I've been posting some news stories that come to my website, QuitKeepers, by way of RSS feed, and I stumbled across the story from the NY Times bemoaning actors' restrictions from lighting up on stage. One comment was made that smoking onstage is an issue of "freedom of expression" and another actually said that "smoking is a part of our history".
C'mon people. Get real.
Addiction to smoking is already difficult enough to overcome without encountering the second-hand smoke in a theater. There is no doubt that various plays and productions have to portray people smoking in order to be true to the scene. But as the NY Times article points out, Molly Ringwald, for whom I suddenly have increased respect, used a fake cigarette that emitted powder to simulate smoke to be true to her role in "Sweet Charity".
As to the argument about smoking being part of our history... if we use that kind of rationale, then shooting up heroine onstage is okay. The near genicide of entire Native American tribes onstage would be true to history. Extermination of various cultures or persons of a specific religion or ancestry would be true to history, if enacted on stage.
In short - it's a perfectly legitimate desire to depict what really happened in our history, without actually doing the thing you're depicting.
Smoking kills people. If you're going to give waivers to actors so they can smoke actual cigarettes of any form, tobacco or herbal or whatever, then how about we have an encore presentation of a few terminal cancer patients in their death throes instead of a cast call for a standing ovation.