Women's Biographies on Film

Inspired by a post on a Turner Classic Movies Facebook fan group that noted it's Women's History Month and asked for readers to send in their favorite costumes worn by women(!), I started coming up with this list of women who have been portrayed in film instead, and it's quite an impressive one: 

Greta Garbo lead the way in Queen Christina (1933). Just the way she runs up the steps for her entrance hooked me. And Katharine Hepburn was a fine Mary of Scotland in 1936. 

Greer Garson played orphans' advocate Edna Gladney in Blossoms in the Dust (1941) and Marie Curie Madame Curie (1943), a role played by Rosamund Pike in the 2019 film Radioactive. Garson was Oscar-nominated for playing Eleanor Roosevelt in Sunrise at Campobello (1960); Jean Stapleton played the role in the 1982 TV movie Eleanor, First Lady of the World. 

Bette Davis portrayed Queen Elizabeth I in The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (1939). Jean Simmons played the young Queen in Young Bess (1953), as Cate Blanchett did (more realistically) in Elizabeth (1998).

Deborah Kerr starred in a fictionalized account of governess Anna Leonowens in The King and I (1956).  In 1959, The Diary of Anne Frank premiered; Shelly Winters donated the Supporting Actress Oscar she won for the film to the Anne Frank house in Amsterdam. Susan Hayward won an Oscar for her portrayal of Barbara Graham in I Want to Live. (Jazz, and marijuana, are blamed.) Patty Duke was named Best Supporting Actress for playing Helen Keller in A Miracle Worker (1962).

Cleopatra (1963) starred Elizabeth Taylor, the first actress to make a million dollars for a role. (The Queen of Egypt was also portrayed as smoking something in the 2005/07 HBO series Rome.) Debbie Reynolds played The Unsinkable Molly Brown in 1964; Kathy Bates played the role in Titanic (1997).  In 1965, Julie Andrews played a version of Maria von Trapp (without the yodel) in The Sound of Music.

Faye Dunaway played outlaw Bonnie Parker in Bonnie and Clyde (1967), for which Estelle Parsons won a supporting Oscar for role as Blanche Barrow. Barbra Streisand knocked 'em dead as the irrepressible Fanny Brice in Funny Girl (1968), the same year that Katharine Hepburn starred as the also-irrepressible Eleanor of Aquitaine in The Lion in Winter; the two tied for the Best Actress Oscar. 

Julie Harris played a milquetoast version of the powerful and misunderstood poet Emily Dickinson in The Belle of Amherst (1976). The only thing Harris seemed to have in common with Dickinson was her red hair. Unfortunately, I must say the same about Cynthia Nixon's portrayal in A Quiet Passion (2016).  

Jane Fonda starred as Tokin' Woman Lillian Hellman in Julia (1977), a film well worth seeing. Shirley MacLaine and Anne Bancroft co-starred in The Turning Point, based on real-life ballerinas Isabel Mirrow Brown and Nora Kaye, a movie I would see again any time if I could find it streaming. 

Sally Field won an Oscar for Norma Rae (1979), based on real-life union organizer Crystal Lee Sutton. So did Sissy Spacek, who was exceptional as Loretta Lynn in Coal Miner's Daughter (1980), in which Beverly D'Angelo was perfect as Patsy Cline, as was Jessica Lange, who played Cline in Sweet Dreams (1985). Lange gave a powerful performance as Frances Farmer in Frances (1982), the year that Sissy Spacek played Joyce (Beth) Horman in Missing.

Silkwood (1983) stars Meryl Streep as activist Karen Silkwood. Streep also starred in Out of Africa (1985) as Tokin' Woman Isak Dinesen. The acclaimed actress played educator Roberta Guaspari in Music From the Heart (1999), Julia Child in Julie & Julia (2009), and Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady (2011) (for which she won the Oscar). She was nominated in the supporting category for playing writer Susan Orlean in Adaptation (2002), a role in which she gets high on a plant powder. 

