Looks like we got very very scared of smoking very very quickly. Is there now a real chance that smoking featuring in a stage play might genuinely upset, or worse still, physically harm, an audience member?
For the record, in the end, as far as I could make out nobody actually did smoke in the play. Lots of people had them in their mouths but nobody lit up.
Ultimately they must have decided against it.
I await a play that will break new boundaries and push authorities to their limits. The signs will simply read: LIVE SMOKING - ON STAGE HERE.
Sleazy huh?
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October 7, 2007 at 11:07 pm
Diehard Geordie
Maybe they were the ’sweetie’ ones, which I remember from my youth. More years ago than I am going to tell you.
Or maybe they have banned them as well, too much sugar.
October 8, 2007 at 10:46 am
minxlj
I think it’s getting to stupidly ridiculous proportions now - I saw a kids film a while back which warned of ‘mild peril’. Then it’s not really THAT perilous, is it??
There were no warning when I was a kid, and guess what? My parents actually used their OWN heads to decide if a film was suitable to take me to. Fancy that, parents being responsible!
October 8, 2007 at 7:51 pm
Stephen Newton
Big notices in Manchester’s Library Theatre greeted us for a Noel Coward play. They did smoke loads, but it didn’t seem to drift over the audience and there were no fatalities on the night.
October 20, 2007 at 2:33 pm
Mike
Here in the U.S., the MPAA (the governing body for film “ratings”) is toying with the idea of automatically branding any film containing smoking with a “R” (adult) rating.
That means: movies with some violence, swearing, and possibly non-nude sex scenes could theoretically have a less-than-R rating; while a movie about puppies running through a field for two hours would instantly be blackmarked as “R” if one person in it was smoking.
It’s patently ludicrous. Political correctness in my country has gone so far over-the-top, I honestly can’t remember a time when people *weren’t* this crazy.
It’s sad to see this same crazed line of thinking is finding its way around the globe.