Willfully. A willfully uneducated stab. This is not about the actual piping habits of famed cigar smokers (seven of them, one fictional). This, is just me funning around some, although admittingly shy of a full-fledged hoot. We'll get to the difference between a comedian and a humorist eventually. Succinctly, this is not a history lesson. This is a silly if not utterly inane thought experiment.
Wolverine is a fictional character. I mentioned there'd be one of those. I don't keep up on Holywood's treatment of the Marvel Universe character, nor on the current issues of his comic book appearances. I assume that his cigar-chomping has been at least greatly diminished in depictions. In my mind, however, a cigar is just as Wolverine as his mutton chops and D.A. hairdo, bub.
Nevertheless, his imperfect inclusion here is on account of his perfect pipe preference being perhaps the most clear-cut one of all these listed. Wolverine, you see, certainly would swear by the cool and partly wild and only half-tamed aesthetic of a corn cob. In this cob would be a burley blend as sure as Canadian bears defecate in Canadian woods.
Winston Churchill. Didn't I see somewhere that his ever-present cigars were being photoshopped out of the historical record? Dunno (willfully). But it's darn near impossible to separate the WWII Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from his tobacco and alcohol accouterment. It's a lot like if a tuxedoed and top-hatted Babe Ruth took on Hitler. Never have I been more intrigued by potential fanfic.
Oh, Churchill would love his showy and ornate Calabash, stuffed early and often with, of course, an English blend, low-hanging fruit be darned. The question is where he'd fit a pipe in-between his other prodigious consumptionary efforts. Really, look up these well-chronicled efforts. They make Wolverine's adamantium skeleton seem not at all that far-fetched.
George Burns famously smoked El Producto stogies. Cheapies. They were a part of his act not just as schtick but as pacing aids for his routine. He said a lot of funny things about his smoking hobby and about his dead doctor's advice to stop. He said a lot of humorous things. The difference between a comedian and a humorist is the former gets belly laughs and the latter, the collective expelling of air through an audience's nostrils.
Burns would likely smoke a drugstore blend in a hardwood pipe. A blister pack cheapie like a Grabow and perhaps with the filter left in, if that is in fact how it came. This practice would drive Miton Berle up a wall--we will get to him in a couple ticks of time. But first...
With Grouch Marx, we talk true wit. Sharpness. Cutting. In his Briar pipe would be packed Virginia/Perique (Va/Per) blends which he'd acerbically never find worth much more than a damn. He'd mainly be disappointed at his pipeful's lack of cigar-inherent naughtiness. Old Marx Bros. films tend to creep me out.
Clint Eastwood's face looks a lot like the recipient of a Groucho scathing. All puckered, pinched, and whatnot. Let's look at him in his famed cheroot-smoking Spaghetti Westerns. See instead (or between scenes) that hot-as-hades clay pipe in his sunburnt hand and pipe-notched pearls? It's stuffed with straight-as-possible perique. Lee Van Cleef, as Angel Eyes, a piper himself--sees that retro-hale flinch and understands.
Milton Berle tried to get George Burns to smoke his much better Cubans. He was not successful there but God gave Uncle Miltie other gifts of... persuasion... namely a member of legendary length. Seems like the long stem of a churchwarden would pair well with all that. A well-aged Virginia pulled from a well-appointed cellar would be just Milton's groove.
Finally, Charlie Chaplin would tightly tuck a nose-warmer short pipe under his own much friendlier toothbrush mustache. It would be filled with a sweetly flavored aromatic cavendish. It would make everyone around him smile at its aroma almost as much as his cutesy antics. What's that? He has a second pipe? Oh, look! He's making them do a fun dance as if each is a little foot. Or was that Buster Keaton? Maybe it was Johnny Depp in Benny & Joon.
Willful.
::: very :::