ask not what stogies have done for you. What have you done for stogies?

[SIZE=3]
The Sunday Times June 11, 2006

[SIZE=4]Churchill's cigar stubbed out by theatre smoke ban[/SIZE]
Karin Goodwin
HE MAY have saved the country from Nazi occupation but even Winston Churchill is not exempt from the tentacles of political correctness.

Because of the ban on smoking in public places, Britain’s greatest wartime prime minister will be without his trademark cigar when he is portrayed on stage at the Edinburgh Fringe festival later this year.

Mel Smith, the comedian and actor who will play him in a production of Allegiance, a play about a little-known meeting between Churchill and Michael Collins, the Irish revolutionary, could be forced to use a plastic replacement.

Producers believe Churchill’s lit cigar and the cloud of smoke which permanently surrounded him are so integral to his character that they plan to appeal to the Scottish executive for a special dispensation.

Frequent references to Churchill’s famous habit have been included in the script by Mary Kenny, about the bond that developed when the two men stayed up drinking until sunrise to thrash out the agreement. She has also stayed true to history by portraying Collins as a chain smoker of cigarettes.

Churchill, who favoured Havanas and kept a room next to his office at his country home in Kent stocked with up to 4,000 cigars, was rarely seen without one. Ash often dripped onto his clothes as he smoked, his cigar wedged firmly between his teeth.

“He was a serial cigar smoker and it is known that he is always puffing. It is very hard to simulate smoking,” said Brian Gilbert, director of the play. “I don’t know what we are going to do. It’s a real poser.”

“This is a personal meeting. It was a real attempt to forge a relationship and that is where these personal habits — such as smoking and drinking — are so important to give the sense that barriers are being broken down.

“I do think that the ban is ridiculous. It’s staggering that it won’t be allowed on stage.”

In one scene Churchill attempts to make peace with Collins by offering him a cigar, but he decides to stick to his Woodbines. Many other scenes call for dramatic pauses, broken by the strike of a match as one of the men lights up.

William Burdett-Coutts, director of the Assembly Rooms where the play will be staged, said he will approach the executive next week to appeal to them to reconsider introducing an exemption for stage and screen.

As a result of protests from actors and directors, the Westminster government is expected to grant such an exemption when the ban is implemented south of the border.

“It is just crazy. How can one portray Winston Churchill without the cigars?” said Coutts. “I think it’s a rule gone too far. There should definitely be an exemption made. It seems to me that maybe the people behind this are not theatregoers or if they are they have just not thought through the real implications of it.”

Robert Hardy, who played Churchill in The Wilderness Years and War and Remembrance and on stage in musicals such as Winnie, said: “I do think that if I was asked to [play Churchill] in a place where I wasn’t allowed to smoke, then I should just walk to the door.

“I’ve done it so often with a lit cigar because, of course, he always had a lit cigar. Whoever you play, if they are a real person you look for the things they did, try and look as like as them as you can, and cloth yourself in their mannerisms. It helps persuade the public who watch you the person you are playing.”

Nigel Knocker, chairman of the International Churchill Society said: “Churchill was a cigar smoker and it would be very silly if he wasn’t allowed to smoke in this production. Cigars became synonomous with him.”

A spokeswoman for the Scottish executive said: “We have made it clear that if smoking requires to be represented in film, TV and theatre performances, realistic alternatives can be used or developed, if the industry feels they are not suitable.” [/SIZE]

I forwarded the article to syndicated radio host and stogie lover Dennis Prager. What will you do to raise the profile of encroachments on our freedoms?

[VictimSix]

Wow that's rediculos!

[j6ppc]

That is so wrong. Especially in the case of a historical figure for whom cigars were umm... central.

Looks like the script depends on "lighting up" as well.


Arrrgh...

[Warhorse545]

That is just stupid.

Stacey

[mikey202]

Thats a shame...here's a picture that I just love...guns and cigars..OH MY!!

[WooferBearATL]

Most theatrical productions are exempt from smoking bans?

[The Prince]

That is focking disgusting.

[CthulhuDawn]

That is the most ass-backwards thing I have ever read. This is like banning a fireworks display because of the excess smoke it causes.

[TU09]

Banning smoking in theatrical productions is pointless. If one person in a 1000 seat auditorium is smoking, the amount of smoke considering the massive volume of a theatre is negligible. If the point is not to portray smoking so as to discourage the public from doing so, then replacing it with an immitation defeats the purpose. I still can't fathom the banning of smoking in public places, so this makes little sense to me anyways.

