A Post-Election Smoke Break With Cigfluencers

Smoke ’em if you got ’em! The world is in the shitter, much like the end of The Cabin in the Woods. All feels hopeless; the system has failed. Time to light up and wait for the big hand to come out of the ground and smash us all. In the meantime, Vulture had a quick cigarette break with Jared Oviatt, creator of the “pics of hot people smoking” Instagram account @cigfluencers, your favorite celebrity’s favorite IG account. He sees the smoke break as a great unifier, where all can come and vent: “I’m sure there will be some good, very depressing conversations going on over a cigarette over the next couple of weeks.”

Are you seeing a spike in shares of cigarettes of despair today?
I have seen Ben Affleck smoking outside his door. I’ve seen that particular photo multiple times today.

Since June onward, there’s definitely been a bit of an uptick. With Jeremy Allen White, The Bear, Charli XCX, the whole brat-summer-thing thing, of course. Also Addison Rae. I think those three in the past couple of months have really spurred a big jump, compared to the past two years.

Why do you think smoking is having a moment right now?
In a world of Botox, fillers, all of that image maintenance, it’s almost a rejection of that. These really cool, very relevant celebrities don’t care about the repercussions of smoking and the effect on your health.

I use Addison Rae as my example. This is a young, talented, beautiful woman who says “I’ll smoke. I don’t care.” It’s about being so carefree in a time when it seems like everyone cares about how they’re perceived — which is probably a bad thing, in terms of young people and getting them not to smoke.

What is your brand of cigs?
Camel Blues. That’s been my go-to. Here in Canada, I’m not smoking every day. It’s like a treat. It’s also a lot more expensive to smoke in Canada.

Is there an underrated smoking celeb who you think needs more attention?
Some of these people, to me, are properly rated. Rosalía, Dua Lipa, Paul Mescal, they float up to the top. Maybe Kirsten Dunst and Jesse Plemons are underrated, because they’re not as public-facing every single day. Talk about a cig-influencer power couple.

When I think about your page, or even think about just pictures of people smoking, I generally am thinking of people from the ’90s, but you’re talking about all these people who are currently smoking.
When I started the page, I was really digging into the archives. But now, I feel like I have more current examples than ever. In the past week there’s nine different photos of Addison Rae, Charli XCX, Jeremy Allen White, even some of The Bear cast. Ayo Edebiri I would say is underrated. Rachel Sennott is an underrated one. Kaia Gerber, I have a picture of her on the set of Bottoms smoking behind the scenes. It’s the ultimate nepo baby, beautiful, successful actress/model/whatever, and she’s smoking. It fits that ’90s mold of who was smoking then. But also, everyone was smoking then.

What made you want to start this page?
I actually wrote a blog post like “Is smoking cigarettes only cool if you’re hot?” I think that applies to a lot of things: Is this only cool if you’re attractive?

So, I wrote a post about that, and there was a picture of Rachel Sennott, Jeremy O. Harris, and Janicza Bravo smoking. I posted it on my Story, and Rachel Sennott reposted it, and I was like Okay, maybe there’s something here. It kept going and going and going. And then Julia Fox shared something when she was dating Kanye in that weird two-week period. And that really boosted a big jump of followers. From there it just continued on and on and on.

Did you ever find the answer to that question? Do you think that smoking is only hot when hot people do it?
I would say it’s only cool when you’re hot, but it depends on your perception of hot.

Smoking can, depending on who you are, elevate you, even if you’re not perceived as classically hot, if you’re that sort of medium-hot, ugly-hot archetype, that could move you up.

Maybe not the question to ask a Canadian, but could sad smoke breaks bring America together today?
I would like to think that there are some lively discussions going on during smoke breaks today, or smoke breaks at the club in the next couple of days.

That’s something we should address here: The smoke break is a space for organizing at work.
The smoke break is a common ground for people of all backgrounds. You probably have an older guy at the company and a younger woman together, and they’re probably talking about that today.

Last question: We can all agree vaping isn’t cool or sexy, right?
No, definitely not. In no way, shape, or form can it be. The only person who can transcend that is Lana Del Rey.