The Empire Had Fireflies, Smog, A Lolly On A Stick And Maybe A Bit Of The Other

I recall that in the  50s much hard earned money went up in smoke; Woodbine, Player and Capstan product, ejected by human fireflies, drifted upwards with much of it caught in the film projector beam like curling vapour trails from caught out Luftwaffe planes.

By and large the cinema going public was not aware of the dangers of cigarette smoking, not that the industry that produced fags was ever going to tell that generation the full facts! My memory tells me that the film stars of the 50s were for ever lighting up and using fags as a prop; impressionable minds were persuaded that cigarettes were swish and cool.   We are aware of the dangers now and consequently consumption has gone down in the UK, but that is not a great problem for the tobacco industry; its global results no doubt delight  its shareholders and perhaps one or two hard bitten funeral directors. Um... on reflection is there such a thing as a hard bitten funeral director? Perhaps not. The one I met a couple of years ago, when my car broke down, was ever such a nice lady.

Getting a lolly in the Empire at the interval depended on two things: did I have the money to buy one and if so was the queue short enough to make the effort worthwhile?

Which leaves me with a bit of the other; I was pre-teen so a bit of the other was a mystery that failed to register on my radar but many couples saw the period of comparative darkness as an opportunity to indulge in some back row recreational fun, the extent of which, at the time, was beyond my wildest contemplations.

WB