Frankly, I thought he had died years ago and I thought he was older.

"Eric Lawson, a working actor who portrayed the Marlboro Man in cigarette ads during the late 1970s, has died. He was 72.

Lawson's wife, Susan Lawson, said Sunday that her husband died Jan. 10 at his California home. The cause was respiratory failure due to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, or COPD."


Ex-Marlboro Man dies from smoking-related disease | Fox News

Everytime I hear one of these stories I get flashbacks of Yul Brenner doing anti smoking commercials just before he died of cancer, when he looked straight in the camera and pleaded, "Don't Smoke".