Cheech & Chong reunited
It's a comedy flashback
By Cathalena E. Burch
cburch@azstarnet.com
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 10.02.2008
So what will it be for 50 pounds of hash? Door No. 1, Door No. 2 or Door No. 3?
Bob the contestant fidgets. Finally, he settles on Door No. 1.
Please welcome Officer O'Malley of the FBI! You're busted!
Cheech & Chong's drug-addled sendup of the popular 1970s game show "Let's Make A Deal" was a wildly irreverent counter-cultural romp that had mothers in the early 1970s storming into their kids' rooms and yanking the needle off the record.
And if those kids were anything like me and my siblings, you sneaked back to the record store and bought another copy. And the next time you played it, you turned down the volume so Mom wouldn't hear anything.
At their height in the late 1970s, Cheech & Chong represented a fresh voice in an otherwise stale decade. They brazenly and openly embraced the drug scene, centering their comedy around the notion that everything is better if you're high.
They also pushed the race envelope, reinforcing Chicano stereotypes and creating new ones. Cheech Marin always sported chinos, suspenders and the proverbial "wife-beater," his forehead draped in a pressed handkerchief. But beneath the machismo pose, his character was this very funny, very ordinary guy who liked to get high.
Asian sidekick Tommy Chong personified the ultimate stoner. He had a perpetual slur, a stumbling gait, and he came off as stoned even when he wasn't.
In 2004 Chong was convicted of selling drug paraphernalia and served nine months in prison.
"It wasn't as bad as it sounds," Chong, a regular headliner at Tucson's Laffs Comedy Caffe over the past decade, said in a 2005 Star interview. "You could play tennis, except they won't give you strings for your racket. You could walk; there's a track there. I mostly walked my time off. And I slept my time off. I was in there with fans. It was like staying overnight with concert fans."
At 70 years old, Chong has told interviewers his toking days are well behind him. But in his reunion tour with buddy Marin, 62, which comes to Casino del Sol's AVA Sunday, he slips easily back into the role as the king of the potheads.
Seeing them onstage will take us back to the days when Cheech & Chong stood alongside the likes of Richard Pryor and George Carlin. The duo's sketch comedy was edgy for the times; they even smoked joints onstage. Whether it was real marijuana is up for debate.
Getting baked was the central theme of everything they did, from hugely popular comedy records to their string of low-budget hit movies starting with 1978's "Up In Smoke."
Their films focused on finding drugs, getting stoned and avoiding cops. The only one that strayed was 1985's "The Corsican Brothers"; Marin had wanted to do a drug-free movie, and it was a box-office bummer. It also spelled the end of the pair's partnership and the beginning of a long feud. Recent published rehashings of the split suggest that Marin, among other things, was fed up with Chong being the center of attention, so he bolted.
Chong went on to a successful stand-up career, a handful of guest appearances on network TV shows and a recurring role as a stoner photo-shop worker in Fox's "That '70s Show" in 2006.
Marin dove headlong into acting with roles in movies like "Spy Kids," "Tin Cup" and "Christmas with the Kranks," and recurring roles in TV shows, including "Nash Bridges," "Judging Amy" and "Tracy Takes On." His latest project is the voice of Manuel in "Beverly Hills Chihuahua."
In August, the pair announced they had set aside their differences and were hitting the road.
"We both reached out to each other. It got to a point where we just decided to stop fighting and focus on the things we love about each other," Marin told Newsweek. "There are a lot of things I admire about Tommy. We're getting along fine."
"Cheech & Chong Light up America" is the first time the two have toured together in 25 years. Those of us who have longed for this day will be the ones anticipating the next line to "Let's Make A Dope Deal" and falling off our seats when Marin struts out in his pink tu-tu. Sure, it's old hat. But it's far out, man!
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