That's one of the things I love about New Orleans, I have never been to any restaurant, bar, or cafe anywhere in this city that I can't smoke. I've even asked for ashtrays and been told that I was welcome to ash on the floor on the rare occasion I am somewhere that doesn't have them!

[Hammerhead]

Were I the actor, I'd just refuse to do the gig. That'll sure get the financiers motivated enough to pressure for a change.

[carbonbased_al]

Originally Posted by Hammerhead

Were I the actor, I'd just refuse to do the gig. That'll sure get the financiers motivated enough to pressure for a change.

I think the only time Churchill wasn't smoking was when he was sleeping. Even then, I bet he had one in his mouth

[caskwith]

Originally Posted by mikey202

Thats a shame...here's a picture that I just love...guns and cigars..OH MY!!

Churchill was a big fan of guns, he always carried a browning 9mm pistol with him for self defence, apparently he was a very good shot. my favourite stroy of him is when somebody tried to ambush his car while driving through Hyde Park, his bodyguard had to restrain him because he wanted to jump out and fight the attackers.
He is also know to have, in moments of excitement, pulled out his pistol, waved it in the air and say: "they can take me, but ill get one or two of them first!!"
What a man!!

[Aaron]

While we're in our own dreamy cigar clouds, freedoms we once took for granted as Americans are being lost daily... today's headline:
Doctors call for 'fat tax' on Coca-Cola and Pepsi

Doctors will this week declare war on America's soft drinks industry by calling for a 'fat tax' to combat the nation's obesity epidemic.

Delegates at the powerful American Medical Association's annual conference will demand a levy on the sweeteners put in sugary drinks to pay for a massive public health education campaign.

They will also call for the amount of salt added to burgers and processed foods to be halved.

The moves come as U.S. doctors - like their British counterparts - are becoming increasingly alarmed at the growing number of deaths linked to obesity.

The resolution will put doctors on a collision course with Coca-Cola and Pepsi, plus the likes of McDonald's and Burger King.

Sales of soft drinks in U.S. schools are in decline ahead of the introduction of guidelines allowing only healthier low-calorie drinks, plus milk and certain fruit juices, over the next two years.

But the medical association wants to go further. Delegates at its Chicago conference are gunning in particular for high fructose corn syrup, the sweetener which is added to everything from ketchup to cola.

One American politician labelled it the 'crack of sweeteners' because it is so widespread.

Some U.S. cities and states already levy taxes on soft drinks or junk foods that raise £500million a year, said Michael Jacobsen, director of the Centre for Science and the Public Interest, an independent health watchdog. But earmarking tax revenue for programmes promoting better diet would be a first, he added.

American doctors are seeing the same alarming trends as those in Britain where obesity is considered to be a 'ticking timebomb of epidemic proportions'.

More than 30,000 Britons die each year because of obesity. In England, 47 per cent of men and 33 per cent of women are overweight, with around a fifth being obese. The problem costs the Health Service £500million in consultations, drugs and other therapies.

Life insurance companies are considering increased premiums for overweight clients because so many are dying prematurely from heart disease and cancer. Cancer Research UK has warned that obesity will soon cause more cancers than smoking.

Just as alarming is the rapid growth in childhood obesity. Among six-year-olds, one in ten is classed as obese, rising to one in five among 15-year-olds.

The Government has warned that the current generation of schoolchildren could be the first to live shorter lives than their parents.

Would Patrick "Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death" Henry or any of the Founding Fathers recognize what we've become 230 years after 1776?

Democracy... while it lasts is more bloody than either aristocracy or monarchy. Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There is never a democracy that did not commit suicide.
John Adams

Or have we become a Terri Schiavo of nations, lingering on the momentum of our past greatness, just waiting for someone else (Mexico? Al Qaeda? China?) to aggressively yank the plug?

We do well against a major opponent but don't seem to have a clue about how to conduct a war of attrition waged against our values.


[SIZE="4"]Ask not what a cigar has done for you... what have you done lately to protect your cigar-smoking rights?[/SIZE]

This is all part of the same lefitst totalitarian group-think that turns health into idolatry.

[Isombitch]

All of the founding fathers would roll over in their collective graves at what we have become! Everything they fought for has been lost!

Give me my cigar or give me death!!!

[TU09]

Our current crop of politicians love to do nothing more than to meddle in our private lives. They seem to get a real kick out of legislating for the sake of legislating and erode our rights while doing so. Unfortunately, it has gotten to the point that it is the core of both parties that are guilty, leaving those of us who like small government and the preservation of our rights largely screwed.