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theatrical cigarette

 A fake cigarette for use in theatrical productions which would produce real-looking, but comparatively-harmless smoke
 
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A number of stage productions require performers to smoke. Unfortunately, unless the actors happen to be smokers, this will expose them not only to some perhaps some minor health risk (a few dozen cigarettes smoked over the course of a play's run will be a very minor health risk compared with smoking dozens of cigarettes weekly for years) but also some discomfort as most non-smokers would find even one drag on a cigarette to be uncomfortable; it might also lead to out-of-character coughing.

I would therefore propose a device that looks like a cigarette-like object which produces a nicotine-free smoke which is designed to be as unobjectionable as possible. I would expect that this should not be overly difficult especially if the smoke were produced not by combustion per se but by a chemical reaction analagous to that used by smoke machines.

—supercat, Jan 25 2004

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       Smoke'm if ya got'em.   

       What is that chemical reaction in smoke machines? I don't frequent venues that use them, but the few times I have been around them, they seem to make me choke and cough like second hand cigarette smoke, but to a lesser degree.   

       I guess dry ice wouldn't be completely benign in such a setting either.
—half, Jan 25 2004
   

       The "chemicals in the smoke machine" are liquids that prduce smoke when mixed. Hard tu put in a cigarette, toxical, too. Still, good idea. But as a cigarette has to consume itself to look realistic, the better solution is still to smoke ultra-lights.
—sidi, Jan 25 2004
   

       Ah, that explains the coughing.   

       Yeah, like I said, dry ice wouldn't be completely benign. I was just trying to think of other ways of making "safe smoke".   

       How about a tiny, yet high velocity fan embedded in the cigarette with directional louvers that would blow tiny, wispy streamers upward. Like those fake fires. Yeah, that'd be realistic.
—half, Jan 25 2004
   

       I just had a production where i had to use a fake cigarette. All you need to do is wrap up a piece of paper tightly untill it's the diameter of a cigarette. Then light it up. It will pretty much burn just like a normal cigarette, but if you do inhale, it will be nothing but smoke from paper.
—leegibbs3, Mar 27 2004
   


 

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