The Dust Off: Cheech and Chong

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


The pending release (August 12) of Tommy Chong’s unauthorized biography of the infamous comedy duo Cheech & Chong shouldn’t be the only reason to revisit the duo’s raunchy, 70s- and 80s-era, marijuana-laden humor, such as:

According to Cheech and Chong News, the duo will hit the road in September to do a stand-up tour and there is talk of a new movie together.

But let’s not forget Up in Smoke, the 1978 flick that scores of stoners since have quoted at least once in their life:

Book, stand-up tour, movie: all of this big news begs the question, “but why?” Chong already wrote a New York Times bestseller about his arrest and imprisonment. Cheech went on to appear in that super lame, post-Miami Vice Don Johnson show, Nash Bridges and do a whole slew of voice-overs for animated features, not to mention star in a bunch of Robert Rodriguez films.

But I guess the bottom-line question is “why not?” We’ve revisited more family-friendly, 60s- and 70s-era entertainment such as The Brady Bunch, and Bewitched and Get Smart, so I guess it was inevitable that some late-70s raunch would resurface as well.

I mean, when your main interests are low-ridin, checkin’ out sexy mamas on the strip, and smoking labrador, an old (and probably new) fan base will no doubt resurface.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate