SNOOP'S ALL TOKE

November 14, 2001 -- 'I don't know the room number we'll be at, cuz," Snoop
Dogg tells a friend in the lobby of L.A.'s tony Le Meridien Hotel. "It's
somewhere on the sixth floor. Just go up there and you'll smell it."

You would expect a man busted last month in Amherst, Ohio, with 200 grams
of marijuana, after pleading innocent, to present a correctively
responsible image when inviting The Post up to his hotel suite.

You would expect him not to be puffing on a joint rolled cigar-thick with
weed and passing it among his Elvis-like posse of six.

In the case of Snoop Dogg, you'd be wrong.

"How many times did I get arrested on the 'Puff, Puff, Pass' tour - once?"
the 29-year-old rapper asks, referring to the recent outing whose very name
constituted probable cause to search the caravan.

"Did I get out? Yes. So it wasn't all that bad." (Actually, Snoop still
faces a maximum sentence of 30 days back in Ohio.)

"Cops know whenever I get off the bus that I'm smoking. It don't even
matter," says Snoop, who claims he dropped the "Doggy" as a sign of
maturity. "They need to legalize weed, because alcohol and tobacco are in
the top five killers in the world, and marijuana ain't in the top 50."

Snoop is here to promote "The Wash," his latest co-starring vehicle with
his mentor, fellow rapper/actor Dr. Dre, which opens today with no critics'
screenings. And, in between long tokes on his "chronic," he does.

" 'Car Wash' was a great movie for its time, and this is a great movie for
our time," Snoop says, referencing the 1976 disco comedy starring Richard
Pryor and Franklin Ajaye. "But none of the characters or scenarios are the
same. The only similarity is that it's in a car wash. It's more like 'The
Odd Couple' with me and Dre."

In "The Wash" - which is written, directed and produced by a man named D.J.
Pooh - Snoop plays a suds engineer who smokes pot and chases women on the
job. Dre plays the straitlaced boss faced with the possibility of having to
fire his best friend and roommate, who actually got him the job there.

Snoop is now in theaters in the horror movie "Bones," in which he tops the
marquee as an angry ghost, and the Denzel Washington drama "Training Day,"
for which he earned much better reviews as a paraplegic drug pusher.

"A couple roles passed my way," says Snoop. "As I did them, I started to
like the movies more and more, and began to get more serious. Now I'm
full-time."

But Snoop promises to keep his music presence large, too.

"I'm gonna balance the two off," he says, "because every good movie needs a
soundtrack."

Snoop - who lives with his wife of four years, Shantay, and their three
children about an hour east of L.A. - recently signed with MCA Records for
what he describes as "a whole lotta money." The label will release his next
solo album, tentatively titled "Big Snoop Dogg: Paid the Cost to Be the
Boss," and distribute his own Doggy Style Records, home to rappers Kokane,
La Toiya Williams, Soopafly and E-White.

"Today's rap is saving the world," says the former Calvin Broadus, whose
nickname derived from his mother's claim that he resembled the "Peanuts"
character. "Without rap, the world would be boring."

Apparently, Snoop feels the same way about pornography. He recently
produced an adult video that shares the name of his breakthrough 1993
album, "Doggystyle." Snoop isn't in the flick but claims to have personally
auditioned every female cast member.

"It's in stores now for $49.95 - rush it or hush it!" he says, promising a
second volume. "But first I got to find some ho's on the road that want to
get down and do it."

Ladies, don't all line up at once.