Isabelle Adjani co-produced the breathtaking Camille Claudel (1988), in which she starred as the sculptor and muse, the same year Sigourney Weaver unforgettably played Dian Fossey in Gorillas in the Mist. 

Judy Davis is wonderful as George Sand in Impromptu (1991). (There's a dejeuner sur l'herbe with herb in it.) Susan Sarandon played Michaela Odone in Lorenzo's Oil (1992), and A League of Their Own is Penny Marshall's ode to the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. In What's Love Got to Do with It (1993), Angela Bassett gives a powerhouse performance as Tina Turner. 

Jennifer Lopez portrays the "Queen of Tejano Music" Selena Quintanilla-Pérez in Selena (1997). Judi Dench took home a Supporting Actress Oscar for her eight unforgettable minutes as Queen Victoria in Shakespeare in Love (1998). She also played the monarch in Mrs. Brown (1997).

In 2000, Julia Roberts won the Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of the title character in Erin Brockovich, and Marcia Gay Harden took the Supporting Actress award for playing Lee Krasner in Pollock. Iris (2001) starred Judi Dench and Kate Winslet as author Iris Murdoch, and Frida (2002) starred Salma Hayek as painter Frida Kahlo. 

Nicole Kidman and her prosthetic nose won an Oscar for playing Virginia Woolf in The Hours (2003). Cate Blanchett took the Supporting Actress prize for playing Katharine Hepburn in The Aviator (2004), winning over Laura Linney as Clara McMillen in Kinsey, and Sophie Okonedo as Tatiana Rusesabagina in Hotel Rwanda.

Hillary Swank was splendid as suffragette Alice Paul in Iron Jawed Angels (2004). Frances O'Connor co-starred as Lucy Burns, with Julia Ormond as Inez Milholland, and Anjelica Huston as Carrie Chapman Catt. In 2005, Charlize Theron and Frances McDormand co-starred in North Country, based on a landmark sexual harassment class action case, and Catherine Keener played Harper Lee in Capote.

Marion Cotillard was named Best Actress for her role as Edith Piaf in La Vie en Rose (2007). Carey Mulligan was nominated for her role in An Education (2009), based on a memoir by Lynn Barber, and  Angelina Jolie was nominated for playing Christine Collins in Changeling (2008). Jolie won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 1999 for Girl, Interrupted, in which Winona Ryder played author Susanna Kaysen. While playing Maria Callas in Maria (2005), Jolie hallucinates on drugs. 

Helen Mirren won an Oscar for playing (the modern) Queen Elizabeth in The Queen (2006), and played Sonya Tolstoy in The Last Station (2009). Reese Witherspoon was Oscar-nominated for her portrayal of Cheryl Strayed in Wild (2014); she'd won for playing June Carter Cash in Walk the Line (2006). Laura Dern was nominated for her role as Barbara "Bobbi" Grey in Wild. 

Tokin' Woman Kathy Bates portrayed Alice B. Toklas's lover Gertrude Stein in Midnight in Paris (2011).  Sally Field played Mary Todd Lincoln in Lincoln (2012), and Helen Hunt played sexual surrogate Charyl Cohen-Greene in The Sessions. Keira Knightley played code-breaker Joan Clarke in The Imitation Game (2014). 

I was disappointed in the Bessie Smith biopic Bessie (2015) starring Queen Latifah, which should have been great. Queen of the Desert starring Nicole Kidman as Tokin' Woman Gertrude Bell was similarly disappointing. (Kidman did a photo spread in Vogue inspired by her role.) Thankfully, Letters from Baghdad (2016) is a terrific documentary on Bell that was executive produced by Tilda Swinton, who gives voice to Bell in the film. 

Tokin' Woman Susan Sarandon became an Oscar winner for her portrayal of death-penalty activist Sister Helen Prejean in Dead Man Walking (2016). Hidden Figures from that year tells the story of NASA mathematicians Katherine Goble Johnson (Taraji P. Henson), Mary Jackson (Janelle Monáe), and Dorothy Vaughan (Octavia Spencer, who was nominated for an Oscar). 

