Lets fire up the fringe
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- Created on Saturday, 30 August 2014 09:35
- Written by James Leavey
Did you know the annual Tiger Dublin Fringe transforms Ireland's capital into a platform for great creative talent from around the globe for 16 days?
Well you do now.
This year the Fringe runs from 5-20 September, in a determined attempt to move and invigorate its growing audience.
The trouble is, I cannot ignite a cigar (or anything else) inside one of the city's artistic venues. Such an act usually clears a room – of smokers, anyway.
Which sort of reminds me of my first trip to the tobacco fields of Brazil a few years ago, and a cultural evening spent at Sao Felix, in Bahia.
This small inland town is linked to its twin, Cachoeira, on the other side of a wide river by a British Victorian iron bridge. It's rumoured to have been designed for the Nile, proved to be too short, and exiled to northern Brazil in disgrace.
I arrived there after several days of high jinks and magnificent Dannemann cigars to admire (leer, more like) the erotic art exhibition in the foyer of the town's brand new cultural centre, sponsored by Brazil's world famous cigar company.
After some drinks and nibbles my party of international cigar retailers, a Russian tobacco writer and myself were shown to our VIP seats and the lights went down.
My friend, Hans Leusen, president of Dannemann, encouraged me to light one of his cigars for we were seated in an open air theatre in the style of London's Globe.
The match sparked and flamed up my cigar whereupon I was immediately applauded by the mostly local audience as I puffed away.
It was at this moment I seriously considered the possibility of a career move - to become a tobacco-exhaling performance artist.
Back to Dublin, for the fringe, which is a very good place to be, I'm thinking of putting myself and my cigars forward for next year's Festival as The Dedicated Cigar Emporium's Goodwill Ambassador.
Indeed, Have Cigar, Will Travel, has long been my motto. If you provide the ashtrays, I'll fill 'em.