"When is smoking allowed for "artistic integrity"?

What happens when performers breach the smoking ban?
Before they took to the stage for their first song in London since the smoking ban was introduced, long-time smokers Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood were warned that they could be fined $50 for lighting up on stage. Like that would stop them $50, why even bother. So what happened? The guitarists lit up.

Smoking may be allowed for 'artistic integrity' - but not in Scotland
Otherwise they - or the venue - can be fined
But Greenwich council will take no action, satisfied that it was a one-off - and their cigarettes were "extinguished almost faster than the message to put it out got to stage," an official said.

A cigarette has been a Stones' prop for years, they aren't covered by new laws that allow smoking on stage "where the artistic integrity of a performance makes it appropriate for a person to smoke".


Pete Doherty at T in the Park - it's outdoors, so the ban doesn't apply
This exception applies in England, Wales and Northern Ireland but not in Scotland, where a tribute show to Bill Hicks, the chain-smoking comic who died of cancer, has been forced to ditch the cigarettes for its Edinburgh Fringe run. Instead the actor playing Hicks jokes about the ban. But when Bill Hicks: Slight Return starts its West End run next month, producer James Seabright hopes that smoking will be allowed.

"In England it's up to the local council to decide whether smoking is allowed. It's a bit of a backward step in terms of artistic freedom but at least it's not a blanket ban like in Scotland. Wow I thought we were tough here in the states.

Officials suggest using fake Cigs instead.

"It is particularly difficult to present some plays set in a 'gritty' social world without people smoking," Holloway says.


So when is smoking allowed for "artistic integrity"? It is at the local council's discretion. Actors light up in Hampstead Theatre's In The Club, a political sex farce set against the backdrop of Turkey joining the EU, and in Forgotten Voices at Riverside Studio, a play set in the 1970s "when everyone smoked," says Ms Chantal.

But the Haymarket, in the West End, has forced a rewrite of a crucial scene in The Last Confession, starring David Suchet, to prevent his co-star lighting up. Look light uppay the fine and start acting like the fucking rock stars you are.You think OZZY gives a shit about the no smoking signs when he's on stage.