Everyone in London smokes
For the past week, I’ve been in London working on the last details for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. My eyes have been really dry and scratchy, which made me worry I was geting conjunctivitis (a.k.a. “pink eye”) or a stye (a.k.a. “who hit you?”). For various reasons — stress, lack of sleep — these eye disorders tend to plague me when starting production.
Imagine my relief when I realized the real reason for my miserable eyes: everyone in London smokes.
Now, this is not a slag on Londoners or their great city. Lord knows I love both. But I quickly realized the term “non-smoking room” means that the blankets are not currently on fire. And the non-smoking section of a restaurant is the table without an ashtray.
Yes, I know I’m spoiled coming from Los Angeles, where smoking indoors, or in the presence of any living creature, is considered abhorant. But here’s to social shaming. When I come home from dinner, I want to feel it in my stomach, not smell it on my clothes.
Truthfully, in my week here, I have seen a few people not smoking. But they were children, and looked a little daft.
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June 16th, 2004 at 5:17 am
I know what its like John. Where I come from. Is basactly the Miami of Australia. I live about 300 meters from the water and about 2000 meters from the ocean/surf. You have probably heard of the Gold Coast. We got a little WB studio down the road.
Its a realy refreshing enviroment to write and surf.
June 16th, 2004 at 5:20 am
I read somthing about a real chocolate factory being involved with the filming. Is there any sets that are going up at the moment? Have you been to the sets/factory yet?
June 16th, 2004 at 3:45 pm
Get over it, you’re on their turf. Your post was as silly as an athiest going into a church and complaining that religion was being thrown in their face. If you don’t like it, then go home.
June 16th, 2004 at 4:00 pm
First of All… Funny stuff John. Was good for a laugh. Secondly, jayfrog where do you get off man? The man was making with the Ha Ha’s, and you just didn’t get it. Don’t get your panties in a bunch just because you left your sense of humor in your rented clown suit.
June 17th, 2004 at 1:55 am
Well I have to admite I spark up once aday in the cold weather. Its winter here now. But put yourself in the shoes of a Londoner. Its freezing.
John was just pointing out that alot more people smoke over there. Whats wrong with having a joke about them. Laugh Out Loud
June 17th, 2004 at 2:18 am
The church-going atheist is a stretched analogy, no doubt, but I’ve been guilty of worse in my quest for a clever simile.
The crucial difference is that church was invented to support religion, while the British islands weren’t united simply to sell cigarettes.
Clearly, England was created to support football.
Or soccer, to us Yanks.
June 17th, 2004 at 3:52 am
As a londoner who smokes, I’ve gotta say I love it and fear the day that they start banning it in public places. Not happy about that prospect. Each to their own however. Mind you, I’ve been to LA and quite frankly you could poison a rock with the air quality there, it’s hideous. So let’s all go stand outside office buildings and spark up. One of lifes little gifts.
June 17th, 2004 at 9:05 am
I think that cigarettes go great on screen. The story that im currently on. Well alot of it is at night. In a dark scene. They look great.
Bad news though. I read that they won’t anything that has a person smoking in it given an R.
Thats stupid I think. Well I was watching ‘The Impostance of Being Earnest’. In one scene with Reese Witherspoon smoking. Well the way they did it was that the cigarette was never alight. Very clever.
PS: The film sucked
June 17th, 2004 at 10:52 am
Ouch:
http://www.defamer.com/topic/also-the-sushi-is-nearly-inedible-016323.php
June 17th, 2004 at 11:00 pm
Damn, can you believe that link Spike set up? People are really desperate for news. Like a chain smoking athiest who slaps people with burning bibles, just to get a light from their singed heads. How was that for an analogy? LOL
June 18th, 2004 at 12:55 am
Whoever made that. Is realy weird. He wasn’t making fun of london or anything. It was just a mention. You are going way over-board on that.
But hey. If you take that to heart. I guess you can make fun of ‘Charlie’, but it is a little bit childish.
June 18th, 2004 at 12:58 am
Oh and.
I don’t think that John comes from LA. Far from it. So hes not a hollywood boy.
(it sounds like im sucking up alot (lol) but realy im just a very truthfull person)
June 18th, 2004 at 9:10 am
Obviously, the way to spark conversation is start insulting random cities. So, watch out Houston.
June 18th, 2004 at 2:24 pm
You gotta point John. I think you should start making up random facts about people everywhere you go. Like, people from Napa Valley curiously smell like butter.
June 18th, 2004 at 2:31 pm
By the way John, Filmforce over at IGN.com did a story today about more cast members for Charlie. The cast of kids sound really cool. You get any interaction with them? How’s it like working with kids? I tend to write my kids a lot smarter than most films I see (not overboard, a la Dawson’s Creek), but I was interested in your opinion.
Anyway here’s the link.
http://filmforce.ign.com/articles/524/524092p1.html
June 19th, 2004 at 2:20 am
Soccor is so much a culture there. Im sure it reaches America about the huge fight happening. Involving england fans.
I think that it is so funny about what sports fanatics do.
PS John. If I don’t recall. You wrote the Charlie script. Ha. Its set involving a factory. Factorys give off alot of smoke. Especialy in London where everything is so old and the city is so small. The air there would be terrible.
June 19th, 2004 at 1:15 pm
Soccer is to America, as Women’s Basketball is to Americo. You know it’s there. You commend them for playing the sport. Mostly kids get into it. But at the end of the day, It falls short of such exciting past times like, watching paint crack.
Oh yeah, about the factory, Oompa Loompa’s have strict health codes. So factory smoke is actually converted into new car smell.
June 23rd, 2004 at 2:03 am
In America, we eat too much. In Europe, they smoke too much.
They’re 20 years behind…
October 3rd, 2004 at 10:27 am
ha ha.
I live in London and I don’t smoke. I’m not a child anymore, but I do look silly. I’m all for banning smoking in our public places - people can do what they like to their own bodies but when your lifestyle choices damage other people then I think it’s pretty selfish to continue to persue them… London rocks though!
April 10th, 2005 at 2:23 pm
Londoner here who doesn’t smoke….
The number of people who do smoke is gradually decreasing. Where I work (VFX company), there are a lot of international employees, and it seems to be the continental europeans who smoke the most….
April 10th, 2005 at 4:19 pm
In Portugal we have smokers and football suporters by the dozens.
April 10th, 2005 at 10:34 pm
I’m confident that most of the hoopla here in the States over second-hand smoke is a bunch of bunk. Statistically, a non-smoker, having never been exposed to second-hand smoke, has a 1 in 12-million chance of getting lung cancer. A non-smoker, exposed to second-hand smoke, has a 1 in 10-million chance of getting lung cancer. Statistically, that’s a pretty insignificant difference.
But you bring up a valid point in that to a non-smoker, the smoke of others can be a very obnoxious irritant. I’ve smoked over a pack a day for over 30 years. All three of my kids suffer from both asthma and allergies, and show obivious signs of eye and sinus irritation whenever they’re around me while I’m smoking. So, I’ve finally signed onto Quit.net and set a quit date of Tuesday, April 12th.
I’m petrified! How will I ever be able to write another word with the crutch of a smoldering cigarette dangling from my lips?