MINNEAPOLIS, July 22, 2009 - A three-judge panel of the Minnesota Court of Appeals recently ruled against a bar owner who tried to circumnavigate the Freedom to Breathe act by holding “theater nights,” during which patrons smoked indoors, according to the Tobacco Law Center.

In response to Minnesota’s passage of the Freedom to Breathe Act in 2007, which bans smoking in bars and restaurants, some bars started holding theater nights to try to take advantage of a loophole in the law that allows actors in theater productions to smoke onstage.

Tank’s Bar in Babbitt, Minnesota, started performing a smoking-ban protest play, the Gun Smoke Monologues, in 2007, Customers wore name tags identifying themselves as actors, according to the Tobacco Law Center.