Monday, February 10, 2014

Toonfomercial: Smoking in the Stone Age? (1960's)

Back in the day, it was fairly common for commercials to actually be part of the show. It was uncommon, however, for The Flintstones to have either Fred (Alan Reed) or his best buddy, Barney Rubble (Mel Blanc) lighting up a cigarette. However, since RJ Reynolds, the world's biggest tobacco manufacturer, was sponsoring the show, Hanna-Barbera felt obliged to do an in-show ad with the boys taking a Winston break........



Oh, sure, some incidental characters were often depicted with a fancy cigarette holder, but that was as far as it went in the plots.

2 comments:

magicdog said...

Since I knew the show from its syndicated repeats, I'd never seen commercials like this! It wasn't until relatively recently that I even knew the show was originally sponsored by Winston cigarettes! Seeing Fred and Barney taking a drag behind the house was quite a shock to me!

I know the series proper did show Fred & Barney (among other characters) smoke cigars occasionally, but the commercial just seems so different.

Why was it in black & white anyway? The rest of the show aired in color.

hobbyfan said...

Internet Archive, where I picked up the clip, only had a black & white copy available that had been uploaded to their site. I can imagine the same thing on YouTube.

Thanks for reminding that sometimes Fred & Barney did smoke cigars, but only for special occasions, it seems.