Smoking In Broadway Shows- Page 2

[Calvin]

Posted: 4/20/06 at 3:10pm

I'm not a smoker, for the record. But to think that lighting up one cigarette on stage is going to make all the actors and audience members start talking like an early 80s Lucille Ball...a bit of a stretch.

WOSQ -- when I did Dancing at Lughnasa, the actress who played Maggie was a former smoker. And as you might know, the script directly calls for her to smoke -- a lot. She understandably did not want to smoke actual cigarettes in fear of becoming addicted again. I don't remember how we handled it.

[YourLilAssassin]

Posted: 4/20/06 at 4:31pm

I know a fair amount of people in the business who do smoke and their voices seem to be doing pretty damn well. Esparza, Feliciano, Cerveris, and most of the OBC of Rent have been smoking for some time now. Could have very easily given it up... but as far as I know, they do. Yes smoking might not be the best thing for you, but people do what they want to do.

[Dollypop]

Posted: 4/20/06 at 4:38pm

There was quite a bit of smoking that the character of Tom did in the production of THE GLASS MENAGERIE at the Circle in the Square. It starred Maureen Stapleton, Rip Torn and Pamela Payton-Wright. The program clearly stated that the cigarettes somked on stage were made from raspberry leaves.

[WOSQ]

Posted: 4/20/06 at 4:50pm

Funny you mention Glass Menagerie, I stage managed a production decades ago and our Tom, a non-smoker in his 30s, ended up starting smoking because of the rehearsals and the run. Took him 15 years to put them down.

If you're an addictive personality (and I am), be careful.

[TakeMeOrLeaveMe2]

Posted: 4/20/06 at 5:58pm

geez everyone flips out about smoking even if its herbal. So say you got the role of a lifetime you wouldnt smoke herbal cigs that really cause no damage theyre like stage cigs. I would! Im doing Grease right now and we smoke A LOT but we dont care its acting its part of being the part!

[ProducersFan]

Posted: 4/20/06 at 6:07pm

My roommate is horribly allergic to cigarette smoke - just walking past someone smoking can set her into a 10 minute coughing fit.
She was in our college's production of The Cherry Orchard and one of the other characters was smoking and was blowing it right into her face. I don't know how she managed to get her lines out without choking back the coughs!

I remember being so sad when Roger lit up during The Frogs.

[DoogieB]

Posted: 4/20/06 at 6:45pm

I have yet to see cigarette smoking in a show, at least that I can remember. But there was a ton o' cigar smoking in THE ODD COUPLE. It was a little like being stuffed in that smokey apartment.

[Dre2387]

Posted: 4/20/06 at 10:07pm

ok, i don't like smoking or really being around people who smoke. But i was props manager/stage crew for our college production of An Enemy of the People. In the first scene, two characters had to smoke cigars and another, a pipe. And we used real tobacco and very cheap cigars. Seriously, they smelled terrible and i swear I felt like I was going to die because of second hand smoke.