Why did the Constantine TV show go out of its way to never show the titular character smoking?

Why did the Constantine TV show go out of its way to never show the titular character smoking? - Top view of miniature airplane placed on over gray world map with crop hand of anonymous person indicating direction representing travel concept

In the 2014 TV show Constantine, John Constantine is a cigarette smoker, just like his comic book counterpart. However, we rarely (never?) see Constantine actually smoke (i.e. breathing in and out the cigarette smoke). For instance, he will pull out a cigarette and lighter, but then get distracted before actually smoking and put it away. Even in the crossover with Arrow, we see Constantine stamping out a cigarette, but not actually smoking.

Why is this? Did actor Matt Ryan not want to smoke onscreen? Is there some sort of rule that smoking can't be portrayed on a television show? Why did Constantine go out of its way to never show the titular character smoking?



Best Answer

In the following article from Entertainment Weekly 'Constantine' team on why NBC character isn't bisexual, smoking cigarettes, the producers claim they could not glorify the character’s smoking due to network content standards.

For the show, producers say Constantine is indeed a smoker … just don’t expect to actually see him smoking. Producers say there’s not much they can do about this due to network content standards.

“He is a smoker in the show, we’re not shying away from it, but we’re not glorifying it,” said executive producer David S. Goyer.




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Does John Constantine smoke?

In comics, Constantine is a chain smoker with his smoking being a driving force around one of the most popular Constantine stories of all time.

Does Constantine stop smoking?

The latest episode of Legends of Tomorrow has done the unthinkable, with resident warlock John Constantine announcing that he has stopped smoking.

Why does Constantine smoke so much?

In the comics, Constantine was dying of lung cancer and managed to trick the devil into taking it away from him, then continued to smoke as a lung cancer survivor. So...you could say, it's an important trait.

What kind of cigarettes does John Constantine smoke movie?

In popular culture. Silk Cut are the preferred cigarette brand of the DC Comics character, John Constantine, Helen Fielding's fictional character, Bridget Jones, and French author, Michel Houellebecq.



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More answers regarding why did the Constantine TV show go out of its way to never show the titular character smoking?

Answer 2

From Wikipedia:

The show remains more faithful to the source material than the 2005 film, although on-screen depiction of Constantine's chain-smoking habit was said to be curtailed because of broadcast television restrictions (the network eventually becomes more lenient and John is shown smoking on screen in later episodes)

Link to the referenced article: Constantine Will Not Be Allowed to Smoke on TV.

In an interview with Collider, pilot-episode director Neil Marshall was asked point-blank about the detail and answered

"No we're not. It's the one thing, a compromise I guess. On network it's the one thing you can't smoke on network. That's one of his character traits. We're working around that. We're trying to get aspects of it in there as much as possible. We'll see."

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