MASTERS OF THE JOINT

Stoner Comedy Pioneers Cheech And Chong Still Smokin' After All These Years

Can the stoned humour of Cheech and Chong stand up to the cold, harsh
light of sobriety?

We may never know.

It's a safe bet to say that most, if not all, of the people who
turned up at the Winspear Centre last night were baked out of their
minds. The opening comic - Tommy Chong's hot wife Shelby - conducted
an informal poll to determine the number of fans who smoked up before
the show, or in the car on the way there.

The response sounded unanimous. There were also some amusing mishaps
in the parkade before the show.

Yes, we'll argue about the moral/legal implications of driving while
high another time. For now, in the hazy, pungent, politically
incorrect atmosphere of a Cheech and Chong show, the chronic stoner
can feel better about his or her skunky habit, wallow in Clodhoppers,
Fruitopia and impending full frontal dementia, and rejoice as the
Edmonton-born Tommy Chong delivers impassioned praise for the holy
green herb that the Almighty has provided us.

"Pot, I think, is going to save the world," he declared.

Amen, brother.

The event was both a celebration of marijuana lifestyle and
nostalgia. When the pope of pot wasn't preaching to the choir, he and
his rubber-faced partner Cheech Marin knocked off the old routines
that came off as fresh as the day they were picked, cured and
crumbled into a pipe. We saw such bits as the Carol Burnett-like "old
man on the park bench," a set of down-home blues from Blind Melon
Chitlin' and "the first Mexican in outer space."

They opened with the classic car scene, which included a joke about
the funny taste of a joint after it was smuggled into prison. That's
where it started. The bit got far more disgusting after that.

These guys always had a flair for going over the top, crossing the
line, and were always able to get away with it because their
characters were complete burn-outs. The same goes today, even when
they're ripping each other in a rhetorical version of Stoogely slaps
to the head.

The jokes always seem to aim lower than you expect them to. You can't
help but laugh helplessly when Blind Melon observes, "When you're
blind, there's only two kinds of women: those that smell good and
those that don't. And I love 'em both."

I think their comedy holds up because decades before Seinfeld, Cheech
and Chong was the original show about nothing. It's just all about
sex, pornography and general degenerate behaviour - timeless topics -
and getting stoned, of course.

It always came back to the marijuana. You'd think the subject would
wear itself thin after a while, but it doesn't. Maybe that's just the
ganja talking.

While Cheech proved to be a master of character - going from the
self-parodying Latino mook to a giddy cracker country singer with
emotional and sartorial precision - Chong has some serious stand-up
chops. It was like you were sitting in the basement with him, firing
one up. He talked about how going to jail for selling bongs was a
"very good experience."

And he got a load of new material from it, too. He advises those
making bongs not to put your face on them, especially if it's Tommy Chong's.

He had to take a drug education course in prison and "I ended up
teaching it." He started reading the bible, he said, and proceeded to
do a stoner's take on the Good Book. Some of the pages are handy for
rolling papers, too. Bada bing!

These guys know what paid the bills. They've apparently settled their
differences of the past - "I didn't even know we had broken up until
five years later when I saw a Cheech and Chong movie and I wasn't in
it," Chong said - and gone back to the chemistry and magic that made
them such a big deal to begin with.

That doesn't sound like the behaviour of most chronic pot smokers I
know. These guys are not stupid. Cheech and Chong are not necessarily
the pot-addled morons they play on stage. I'm beginning to think
they're like Dean Martin. That was apple juice in his tumbler - and
that's dog poop in those giant joints!

The show fires up again on Sunday.

SOUNDCHECK

MAIN EVENT

Cheech and Chong

IN THE SEATS

1,700 in the Winspear

NOTE PERFECT

Like preaching to the choir

RATING

4 out of 5