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The son of a Los Angeles police officer, American actor/director Richard "Cheech" Marin earned his nickname through his fondness for the Chicano food, specialty cheecharone. An excellent student (if something of a class cutup), Marin entered California State University, only to drop out and hightail it to Canada to avoid the draft. While working as an improvisational comedian with Vancouver's City Work troupe, Marin teamed with Tommy Chong; the Hispanic/Asian duo created the characters of Cheech and Chong, a pair of zoned-out dopers ever in search of the "perfect joint." On the strength of their bestselling record albums, Cheech and Chong were signed for the inexpensive comedy film Up in Smoke (1978), which wound up as one of Warner Bros.' highest-grossing films (not to mention one of its highest, period). As the drug culture lost its momentum, so did the film career of Cheech and Chong, with each of the team's subsequent films making less money than its predecessor. By the time C & C headlined the atrocious The Corsican Brothers (1984), the jig was up. Cheech and Chong split up in 1984 (though they remained friends) and went off to their own projects. While it was Chong who directed many of the team's features, Marin sat in the director's chair for the best of his post-team projects, the 1987 film Born in East L.A, inspired by Cheech's own parody music video. Marin's starring film is Shrimp on the Barbie (1990) contained no drug jokes and fewer laughs (an indication of its quality is the fact that the director had his name removed from the credits in favor of the pseudonymous "Alan Smithee"). Lately regarded as an elder statesman of the counterculture, Marin has kept busy with cameo roles, cartoon voice-overs (Oliver and Company, Ferngully, The Lion King), and a brief stint as a costar of the 1992 TV sitcom "Golden Palace." In 1996, he began co-starring opposite Don Johnson in the television drama Nash Bridges. Around this time he began a fruitful collaboration with independent filmmaker Robert Rodriguez. Marin had a part in Desperado, and played multiple characters in the vampire film From Dusk 'til Dawn for the Austin based maverick. Marin was cast as Kevin Costner's best friend in the golf comedy Tin Cup in 1996. The beginning of the next decade brought Marin an unexpected new audience as he began a series of humorous appearances in family films and lent his vocal talents to a number of animated films. He appeared in all three segments of Rodriguez's Spy Kids series, did vocal work in Good Boy, and voiced one of the Cars in Pixar's film. He also played small parts in John Sayles Silver City, and Bob Dylan's Masked & Anonymous. He can be seen in 2008's Beverly Hills Chihuahua.
by Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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2 reviews
A Review of the Light Up Canada/America Tour - Their first Show, from Ottawa Canada.
By Justin and Fabiola of Ottawa.
We were blessed to see the very first appearance of Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong in Ottawa; their first live show together in almost 3 decades! There were some minor errors in their first presentation of the show, but these minor human foibles only drew the entire crowd deeper into their full and unconditional love for these two iconic beings. Artificial boundaries of class and race melted away from the audience as this legendary duo went to work for the first time in a generation.
We sat in the third row just left of Center stage. It was fascinating to see how a combination of beauty, eloquence and hilarity formed an emergent new property in Shelby's first presentation with the new Cheech and Chong show. Her work here was genuinely funny and it carried a strong social message as well; - Good work Shelby!
Periodic smiles from Cheech Marin, as he quickly and seamlessly regressed back into each of his classic characters in this first show of the tour, melted the crowd's collective Canuck heart. Cheech literally had us crying with laughter throughout the show. Mr Marin is a deeply important modern media figure for my wife's Latino community even here in Canada. One can only imagine what will take place between Mr. Marin and his increasing Latino audience particularly in certain venue's South of the (Canadian) boarder. Cheech masterfully cements a sheer connection with his audience and there is an electricity that forms quickly between Mr. Marin and those who watch his performances.
Fabiola was one of the few Latin persons present for the Ottawa show that we could see. Fab laughed uncontrollably and I think actually lost her consciousness for a second as Mr. Marin performed his classic car starting routine "chinga-chinga-chinga-chinga" - "cavvvvrrrron!" "puta-puta-puta-puta, “ and this was just at the beginning of the show! As I have come to understand over the last 17 years Mr. Marin represents a major artery in the pan national Latin American Heart. When you see his art collection, and really pay attention to some of the roles he has played over the years you will begin to understand this fact.
Tommy Chong was golden in every sense of the word. His sincerity, his unbridled authenticity and his strong and refreshing sense of social critical purpose, provoked tender and at times, socially angry emotions in the audience, which he masterfully channeled for them into deep belly laughs. What a powerful formula Tommy, linking the lightly psychedelic and profound emotional attachment of the audiences' collective memory of "Cheech and Chong", with a gentle expanding of their social and political consciousness! Only a profoundly spiritually and mentally ill world would allow Mr. Chong to sit in jail the way they did or to pull him and his family along that ugly and shameful road (theirs not Tommy’s) to jail the way they did. Yes Tommy, George Bush is truely a Moron!
There is only one request which I am sure will resonated in the hearts and minds of all of your fans implicitly or explicitly guys; - and I ask this of you with the humblest of hearts. My question is this: How literally powerful would it be to see a fully "transformational" leap in the human connection behind the scenes between Tommy and Cheech? Beyond their dictionary exemplifications of on stage comedic legacy, brilliance and synergy, - even during their first live performance together in close to 3 decades; - if these guys could genuinely support each other into becoming "best friends" again, imagine how this could permeate an already "perfect show", how it would profoundly and correctively impact with and model transformational reconciliation in an age of such dangerous division and derision?
Long Live Cheech and Chong!
We look forward to your responses,
Gratefully,
Justin (a psychotherapist) and Fabiola (Hospital Manager),
from Ottawa Canada,
jdh@ripnet.com