New show will document Jim Belushi’s experience as a cannabis farmer

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Jim Belushi will soon be taking his talents to a television near you. The younger brother of the late John Belushi will star in a new show, “Growing Belushi,” that documents his experience as a cannabis grower on his 93-acre farm in Oregon.

The show is set to premiere later this month on Discovery. Belushi, who has had previous roles on Saturday Night Live and Twin Peaks, as well as starring in Broadway productions and a long list of movies, will be trying his hand at unscripted TV for just the second time. A 2015 series called “Building Belushi” followed him as he built a riverfront cabin on the property.

“I’ve done everything else,” he told the Chicago Tribune. “I’ve done TV comedy, TV drama. I do improvisational shows. I do Blues Brothers (shows) across the country. I’ve played a clown. I played an orangutan. And the unscripted television business is a formidable business in our entertainment industry, so it seemed natural to me because I’m an improviser from Second City in Chicago, and this whole show was improvised.”

For cannabis consumers in Illinois, they will soon be able to sample some of Belushi’s work. The Greenhouse cannabis dispensary in Skokie will be carrying limited-edition flower from the farm at some point in the future and Belushi told the Tribune that he has plans to sell his cannabis elsewhere in the state “sooner than later.”

Belushi is a strong believer in the therapeutic potential of cannabis and cites his brother’s death as one of the reasons he got involved in the industry. “That is why I became a cannabis farmer. To spread this medicine to people who need it. No family should have to go through the trauma of losing a loved one to opioids,” he tweeted in June.

In the first episode of the series, Belushi discusses his brother John and traces his death back to his high school football days and the possible brain injuries he faced as a middle linebacker.

“I know he had damage to the brain. As soon as alcohol and drugs were available to him, I think he went right to medication,” he said. Belushi has previously tweeted that “If my brother John was a pot head, he’d still be here today.”

Belushi will also be using his air time to promote the Last Prisoner Project, an organization dedicated to freeing nonviolent cannabis prisoners.

The 66-year-old Belushi told the Tribune he had some brushes with the law while attending Wheaton Central High School. “I actually got arrested in Wheaton for joints a couple times, but that was the extent of it. By the time I got to college, I got very serious about my craft as an actor,” he said. “I never let alcohol, cannabis, anything get between me and my work.”

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