Celebrities are supposed to reflect our best and brightest qualities. These people have all the resources in the world at their disposal and what they say can affect everything from your facebook feed to international politics. The life of a celebrity is that of constant public scrutiny and drama.

So it comes as no surprise that when celebrities talk about cannabis, people listen. Not only do they listen, they open their wallets. Personalities like Snoop Dogg, Joe Rogan and even President Obama have strains of cannabis bearing their name. While celebrities like Paris Hilton and Natalie Portman have spoken in favor of legal cannabis, people like Willie Nelson and Seth Rogen have made their fortunes with their art reflecting the cannabis community.

Not all public personalities have come out in support of cannabis though. One Huffington Post writer said “I, for one, am absolutely against the legalization of marijuana. Period. There isn’t an argument in the world that will change the fact that psychoactive substances produce emotionally crippled adults.” These kind of outright refusals to change position based on facts are common enough that huge media organizations have continued to publish these opinions and have not been called to task by the government for spreading misinformation and outright lies.

Even popular TV characters like the TMNT and Super Mario are down to condemn use. While the cannabis craze has made it much less acceptable to claim that weed is a ‘gateway drug’, the drug warriors of the 1980’s that helped spread misinformation about cannabis and its risks like Nancy Reagan with her ‘Just say no’ campaign with D.A.R.E.

Although marijuana opponents have long pointed to studies suggesting that long-term use could be tied to a lack of motivation, a sampling of successful users suggests otherwise. Pot policy reform group Marijuana Policy Project has released a list of the top 50 most influential Americans who have used marijuana, and it’s a doozy.

The list contains politicians, Supreme Court justices, entertainers, entrepreneurs and even a president of the USA. Some admitted only to trying the drug once or twice, while others, like Maya Angelou, reportedly “smoked marijuana with abandon.”

“The goal here is to dispel the myth that marijuana users are ‘losers’ who lack motivation, and highlight the fact that they are typically productive and oftentimes quite successful,” said Mason Tvert, director of communications for the Marijuana Policy Project, in a release. “As this list demonstrates, many of our nation’s most successful citizens have used marijuana.”

FILM CELEBRITIES AND CANNABIS

 

TOMMY CHONG

Tommy Chong is a legend in the cannabis community. From his satirical portrayals of a burned-out stoner to his experience with the US justice system in the early 2000’s with ‘operation pipe dreams’, Tommy Chong has been a public figure fighting for cannabis legalization. He has spent the last few years focusing his efforts in legalizing cannabis for Michigan.

Known to many as the Godfather of Ganja, Tommy Chong practices what he preaches with medical cannabis. He has used cannabis treatments for his own battle with cancer after being diagnosed during his season on Dancing with the Stars. During an interview he said his life goal was to ‘help with making sure that every parent that needs cannabis medicine for their child that suffers from epilepsy, to make sure that they get all the medicine that they need.”

A big proponent of how cannabis can stimulate the economy, Tommy said in the sam interview that he believes cannabis can be used to offset the negative impact of companies like Ford Motors, Mars Bars and others moving their operations overseas by filling their now vacant American factories with cannabis growing and processing operations.

He also said “I want to start a marijuana fertilizer company. I want to take all of the stems and all of the root balls from marijuana plants that people throw away, grind it up, and turn it into fertilizer. There are a lot of crops out there that are really taxing on the soil, and cannabis fertilizer is a great way to put nutrients back into the soil. That’s the great thing about the cannabis plant. We can use all of it. Every last sliver.”

CHEECH MARIN

This American actor, comedian and writer gained his initial popularity in the 1970’s and early 80s. The satirical comedy he became known for centered on cannabis counter-culture and gave a whole generation an icon to hold up as what a stoner should and could be. Born Richard Anthony Marin, he got the nickname Cheech as a baby because his uncle said he looked like a little chicharrón.

Cheech Marin is more than an actor though. He is a seasoned writer, having penned several children’s books, wrote for an underground rock-and-roll magazine called Poppin Magazine, was the first celebrity champion on Jeopardy and even has an Honorary Doctorate from the Otis College of Art and Design.

Over the years, Cheech has appeared on countless shows and given dozens of interviews where he talks about the need for cannabis to be legal. He also is outspoken about how much safer modern cannabis is than the pot of yester year saying ‘Now you don’t have seeds in there popping that will hit you in the eye’.

MORGAN FREEMAN

Morgan Freeman is a 78-year-old Oscar winning actor has a long history with cannabis. He began using cannabis with his first wife and currently uses it to treat his fibromyalgia. After a nasty accident where he flipped a car off the road while driving in Mississippi. It took four hours of surgery for the doctors to repair his shattered left shoulder, arm and elbow.

The nerve damage Freeman sustained never fully healed. To this day he wears a compression glove on his left hand to prevent blood pooling. Fibromyalgia is one side effect of the trauma and the actor claims the only relief he has found has been through the use of cannabis. Besides using for a long time, Morgan has come out as a vocal advocate and wants it fully legalized.

The active actor said in an interview that you can get enough energy to get things done ‘if you smoke enough marijuana’. Freeman also told Larry King ‘they can’t continue to say it’s a dangerous drug when it’s safer than alcohol.’ While he may not consider himself a connoisseur, his willingness to speak out on the need to legalize cannabis has helped advance the cause.

NATALIE PORTMAN

The Black Swan star admitted to Entertainment Weekly that she was a bit of a stoner during her college days at Harvard University. 'I love stoner comedies. I smoked weed in college, but I haven’t smoked in years,' she has told Entertainment Weekly. I’m too old. I wish I was that cool, but I’m like an old lady now. I’m in bed by 10 p.m. I can’t do that anymore.'