Emma Stone portrayed Billie Jean King in Battle of the Sexes (2017), and Margot Robbie played tragic ice skater Tonya Harding in I, Tonya, for which Allison Janney took home a Supporting Actress award for playing her mother. Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise documented the life of the prominent writer, activist and Tokin' Woman. 

On the Basis of Sex (2018) dramatized Ruth Bader Ginsburg's early career; the documentary RGB explored her life and work. Keira Knightley played the French author in Colette and Amy Adams played Lynne Cheney in Vice. Saoirse Ronan starred in the title role for Mary Queen of Scots, with Margot Robbie playing her sister Queen Elizabeth I. Francis McDormand took the Oscar for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, based on events around the real-life murder of Kathy Page. 

In 2019, Kristen Stewart puffed pot in Seberg, Cynthia Erivo portrayed Harriet Tubman in Harriet, and Greta Gerwig's Little Women merges the character of Jo with author Louisa May Alcott. Renée Zellweger gave an astonishing (but sad) performance as an aging Judy Garland in Judy. 

Bombshell (2019) stars Charlize Theron as Megyn Kelly, Nicole Kidman as Gretchen Carlson, and Margot Robbie as a composite character, the women at Fox News who set out to expose CEO Roger Ailes for sexual harassment. Another Bombshell (2018) is a documentary about actress/inventor Hedy Lamarr. 

The TV series Mrs. America (2020) tells the story of conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly, played by Cate Blanchett, who co-produced. Also depicted are Jill Ruckelshaus (Elizabeth Banks) and Betty Friedan (Tracey Ullman), with Rose Byrne as Gloria Steinem, Uzo Aduba as Shirley Chisholm, and Margo Martindale as Bella Abzug. Sarah Paulson plays the wide-eyed innocent we see the story through who, undergoes an awakening induced by drugs (as so often happens). 

Jennifer Hudson executive produced Respect (2021), in which she starred as Aretha Franklin. Hudson also portrayed Winnie Mandela in a 2011 film of the same name. 

The United States vs. Billie Holiday (2021) is a documentary depicting how the singer was targeted by the US Government for her drug use due to her politics. Diana Ross played her in Lady Sings the Blues (1972).  

"The First Lady" series (2022), interweaves the stories of Eleanor Roosevelt (Gillian Anderson), Betty Ford (Michelle Pfeiffer), and Michelle Obama (Viola Davis). Jessica Chastain transformed into Tammy Faye Baker in The Eyes of Tammy Faye, and won the Oscar for it. 

And finally, Annette Benning portrays long-distance swimmer Diana Nyad's record-breaking swim from Cuba to Floria at age 64 in Nyad (2023). Both she and Jodie Foster, who played her trainer Bonnie Stoll, were Oscar-nominated for their roles.

What films have I missed? Tell me in the comments. 

Women's History Month 2026 - Leading the Change: Women Shaping a Sustainable Future

The theme of this year's Women's History Month is “Leading the Change: Women Shaping a Sustainable Future,” encompassing "financial sustainability, community resilience, leadership succession, and intergenerational equity." 

"Whether developing green technologies, advancing economic justice, strengthening education systems, or building civic power – women are designing blueprints for sustainable transformation," says the National Women's History Foundation. "This theme affirms that shaping a sustainable future means fostering systems that support both people and the planet." 

The cannabis, psychedelics and environmental movements have many women to honor who have advanced sustainability. 

One is Tina Gordon of Moon Made Farms, in Southern Humboldt, California. In her sustainably grown garden, Gordon incorporates "aspects of nature, native soil, and on-site composting, we introduce forest and plant material to our gardens to ensure the best and healthiest product. We want to encourage the genetics, and ultimately epigenetics of the plant to carry through an expression of this unique geographic environment."

