Last week, Steve Jelbert profiled Super High Me for The Times of London, highlighting the Roll Your Own Screening program. The article, titled Super High Me reveals the secrets of a rolling stoner, opens with the choice teaser:

For once the heads have got it together. A documentary that began life as an offhand gag from America’s “second-best pot comic” (as rated by the toker’s bible High Times) has made a tiny bit of cinema history.

Steve has an interesting background for a journalist, and talking with him was a gas. The article has some great POV from Doug on the background for the film.

Benson […] plays Super High Me for laughs - and all his antics are actually legal in California. “It would be difficult for anyone who has obligations to do,” he says. “So I wouldn’t break the law. I didn’t operate a motor vehicle for the 30 days of filming. The crew drove me everywhere. It’s a showbusiness thing. Someone outside showbusiness should try it and see how it works for them. But not a brain surgeon. There may be car mechanics that are already doing it, though.”

Steve grasped on to the idea of Roll Your Own as an exercise in “motivating the supposedly unmotivated.”

The film holds the record for the widest documentary opening ever. It was shown in more than 1,000 venues on the holiest day of the smoking year, April 20, 4/20 in American parlance. Supposedly named for the after-school meeting time of a gang of Californian teen-agers in the Seventies, 4:20 is now a universal smokers’ code. Knowing that the film could not get television advertising or a wide release, the producers approached the indie marketing and distribution specialists b-side, which simply made screening copies available to anyone who wanted one and could offer premises.
[…]
From college campuses to comedy clubs, sympathisers joined in. An Illinois couple showed the film at their wedding reception. A San Fran-cisco “guerilla drive-in” outfit projected it on the wall of a local store.

Check out the full article here.

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After more than 1,000 screenings on 4/20, the Roll Your Own Screening program has been extended through 5/20. If you missed out on 4/20, you don’t need to wait until next year. Sign up today to Roll Your Own.

In the mean time, check out these photos from some of the 4/20 events.

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With 4/20 finally here, it’s time to take your Roll Your Own Screening to the next level. Several ways to get cool stuff while enjoying Super High Me.

Have Your Guests RSVP

For all screening hosts, get 20 or more RSVPs, and we’ll send you a badass “Roll Your Own” poster. Simply have your guests RSVP online by end of day 4/20 by going to your event page. If you need help finding your event page to share with guests, click here.

Everyone who RSVPs online with a valid e-mail address by end of day 4/20 will get a coupon on 4/21 for 20% off all Super High Me merch - including posters, t-shirts and movies. They’ll also be automatically entered to win more swag:

• One kick-ass Super High Me movie poster, signed by Doug Benson
• One of 25 “Roll Your Own” Super High Me posters
• One of 25 Super High Me t-shirts

The drawing will be on 4/25, with winners notified on 4/25 and will be subject to the contest rules here.

Take Pics and Win a Signed Poster

Take pictures of your screening, then e-mail them to our41tip@photos.flickr.com, with the name of your event in the subject. Photos are due by 4/24. Doug Benson will personally choose the top ten photos, and each winner will receive a rad Super High Me movie poster signed by Doug Benson. Winners will be notified on 4/25.

So get those RSVPs, get out your camera, and get ready to ROLL YOUR OWN.

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We expect 40,000 people to attend public and private Super High Me events on 4/20. We can’t wait to hear — and see — how your 4/20 is.

And if you didn’t make it in time to host a 4/20 screening, have no fear. Free Roll Your Own screenings will continue through 5/20. See you all this weekend.

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Check out the store here.

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Check out the map here.

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Nice feature on Super High Me and the Roll Your Own program in Lost at Sea Magazine. Choice excerpt:

Having garnered laughs at a number of special engagements, media screenings, and film festivals, Super High Me will be taking it to the masses for a “grassroots” nationwide festival of “Roll Your Own” screenings this weekend. Any users of the movie’s website can register to host a screening of their own on the slightly obvious date of 4/20, for which Benson promises to send a DVD, free of charge. If you can’t find a screening in your area and you’ve got a DVD player, a projector (”the one you use at the office is perfect”), and a couple of speakers, why not go for it - there’s a good chance this is the best comedyocumentary you’ll see all year.

Truth is, Benson’s film could’ve been on just about any topic and been equally as entertaining, so long as Benson himself was the star. Marijuana is generally a comical subject, and the film being spoofed was funny in itself. Add to that mix a guy who could crack jokes mid-nap and still make the entire room erupt with the giggles, and you’ve got a winner. The guy has got funny on lockdown. Super High Me is this year’s Super Size Me for the stoner in all of us. And the best part? You don’t even have to be stoned.

Check out the full story at: http://www.lostatsea.net/feature.phtml?fid=63529363147fba939da41a.

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