It sure seemed to me like there was a wave of high profile lung cancer victims in the 70s and 80s. I always attributed it to the a-bomb and h-bomb testing, that fallout was picked up by the plants and trees growing at the time. Tobacco plants too. But that was an uninformed assessment in my youth, trying to explain what I did not understand. It is quite possible (and in retrospect, probable) the DS made an effort to purge the heroes of old in order to start their Hollywood march toward Marxism. Almost all of the old time actors alive today are marxists, or controlled by them.