Sophia Buggs—also known as Lady Buggs—is an urban farmer, medicine woman, and community leader in Youngstown, Ohio. Through stories, blessings, and reflections, she explores themes of ancestral connection, Indigenous practices, food justice, and the challenges and joys of negotiating community partnerships. Her talk at the Women's Visionary Congress 2023 is both a celebration of cultural heritage and a call to honor the unseen forces and generational wisdom that guide us toward collective healing and empowerment. 

Winona LaDuke (pictured), the Native American activist who ran for Vice President on Ralph Nader's ticket in 1996 and 2000, is growing hemp and other crops in Osage, MN, where she operates a hemp market store and coffee shop. "I want to scale up and join the 400,000 other horse powered farming operations in North America, understanding the sacred relationship between life, power and the future," LaDuke writes. "I would like to live well, I am interested in decoupling food and hemp from fossil fuels, and I am also interested in the quality of life which small-scale farming creates." 

Another who sought a sustainable life is actress Heather Donahue (The Blair Witch Project) who wrote the book GrowGirl about her move to a Northern Californian pot-growing region, where she started a farm in 2008. She wrote, "There are a lot of pretty normal people who've taken to growing as a way to weather this economy and try to carve out a sustainable life with some semblance of autonomy, often in beautiful places that don't have many other jobs available." As she recounted on a recent episode of the podcast "Great Moments in Weed History," Donahue (now known as Rei Hance) has now moved to a town in New England where she lives intentionally small.  

Actress and environmentalist Daryl Hannah urged politicians to legalize marijuana and psychedelics in 2005, and in 2021 she tweeted in objection to "the yearly DEA raids & constant federal charge threats to Ogalala Sioux Covil rights champions - Alex & recently passed heroine Debra White Plume for trying to grow1 acre of industrial hemp." Hannah is the founder of the Sustainable Biodiesel Alliance (SBA), and sits on several environmental advocacy boards such as the Environmental Media Association (EMA), Sylvia Earle Alliance, Mission Blue and the Action Sports Environmental Coalition. 

Stella McCartney deserves a nod for including hemp fabric into her fashion designs. It's been reported that her father Paul is growing hemp on his farm in England. Stella follows in the huge footsteps of Anita Roddick, who was a worldwide pioneer when she added hemp products to her eco-friendly line at The Body Shop in the 1990s. 

Known as "The Duchess of Hemp," Patricia Ann Steward was an activist, entrepreneur, and a key compatriot of Jack Herer (author of The Emperor Wears No Clothes: Hemp and the Marijuana Conspiracy). Born in Phoenix, her parents were two of the original owners of National Car Rental, where she worked as a teenager and honed her entrepreneurial skills. While attending school in Southern Texas, she met Janis Joplin and went with her to San Francisco, where she also befriended Grace Slick and worked "to address the issues of the day." In the 1970s, Patricia opened the Balcony Hall in Scottsdale, AZ, a music club featuring musicians like Donovan and John Prine, and go-go dancers in cages. 

Another hemp pioneer to honor is Christie Bohling, who was reportedly a "major league pot smuggler" in the Southwest when she turned her efforts towards legalization in the 1990s, founding CHA - the Coalition of Hemp Activists. "She was fiercely outspoken, instrumental in the early battles for hemp legalization. Jack Herer considered her an equal," writes High Times photographer Malcolm MacKinnon, who took this portrait of Bohling in the Arizona desert wearing a hemp poncho while standing next to a bale of hemp. 

 WOMEN ENVIRONMENTALISTS

Women's Visionary Congress 2011 presenter Dorka Keehn's book EcoAmazons: Twenty Women Who are Transforming the World chronicles the undertold story of womens' contribution to the environmental movement. Starting with Susan Fenimore Cooper (daughter of the novelist James) who wrote of her time in the woods "where the mind lays aside its daily littleness," Keehn moved to inspiring moderns like Hazel Johnson, Rev. Sally Bingham, and scientist Janine Benyus who coined the term "biomimicry." "If we're going to have a sustainable future, we need to be emulating them," Keehn said.

