Spring 1990 ... bookstore, Westwood Village, CA ....

Jack Herer's "The Emperor Wears No Clothes" catches my eye. I glance at the subtitles: "Hemp and the Marijuana Conspiracy … How Hemp Can Save The World." I wonder, What is this guy smoking and where can I get some?

I spend $12.95 and race home. Right from the opening chapter on "History of Cannabis Hemp," I'm propelled through the looking glass …. everything I thought I knew about marijuana turns upside down and backward … the "DEMON WEED" is a beneficial plant! … "REEFER" goes back 10,000 years in every culture! … "POT" can save the world! …. environmentally friendly INDUSTRIAL HEMP has thousands of uses but American farmers are banned by federal law from growing it ... even though it comes from the non-intoxicating side of the cannabis family ?! The book sees certain sinister forces spending unbelievable amounts of our tax money to keep America hemp free. The book’s villains are the federal government, corporate America and the mainstream media.

At the time, I was as mainstream media as it comes: staff writer at a large metro newspaper. Fortified by my new expert source, Jack Herer, I figure its up to me to expose to the world (or at least the Valley) the True History of Hemp and the Real Facts Behind Marijuana Prohibition. But my story proposal bounces from the Editor of the paper to the National Desk to the Sunday magazine and finally back to me. Thanks but no thanks. Swell. Now the Editor suspects I’m a pothead and half the newsroom is hitting me up for a joint.

I send the same story proposal to Oliver Stone, the Hollywood rebel who is so not afraid of controversy that his entire filmography is built on themes of conspiracy, corporate greed, cover-up and injustice. Sound familiar? As I’d hoped, he says he is "fascinated" with the proposal. He thinks it would be a great subject for a documentary and gets a New York documentary company involved as producer … attaching himself as executive producer.

Footage is shot at protest rallies, then cut together with archival shots, and voila! An 8-minute trailer to shop around in hopes of getting a TV or cable network to shell out half-a-million dollars in production money. But after three or four years of shopping, the project finally dies when Stone tells me he's dropping out. Moral of the story: Even an Oscar-winning director can't get a marijuana movie made. Not even at HBO.

After I get out of the newspaper business in 1995, director Jeff Jones and I form Double J Films. Jeff is a longtime pal since ours days in the Midwest, where I wrote sports columns and he was a whiz kid advertising director. He later spent some time in Chicago and then moved to L.A. He always told me that he wasn't too interested in longer formats because he didn't think he could pay attention to anything for more than 30 seconds except sex, and even that was getting problematic.

Fall 1997 … I run into Jack Herer in Santa Cruz, Calif., at a medical marijuana conference. I get to know him over the next few months. It slowly dawns on me that his story has all the makings of a great documentary: High school dropout/Army M.P. /Goldwater Republicanturns hippie, rescues valuable natural resource from dustbin of history … fights the power ... gets thrown in jail ...overcomes skeptics … becomes cult folk hero … lives like a pauper … dedicates life to a plant and starts a revolution.

January 1998 … I tell Jeff Jones I want to revive the marijuana/hemp documentary but this time focus it on Jack Herer. He immediately hides his credit cards. Reminds me that even Oliver Stone couldn't make a marijuana documentary happen.

We do venture far outside Hollywood for financing. All the way to England. We connect with Anita Roddick. You know … The Body Shop Anita Roddick … human dynamo Anita Roddick .... environmental hero Anita Roddick ... cover of Hemp Times Anita Roddick … wealthy champion of worthy causes … prominent supporter (along with Paul McCartney and Richard Branson) of the Cannabis Decriminalization Campaign in her native England … and powerful advocate of industrial hemp who … is introducing a line of hemp-oil products in her 1,700 stores.

Call it karma or luck, but Anita Roddick just happened to be speaking at a businesswoman's luncheon in California near… where I lived at the time! Dressed in an official all-black producer's ensemble, I approach THE lady in a hallway after the luncheon. Quickly, nervously, I introduce myself and pitch the project. I hear her say a certain word, and it isn't "Security!" It's "opportunistic." As in, "This couldn't be more opportunistic for both of us." Hands trembling, I give her a copy of "The Emperor Wears No Clothes," along with a proposal for the documentary. She promises to get back to me. A certain vibe tells me she's not pulling my leg in order to make good her escape. Three days later … the phone rings. She loves the book … shares our passion … thinks our film is a great idea!

Next thing you know, we're in New York with Jack Herer … cameras rolling.

J.A. Meyers
June 1999