Thursday, December 17, 2009
Anne Archer and Andres Williams in "The Graduate"
Public health trumped free speech and artistic expression in Colorado on Monday when the state Supreme Court upheld a ban on all smoking in theaters…actors included. Colorado approved its Clean Indoor Air Act in 2006, setting off a legal challenge by local and national theater organizations that claimed the law infringed upon free-speech rights and interfered with their abilities to accurately produce plays, such as “The Graduate” and “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf.” The ban is the first in the nation to force actors to rely on fake cigarettes when portraying characters who smoke.
While the state’s high court ruled 6-1 that the ban was constitutional because it aims to promote public health rather than stifle free speech, one judge took umbrage with the majority’s viewpoint. “A single puff of talcum powder, or a prop cigarette with a reflective tip or light placed at the tip, can hardly depict the ‘boozy veil of smoke’ necessary to ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?’” fumed Justice Gregory J. Hobbs in his dissenting opinion. “Neither prop nor talcum cigarettes allow an actor to dramatically exhale a puff of smoke, as Mrs. Robinson does in ‘The Graduate.’”
Smoking on stage is also banned in Lincoln, Nebraska and Scotland.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Colorado Supreme Court Upholds Ban of Smoking on Stage (by Jessica Fender, Denver Post)
Colo. High Court Snuffs Out Theaters' Challenge to Smoking Ban (by David L. Hudson, First Amendment Center)
Colorado Judge Fumes Over Ban on Theatrical Smoking (On Point News)
Curious Theatre Company, et al. v. Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, et al. (Colorado Supreme Court)
No Smoking in the Theater, Especially Onstage (by Zachary Pincus-Roth, New York Times)
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