Another to emulate is Naomi Klein, the brilliant author of The Shock Doctrine and its sequel This Changes Everything. At a standing-room-only event in Berkeley, CA in 2014, Klein said that while The Shock Doctrine talked about the "disaster capitalists" who take advantage of events like Hurricane Katrina to assert their elitist agendas, we now need a "disaster collectivism" to fix the climate change that is destroying our habitat. "We're past the point where radical changes aren't needed," Klein told the crowd. "It isn't enough to resist; you need your own strategy." For one thing, we need a "polluter pays" model that funnels the profits from the oil industry into renewables, she said. Pointing out that renewable energy industries generate 6-8 times as many jobs as do oil industries, she noted that adding jobs will help end the "industrialized racism" of the prison industry. In 2013, along with 174 other prominent women (and men), Klein signed a letter to Obama calling for an end to the injustice of the war on drugs.

We recently lost Susan Wojcicki, the former CEO of YouTube who was named "the most important person in advertising," as well as one of Time's 100 most influential people in 2015. She served on the boards of the UCLA Anderson School of Management, Environmental Defense Fund, and Room to Read, an organization that focuses on literacy and gender equality in education. Wojcicki was an advocate for the expansion of paid family leave, countering gender discrimination at technology companies, getting young girls interested in computer science, and prioritizing computer programming and coding in schools. She also owned a real estate holding company that worked on the sustainable growth of Los Altos, California. 

Chilean botanist, environmentalist, and author Adriana Hoffmann was Chile's Environment Minister in 2000 and 2001. She advocated for the sustainable management and protection of Chilean forests, leading opposition to illegal logging in her role as coordinator of Defensores del Bosque Chileno (Defenders of the Chilean Forest) since 1992. Hoffmann authored over a dozen books on the flora of Chile and 106 botanical names, mostly realignments of species and infraspecific taxa of cactus.

No list of women environmentalists would be complete without the recently, dearly departed Jane Goodall (pictured). She founded the Jane Goodall Institute in 1977 to promote wildlife conservation, followed by the Roots & Shoots youth program in 1991, which grew into a global network. Goodall also established wildlife sanctuaries and reforestation projects in Africa and campaigned for the ethical treatment of animals in animal testing, animal husbandry and captivity. 

And the grandmother of them all was Rachel Carson, the author of Silent Spring, which started the environmental movement when it was published in 1962. Carson began her career as an aquatic biologist, and her widely praised 1951 bestseller The Sea Around Us won her a U.S. National Book Award and advanced marine conservation. Although Silent Spring was met with fierce opposition by chemical companies, it spurred a reversal in national pesticide policy, which led to a nationwide ban on DDT and other pesticides. It also inspired a grassroots environmental movement that led to the creation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which today's news reports is being eviscerated. 

GOALS & OBJECTIVES OF WOMEN'S HISTORY MONTH:

• Honor: Celebrate the diverse contributions of women who are leading sustainability efforts across environmental, economic, educational, and social justice movements.

• Educate: Raise awareness about the important historical and contemporary roles of women in shaping sustainable change.

• Inspire: Empower individuals and institutions on how to take action toward sustainability, equity, and justice in their own spheres of influence.

• Connect: Build bridges across generations, geographies, and disciplines to foster collaboration, mentorship, and shared learning.

• Envision: Encourage a long-term vision for our future where women’s leadership is central to thriving communities and a healthy planet.

LET'S DO IT ALL! 

 

 

Paul McCartney: Man on the Run

The new Amazon Prime documentary, "Paul McCartney: Man on the Run" charts McCartney's marijuana arrests and their affect on his music, and life. 

Through archival film footage and interviews, the film follows McCartney's musical journey, starting with the breakup The Beatles. Criticized for putting out apolitical albums of what he later called (unapologetically) "silly love songs" with his band Wings—featuring his wife Linda on keyboards—the band and Paul's songwriting gained an edge when he faced jail time for growing five marijuana plants on their family farm in March 1973. 