Her comments were made before she announced her pregnancy in 2011.The actress did actually graduate from Harvard in 2003 with a B.A. in Psychology. During her time at Harvard, she only made two films; Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones and a small role in Cold Mountain.

She told the New York Post at the time: 'I don't care if college ruins my career. I'd rather be smart than a movie star.' She has enjoyed reliving her 'stoner' days in Your Highness, the medieval comedy in which she stars alongside James Franco and Danny McBride.

MATTHEW MCCONAUGHEY

Matthew McConaughey was born in Uvalde, Texas during the winter 1969. Mathew recognized his talent early and pursued acting while still in school. He was voted, “most handsome”, in high school and started his acting career appearing in commercials and in other small film roles. He struggled in anonymity for the rest of his adolescence and managed to complete all his schooling before he dedicated himself to achieving his dream of becoming a movie star.

He got his first big break when he appeared in “Dazed and Confused.” Dazed and Confused is a movie about a group of teens celebrating the end of high school and another group of freshmen doing their best to avoid getting hazed. His performance was so spot on that thirteen years later, people still quote his characters lines. Later on he starred in movies such as A Time to Kill, Contact and most recently in Interstellar.

McConaughey is no stranger to cannabis and has been very public with his support. He has even been in trouble publicly with the law for being found with weed in his home. The police were called for a noise complaint and they found McConaughey practicing bongos and smoking a bowl. His charges for possession were eventually dropped, but he was slapped with a fine for violating the local noise ordinance and for resisting arrest. He is a part of the list of popular celebrities that are outspoken about their consumption of herb. Pictures of McConaughey smoking herb can be found all over the internet as well.

WOODY HARRELSON

Harrelson has protested America’s marijuana policy and considers himself an active pot smoker. Actor/marijuana activist Woody Harrelson is one of a select group of actors that have triumphantly made the transition from the small screen to major motion pictures.

In the mid-'90s, Woody Harrelson climbed redwoods to protest logging and wore hemp clothes to bring attention to marijuana prohibition. In 1996, the same year he was nominated for an Oscar for his portrayal of Hustler publisher in The People vs. Larry Flynt, Harrelson was arrested in Kentucky for planting hemp seeds.

He finally outed himself as a active pot smoker at the Seattle Hempfest in 2001, telling the large crowd, "I recently decided to stop smoking, but I thought more about it and decided I didn't want to be a quitter!" In 2003, he was the keynote speaker at the NORML Conference. Harrelson narrated Ron Mann's pot-doc Grass and, in 2003, Mann filmed Harrelson in Go Further, which documents Harrelson's lifestyle that includes raw foods, yoga, biodiesel, bicycling and, of course, hemp.

In 2008, he co-starred with fellow Top CelebStoners Matthew McConaughey and Willie Nelson in the stoner flick, Surfer, Dude. He even appears in the 2012 documentary, Hempsters: Plant the Seed.

SETH ROGEN

What’s Rogen’s secret to writing great comedy? Lots and lots of weed. "We are going to do a screening of #TheInterviewMovie in Colorado where I get baked with everyone first, and we can smoke weed in the theater," he tweeted before the screening. Rogen, who is open about his love for pot and frequently plays stoners in his films, the event took place Dec. 8, 2014.

With films like "Superbad" and "Pineapple Express" on his resume, Seth Rogen easily one of the reigning kings of today's brand of stoner comedies, so it would be understandable if he found the current wave of marijuana legalization around the U.S. troubling from a creative perspective. But Rogen told CBS News that he's far from worried about the implications of a more pot-friendly culture.

When he was asked about marijuana’s place in culture, he replied, ‘It's interesting, it's a very good question. I don't know. We haven't found any real difference in the way people react to it on screen. We made "This is the End" years after "Pineapple Express," and there's a shot in "This is the End" that's just a bunch of weed on a table, and people literally cheered in the theater when it came on the screen. [Laughs.]

‘I think right now, if anything, probably more people are trying it than ever have because it's becoming a little more socially accepted than it was. And I'm sure there are people who kind of thought, 'As things ease up, I'll try it,' you know? So I think there's a version where it's actually more popular than it's ever been. It's probably less taboo than it's ever been in some ways, but I think its popularity outweighs it's taboo-ness.”

JOHNNY DEPP

Born John Christopher Depp II in Owensboro during the summer of 1963 in Kentucky, Johnny Depp became famous for the quirky and unusual characters he plays on screen including Edward from Edward Scissorhands and Ichabod Crane from Sleepy Hollow. Johnny has developed over his career to become a producer, actor and a musician.

Not only is he a talented performer, Johnny also won best actor for both the Golden Globe Awards and Screen Guild Awards. He broke the Guinness Book of Records for the highest paid actor and was labeled a Disney Legend in 2015. Johnny originally wanted to be a rock and roll star, and he succeeded. He dropped out of school and joined numerous bands. After years of playing with the band called, The Kid, and after moving to Los Angeles he started acting.

He became more popular after playing a small role in Platoon and stared in 22 Jump Street. Since then he has created an image for himself, the bad boy of Hollywood. Johnny has been known to smoke herb with rock stars backstage, and he starred in movies that was heavy in drug content and use; he starred in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and he starred in From Hell.

Johnny Depp knew several Hollywood celebrities and he smoked and consumed weed with them. He is considered a celebrity stoner because he has made comments like, "I'm not a great pothead or anything like that… but weed is much, much less dangerous than alcohol." He also received community shaming for saying that he would rather his kids smoke weed with him at home instead of not knowing where his kids are and smoking or digesting potentially fatal unknown substances. Overall, Johnny Depp has a positive view about weed and has said so many times in public.

Cannafo News Team

Cannafo news administration team.