Former Disney Cigarette Night…Facts v. Fiction

As many may or may not know, Disneyland Park once had a tobacco shop. Once located on Main Street, U.S.A., in the original Disney theme park, it offered “tobacco and smoking accessories from around the world.”

Disneyland Tobacco

In addition, park guests who stopped by the shop could also get complimentary Disneyland Tobacconist matchbooks. These feature an image of the Main Street, U.S.A. store on one side and the text “Tobacconist Souvenir Matches from Disneyland – Walt Disney’s Magic Kingdom.”

The shop was located between the Magic Shop and the Main Street Cinema. And even after the shop was removed, a classic “cigar store Indian” remained.

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Smoking at Disney Park

Nowadays, much smoking is prohibited across all Walt Disney World Resort and Disneyland Resort areas (aside from designated smoking areas).

In fact, as of May 1, 2019, Disneyland Resort (including both theme parks and Downtown Disney) is entirely nonsmoking.

But cigarette smoking was commonplace in American society when the original park opened in 1955.

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It was not unusual for people to smoke on airplanes, in restaurants, at work, and anywhere they wanted to. As more education about the health effects of smoking came to light, the prominence of tobacco smoking started to decrease through the decades.

Disney Cigarette Night

However, images have recently emerged online showing ads for a Disney Cigarette Night. Some images showing the event depict classic Disney characters such as Mickey Mouse, Winnie the Pooh, Donald Duck, and even Princess Jasmine.

The characters are either handing out cigarettes, holding them, or, in some cases, smoking themselves. But these images and advertisements are not authentic.

https://twitter.com/ShutUpAndrosky/status/1708297124256092369

They are AI-generated parodies that seem to be on the rise currently on X (formerly Twitter). The Walt Disney Company has made many efforts through the years to disassociate itself from tobacco (as well as guns).

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If you pay close attention to the images, you can spot unusual tells that they are not real. For example, Disneyland is often misspelled, and certain characters, such as Jasmine and Genie, were only created in the 1990s.

So there’s no way they could be involved in any smoking-themed event in the 1980s.

Smoking in Disney Media

If you are ever on a Disney Cruise Line ship, they have a large mural with an image of Walt Disney outside the onboard theater.

However, the Walt Disney Company altered the original image to remove a cigarette from the hand of Walt Disney himself because they didn’t want Walt to be seen as promoting smoking.

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In addition, there have been other removals of cigarette smoking from Disney films. One example includes the 1948 animated feature Melody Time.

When the Disney film was released on DVD in the United States, the Pecos Bill section was edited to remove Pecos Bill smoking.

But despite the Walt Disney Company’s position on smoking, it still has to battle parody sites and AI images. And with certain characters becoming public domain soon will make it much harder for the entertainment giant to control how its characters are seen.