MOVIE OF THE DAY: "TOBACCOLAND ON PARADE" (1950)

If you're not a smoker now, you will be by the end of Tobaccoland On Parade. For not only does its subject, Chesterfield Cigarettes, taste cleaner and milder, it's the American thing to do! It helps support farmers in a half-dozen former Confederate states! It's fun! It's patriotic! And best of all, Chesterfield sponsors your favorite radio and TV stars! What's not to like about smoking?

And make sure he has a fancy-shmancy name.

Now, nobody would watch a 30-minute lecture by a tobacco rep unless they were smoking cigarettes spiked with THC. Therefore, it was necessary to hire a professional documentarian who knew what audiences wanted: to be lulled into a stupor by color, travel footage, a friendly narrator, and, most importantly, STARS!

 

The kid on the right can't believe he has to
go through another take of this crap.

A group of clean cut kids in their late teens are on a hike in an unidentified woodsy area when they stumble upon a small-town grocery store, where the owner is too busy watching Arthur Godfrey on TV to serve the customers. These days, the kids would have shoplifted whatever they could stuff in their pockets before running out the door. 

 

 

The oaf who gave grandma a thrill.

But this being 1950, they stick around and watch Godfrey plunk his ukulele
and tell the kind of hoary jokes that bafflingly made him one of the best-loved radio and TV "personalities" of his time. I'm not sure there's anyone today you could compare him to, which is a good thing.

(Speaking of radio, the store owner is played by Parker Fennelly, using the faux-New England accent he perfected as Titus Moody on The Fred Allen Show, and decades later in Pepperidge Farm commercials.  Cigarettes, cookies, it was all the same to him.)

When he finally shuts off Godfrey, Fennelly isn't content just to serve the kids ice cream cones in the wrong flavors.

The singing somnambulist.

Instead he spends the rest of the running time explaining why selling Chesterfields helps protect the national defense and keep the lights running, not to mention making him "partners" with scientists, factory workers, and radio stars like Perry Como, whose show just happens to be airing at that very moment.

The constipated-looking Como was known for livelier songs than the one he sings here, the maudlin "God Made Thee Mine". A witty guy in real life, Como should have recreated the time when, as a disgruntled MGM contract player, he was fired for singing "Fuck you, Mr. Mayer" under his breath at a birthday party for the studio boss. This automatically makes Perry Como cooler than anyone on the Top 40 today.

Breaking bad, cigarette-style.

Back at the country store, the kids, who should have snuck out the door by now, demand to know more about the joys of smoking. And so Fennelly gives the entire history of tobacco farming from America's founding all the way up to now, while never explaining exactly why people smoke. 

Maybe it's those "wicked-smart" scientists we see at the company lab, allegedly working on ways to make Chesterfields tastier and milder. But Fennelly skips over the part about how they're really jacking up the addictive content in order to get people hooked for life. Otherwise, we'd be watching Nicotineland on Parade.

I hope she was smart enough not to smoke.

But what about the ladies? Glad you asked! Unlike other companies, Chesterfield is an equal opportunity employer. Or as Fennelly says, "As for the girl partners -- well, they may be pretty, but they are smarter than whips!" Gee, I never knew I had a choice between looking for brains or beauty!

Unfortunately, her employer doesn't offer
insurance.

And that's not the only place where women girls are needed. Just off the boardroom, there's a mixed-sex group of pros in quality control whose job is the envy of Americans everywhere. Apparently all they do, day in and day out, is take a couple of puffs of  hot-off-the-press Chesterfields to make sure they're up to snuff, before dropping them in a dirty water Dixie cup. What's sad is that I'd probably take that job now.

 

 

Ahh, working in the fresh air!

And talk about liberal! African-Americans are more than welcome in the ciggie industry. That is, if they don't mind picking and wrapping tobacco leaves in the hot Southern sun nine hours a day, six days a week, while their white bosses are inside counting the profits. But look, some of them get to wear hats, so don't tell me they don't have it made.

Thanks for the coffin nails...

This equality jazz is all well and good, but it's been far too long since we've seen a star at work. So faster than you can say "Pentagon clown," we're at a Chesterfield photo shoot with Bob Hope. Being averse to even saying "hello" without his cue-card guy at the ready, Hope must have been relieved to open his mouth only to inhale the remnants of  burning leaves.

 

"Just because I think they're foul doesn't
mean you shouldn't buy them."

You can't have Bob without his road partner, and so we return to the country store just in time for Bing Crosby's broadcast. Dressed in a snazzy two-toned tie and blue shirt, Bing offers a little of "Swingin' on a Star" in his ever smooth style. Ever smooth because, while he was obliged to promote Chesterfields in print ads, he never smoked them; the cigarettes were added to the photos after the fact. Is there no such thing as truth in advertising?

C'mon, baby, you know you want it.

What Tobaccoland on Parade demonstrates is the enormous power that a dangerous, useless product like cigarettes wielded in public and professional life until fairly recently. Everywhere you look in this movie, people are puffing away as easily as breathing (which likely became more difficult for them over the years). There's a reason why people aged faster back then.

 

Have you ever written a check like this to
the IRS? No? Then stop complaining and
start smoking!

I have no idea if Tobaccoland On Parade  ran in regular theaters, Rotary Club meetings or high school auditoriums. But considering it's essentially a half-hour commercial, Chesterfield's parent company Liggett & Myers must have paid for the privilege -- even if, as the narrator reminds us, they forked over a million tax dollars to the IRS every day. Taxes that help build things like dams and military aircraft. You like dams and military aircraft, don't you? Then smoke Chesterfields, damn you!

PS: It won't surprise you to learn that all four stars in Tobaccoland on Parade had the same sponsor. And three of them had its name in the programs' titles: The Chesterfield Supper Club (Perry Como), Chesterfield Sound-Off Time (Bob Hope), and The Bing Crosby Show for Chesterfield. It's Chesterfield's world; we're just choking in it.

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From 1953: Arthur Godfrey's announcer Tony Marvin reassures us that Chesterfields are safer than mother's milk: