Pubdate: Sun, 10 Apr 2005
Source: Herald News (NJ)
Copyright: 2005 North Jersey Media Group Inc.
Contact:  http://www.northjersey.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2911
Author: Virginia Rohan, Staff Writer

GETTING HIGH ON A MUSICAL

One whiff of "Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical" and I
was hooked, instantly transformed into a singing,
laughing maniac.

Showtime's film, making its TV debut Saturday, is a definite high.
It's a colorful, campy, fun and feel-good tale of young love and
decades-old propaganda, of drug-crazed zombies and wide-eyed
townsfolk, blending dark humor with sunny production numbers.

This toe-tapping project comes from two Jersey guys - Kevin Murphy and
Dan Studney - who met in the mid-'80s as theater arts majors at Drew
University and went on to storm Hollywood.

Lyricist Murphy, a native of Tabernacle, is a writer on "Desperate
Housewives." Composer Studney, who grew up in Hillside, has an
eclectic showbiz resume that includes everything from "Party of Five"
episodes to "Simpsons" comic books.

On this recent evening, the two have returned to their alma mater in
Madison to screen their new "Reefer Madness" (a big hit, by the

way, among Drew students, as it was at this year's Sundance Film
Festival).

Seated in a lounge of the Student Center - their adoring mothers
nearby - the two reminisce about their days at Drew, when they wrote
two musicals together.

That's also when they first saw "Reefer Madness," the notorious 1936
anti-marijuana film in which one puff transforms innocent young folks
into oversexed, violent, cackling psychos.

"My roommate in college and I were sort of video packrats," says
Murphy, who double majored in political science. "We had, like, every
movie ever made on a great big shelf in our dorm room, so we were
aware of it, just like we were aware of other fun cult movies."

The original was not just a bad movie, but a "gloriously bad" one, as
Murphy and Studney say on their Web site (reefer madness.org), which
also provides this fascinating history of the old film:

Financed by a small, earnest church group, "Tell Your Children" was
purchased by exploitation film maestro Dwain Esper, who cut in
salacious shots, and slapped on a sexier title, "Reefer Madness."

After a brief run, the film was largely forgotten until 1971, when
Keith Stroup, founder of the National Organization for Reform of
Marijuana Laws, bought a print for $297 and started showed it at
pro-pot festivals. Subsequent distribution of the movie to college
campuses throughout the '70s by the burgeoning New Line Cinema
established its cult status.

The idea of taking "Reefer Madness" to a whole new level came up while
Murphy and Studney were listening to a Frank Zappa CD while driving
back to L.A. from a film job in Oakland, Calif.

"There was some reference to reefer in one of the song lyrics and then
the idea popped up: Wait a minute, what about 'Reefer Madness' as a
musical?" Murphy recalls. "By the time we made it back to Los Angeles,
I'd written a song lyric, and Dan had a melody."

Their "Reefer Madness" musical opened in L.A. in 1998 and had a
successful run there. An off-Broadway production - which opened in
2001, days after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks - folded fast.

Nonetheless, plans for a movie version moved forward.

Kristen Bell ("Veronica Mars" on UPN) reprises her role from the New
York production as Mary Lane, the "vomitously perky" (in Bell's words)
sweetheart of dimpled all-American Jimmy Harper, who dooms them by
trying reefer.

Harper is wonderfully played by Christian Campbell, who had the same
role onstage. His sister, Neve Campbell, Studney's "Party of Five"
pal, plays Miss Poppy, who runs a local ice-cream parlor. (There's
even an appearance or two by Jesus, played as a sort of Vegas lounge
lizard, by Robert Torti.)

At the Reefer Den, we meet hostess Mae Coleman (Ana Gasteyer), her
abusive pusher boyfriend, Jack Stone (Steven Weber), and two weed
freaks: Ralph Wiley (John Kassir), a onetime college guy, and Sally
DeBains (Amy Spanger), a "reefer slut."

It's all dramatically narrated by "The Lecturer," a crusader who
brings this cautionary tale to a small town, where parents crowd into
the local high school. He is one of 10 characters played by Alan
Cumming (who even does a mean Franklin D. Roosevelt).

"Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical" has something for
everyone. Its infectious songs, which invite a viewer
to sing along, make it an heir apparent to "The Rocky
Horror Picture Show."

"From your mouth to God's ears," Murphy says.

It also has inside references to other musicals and some stoner slang.
But this "Reefer Madness" is only nominally about pot, its authors
insist.

"I'm not the marijuana-crusading guy. Neither is Kevin," says Studney,
who does not want to disparage the people who are trying to get
medicinal marijuana legalized. "It's not to belittle that, but that's
not why we wrote this. I just don't think this is about that. Not at
its core."

So, what is it about - besides being what Murphy calls a "big, glitzy
singing-dancing package complete with singing clams"?

While researching the project, they discovered that William Randolph
Hearst and Lammont DuPont "had a vested financial interest in getting
industrial hemp legislated out of existence," Murphy says.

Hearst and DuPont, seeking to protect their investments (paper
production and nylon, respectively), joined Andrew Mellon, their
banker, to quash the competitor.

Mellon, who was also treasury secretary, installed his nephew by
marriage, Harry J. Anslinger, as the first national drug czar. (The
high school in the movie is named after him.)

"This guy was kind of an insane pit bull, a crazy racist," Murphy
says. "Hearst's papers would print wild stories - about this kid in
Florida that hacked up his entire family with a pickax because he was
high on marijuana - and Anslinger would cut out those articles and go
before the Congress.

"And then all the congressmen would say, 'Oh my God, what's
happening?' ... Then, of course, Hearst would write that congressmen
are up in arms because they're hearing about all the horror stories.
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