Jimmy Kimmel to celebrate 4/20 with new cannabis documentary series

Jimmy Kimmel adds a new project to his already extensive list of cannabis-related productions. The Jimmy Kimmel Live! is executive producer of 4X20: Quick Hits, a new documentary series from Hulu, obviously scheduled for release on April 20.

The series is based on a simple concept: four short documentaries by 20 minutes each devoted to different aspects of the cannabis cultivation. All four films will be released simultaneously on the platform.

«Christmas has an entire cable channel dedicated to holiday programming. For 4/20, we made four 20-minute documentaries for those who celebrate the day with trees of a different kind,» said Kimmel.

Four films exploring the underground roots of cannabis culture

The 4 documentaries will focus on the cultural history that has shaped weed's place in the American imagination. According to the trailer and descriptions shared ahead of release, the series explores the cult films, counterculture media, glass art and political battles that surrounded cannabis long before it became a regulated industry.

The four documentaries are :

• Highly Unlikely, directed by Brent Hodge, which revisits the heritage of the stoner comedy of 2004 Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle.
• High Times, directed by Kyle Thrash, which focuses on the history of High Times magazine and its founder Tom Forcade.
• The Legend of Ganjasaurus Rex, directed by Alex Ross Perry, traces the strange post-life of a 1987 low-budget cult film that has become a local legend in California.
• Bong Voyage, directed by Todd Kapostasy, who follows the glass artist Jason Harris and the era of federal crackdowns on cannabis paraphernalia.

All four films were supervised by producer Adam M. Goldberg.

High Times and Tom Forcade: the history of cannabis media

Among these four short films, the one about High Times tells the story from Tom Forcade, founder of High Times magazine, and portrays the publication as a blend of outlaw journalism, counter-cultural activism and media provocation.

According to initial reports, the documentary links Forcade's motivations to the Free Press movement, High Times as a publication that helped normalize cannabis consumption through a mix of humor, political defiance and unabashed celebration of the plant. The short film also sheds light on how Forcade allegedly used cannabis smuggling to finance the magazine's rise, a story that reflects the blurred boundaries between activism, entrepreneurship and illegality that shaped cannabis media in the 1970s.

For many, High Times was not just a magazine, but a cultural megaphone that propelled cannabis to the forefront of public debate at a time when it still carried major legal risks.

From Harold & Kumar to Operation Pipe Dreams

Other films in the anthology explore very different facets of the same cultural ecosystem.

Highly Unlikely examines how Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle became more than just a comedy, turning into an enduring benchmark of modern stoner cinema. The actor Neil Patrick Harris, who made a memorable appearance in the franchise as an exaggerated version of himself, appears in the trailer, saying, «I love that we're discussing how this fits into our cultural zeitgeist.»

On the other hand, Bong Voyage plunges into the world of glass pipes and the artists who create them, linking this history to Operation Pipe Dreams, a federal crackdown on sellers and manufacturers of cannabis-related accessories.

And in The Legend of Ganjasaurus Rex, the series turns to a cult film rooted in the past. Humboldt County, in California, exploring how underground cinema became another form of protest at the height of the war on drugs.

The series will also count on the participation of celebrities such as John Cho and Kal Penn, Tommy Chong, and many other guests.