According to a TV interviewer in the film, it was said in court that, "McCartney had a considerable interest in horticulture, and many of his fans sent him seeds to grow. The cannabis seeds, it was said, came to him in such a way."  He admitted he had knowingly growing the plants, but claimed he didn't know what they were. 

The film does not mention the statement McCartney made in court regarding cannabis's legal status. “I feel that there should be legislation on the use of cannabis," he said. "Drink is a much worse drug to my mind than cannabis.” 

Later that year, Wings hit their stride with the release of their album "Band on the Run." The album was recorded in Nigera, where McCartney said he smoked the strongest weed he ever had in an interview with Marc Maron where he noted that "for the creative process it was required." 

Alysa Liu: From Oaksterdam to the Olympics

I've always loved figure skating, maybe since watching the graceful and glorious Peggy Fleming winning the Olympic gold medal in 1968 when I was just a girl. Where I grew up in Pennsylvania we skated in the winter, on ponds at our local mall that had an ice skating rink where scenes from the movie "Flashdance" were filmed. 

At this year's Olympics I fell for Alysa Liu during her short program, which placed her third going into her final triumphant free skate. Liu is an entirely different kind of skater, one more focused on her art than the competition, resulting in a relaxed and joyous presence on the ice that's captivated the world. 

Liu trained at the public rink in the city of Oakland, CA, just a few blocks away from the area known as Oaksterdam for its preponderance of Amsterdam-style cannabis shops that started springing up after California voters legalized medical marijuana in 1996. She gave a shout-out to her home city, pointing to an Oakland flag that a fan had brought, after her championship skate that was set to Donna Summers's disco version of "MacArthur Park," a 1970s song about a park in Los Angeles. “I’m just glad,” she said, “that I could bring Oakland to Milan.” 

Liu's father, who (as everyone knows by now), fled China after organizing protests against the government there, saw promise in his oldest child and paid for skating coaches, taking her to winning her first US National Championship at age 13 (the youngest female champion ever). At the 2022 Olympics in Beijing, she came in sixth despite the extra pressure of the Chinese government attempting to "naturalize" her, after sending spies to gather information on her and her father. Doubtlessly traumatized by that, and tired of the regimented life of a competitive skater, she quit the sport that year at the age of 16, so that she could have more of a normal teenage life, going to concerts, taking her first vacation, and getting her driver's license. 

Describing going on a ski trip with friends in 2024, Liu said it "was such an adrenaline rush, to get down the mountain when your legs are that tired. It's hard, and you had to tap into that part of you that fights, and I hadn't felt that since I quit skating.....and I was like, if I can get what I'm feeling from skating, I should just do that." 

Liu told 60 Minutes that she initially went back to skating for "quick hits of dopamine." She told ESPN, "I have ADHD and I love situations that I'm not expecting. It gives me a dopamine rush. With little mistakes, I love working through it. I have to think. And although it's not ideal to make those mistakes in competition, it was made and my brain still was releasing those chemicals and I had to think, 'What next? I have to add a combo here and here.' It was a little bit of fun and a nice little challenge."

It's Time for the NYT To Admit It Has an Editorial Problem

A discussion titled, “Marijuana is Everywhere. That’s a Problem” with New York Times editorial writers Emily Bazelon, David Leonhardt and German Lopez, who co-wrote Monday’s NYT editorial calling for greater regulation of cannabis, focuses on theory rather than practicality, except when used for prejudicial purposes. 

The conversation starts with the clarification that, like the famous NYT editorial series of 2014, theirs is pro-legalization, due to the harms of cannabis prohibition—namely huge numbers of arrests, disproportionately for people of color. They pointed out that they say in the editorial that they oppose the current ballot measure in Massachusetts that would re-criminalize cannabis. 

