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Up In Smoke: Cheech Says No Reunion With Tommy Chong
AP | CentreDaily | 05/25/2006

CONCORD, N.C. -Those rumors about an on-screen reunion of Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong? Reefer madness, according to Marin.

The actor - one half of the stoned comedy duo that embodied 1970s and 1980s marijuana humor - said there will be no future joint efforts with Chong.

"DOA," Marin replied when asked about the prospects during a press junket this week for "Cars," the new animated summer offering from Disney and Pixar. In the film, Marin voices Ramon, a vintage low-rider who befriends lead character Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson).

"We've tried to do it a bunch of times and we always end up at the same place," Marin said. "All the old animosities resurface."

"You know what?" he added. "I'm real comfortable leaving Cheech & Chong right where it is. I was a big Laurel & Hardy fan when I was a kid. I used to watch them on TV all the time and then one time I saw a Laurel & Hardy film they made when they were a lot older and it creeped me out. I just never wanted to do that."

Marin said breaking into animated films with 1988's "Oliver and Company" helped give his career a second act. He went on to do voices in "FernGully" and "The Lion King," acted in the "Spy Kids" series of children's movies and co-starred on the TV series "Nash Bridges."

"That was always a point of conflict with Tommy and I," Marin said. "I wanted to kind of keep moving and do other stuff and he wanted to stay at that same thing. My natural inclination was to keep moving."

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