I fought Tobacco Companies With My Film. The Hidden Story. Fair & Balanced.

In 1988 I got a wonderful job to produce a one-hour primetime television special on the cigarette industry. On tobacco. On Smoking. PBS told me that I needed to show “both sides” of the cigarette debate. I knew based on the 1964 Surgeon General's report on tobacco and its dangers that cigarette smoking was bad for people - that lung cancer and other diseases were a direct result from smoking cigarettes and even from secondhand smoke. many people in my life smoke cigarettes right in front of me then. It was perfectly acceptable to be in a small room with a group of people three quarters of whom smoked cigarettes. Without proper air filtration in offices no less.
But the PBS system required that to produce a prime time television show on cigarettes, I needed to make it “fair and balanced.” I talked Phillip Morris into letting me go behind the scenes so long as I did not distort their side of the story. They allowed me to film a public relations meeting with the messaging genius, Guy Smith, creating positioning and key messaging to fight the antismoking laws popping up in San Francisco and other cities. At the time Philip Morris, the largest cigarette manufacturing company, created messaging to defend the right of cigarette smokers to smoke, based on powerful terms like freedom and liberty. This recording behind the scenes is the only one I know of with the industry let the public see how they think out the kinds of messages that prevented antismoking laws or at least delayed their passage.
If you find this of interest, I ask you to support my efforts by clicking the thanks button to the right below the video screen. That will help me to keep on going showing clips from my films and my archive.
Thank you
David Hoffman