Arena

Season 1, Episode 507

Episode Title: Cigars - out of the Humidor

Air Date: 1997-12-25

Overview:

In 1962, before John F Kennedy signed the embargo banning the importation of cigars into America from Cuba, the President ordered 1,200 Havana cigars, according to Pierre Salinger, his former press secretary. Tonight's programme follows the story of the cigar - from the tobacco fields west of the Cuban capital of Havana into the factories where poetry and daily newspapers are read aloud to workers; to Hollywood cigar bars and the gentlemen's haunts of St James's, London. With contributions from actors James Belushi, George Wendt and Peter Weller, plus Lord Grade and politician Kenneth Clarke.