During the discussion, both Leonhardt and Lopez went right away to the fact that things are too loose now because marijuana can be smelled walking down the street. In Lopez’s case he says he was offered a hit on the street in his native Ohio, and Leonhardt talked about the streets of NYC and DC, where he spends time. Leonhardt also seemed distiurbed by the proliferation of cannabis shops in Colorado. 

Lopez expressed concern that legalization has increased use, drawing on his perspective reporting on the opioid crisis. He was also alarmed that we have “culturally embraced" cannabis. “You see Gwyneth Paltrow investing in Big Weed in CA,” was an example he used, picking up on the prohibitionist organization SAM’s drumbeat about Big Weed.  

Other issues like increasing numbers of people in polls saying they have problems with marijuana, and emergency room visits for CHS, were mentioned. Also mentioned, as in the editorial, were names of products that sounded like cookies and were marketed to kids (something that isn’t permitted by licensed vendors in California and elsewhere). 

Much was made of the 2024 NSDUH survey finding that more people smoke cannabis daily than use alcohol, with everyone assuming this meant people get totally stoned all day long. Leonhardt said twice that he “very much likes” alcohol or his martini, and Lopez said he “partakes" himself. But apparently everyone else who uses cannabis does so problematically in their eyes. People who have a problem with pot aren’t productive, and create problems for society, is Lopez's opinion. "We’ve gone way too far it glorifying its use,” he said.

On medical marijuana, while it was acknowledged that some people in pain or with specific ailments might benefit from it, cannabis hasn’t gone through the rigorous studies and government oversight needed to establish it as a true medicine, and we should re-think a system by which cannabis dispensaries sell a product claiming medical use, the speakers said. 

It's a Green Day in the Bay

Lost in the controversy about Bad Bunny appearing at the Super Bowl halftime show is the fact that the cannabis-loving band Green Day will kick off the music portion of the Super Bowl with a performance at the game's opening ceremony.

In 1987, guitarists Billie Joe Armstrong and Mike Dirnt, both 15 years old at the time, along with bassist Sean Hughes and drummer Raj Punjabi, a fellow high school student from Pinole, CA, formed the band Desecrated Youth, later renamed Sweet Children. 

After signing with Lookout! Records in 1988 and before releasing their first EP in 1989, the group adopted the name Green Day. In the Bay Area, where the band was formed, "green day" was reportedly slang for spending a day doing nothing but smoking marijuana.

The band's name "was absolutely about pot," Armstrong told Bill Maher, adding, "We were trying to be the Cheech & Chong of punk rock." Armstrong went on to say that he stopped smoking weed after he had children, and then described a gravity bong to Maher. "I like burning the substance" as opposed to vaporizing, he said, because he "it smells good, it fills the room." Vaporizing felt like "one more reason to hide the fact that it should be legal." 

"Join the Club" Film Tells the Story of Dennis Peron and Medical Marijuana

"Join the Club" is a powerful documentary about Dennis Peron and the origins of the medical marijuana movement, set in the gay rights movement and the AIDS crisis in San Francisco. The tactics of the US war on drugs that began with Richard Nixon and was carried on by successive US presidents is also presented in the film, making the DEA and its multi-jurisdictional forces look like the ICE of its day. 

Filmmakers Kip Andersen and Chris O'Connell were able to conduct the last interview with Peron just before he died in 2018, and his story is told in flashback with remarkable footage of Peron's historic Cannabis Buyer's Club, including police video from an officer who infiltrated the club, news reports, and interviews all skillfully edited together. 

Born in the Bronx, Peron was drafted into the Vietnam War where he recounts seeing 1000 dead soldiers the month that he arrived. Eschewing alcohol as "the war drug," Peron smoked his first joint instead, and the filmmakers do a wonderful job of depicting how that changed his life. Bringing back three pounds of marijuana when he returned from Vietnam launched his career as a pot dealer and activist in San Francisco. 

Peron began his political involvement as a supporter of Harvey Milk, who was the first openly gay man elected to public office in California when he became a San Francisco supervisor. The assassination of Milk and Mayor George Moscone highlighted the terrible ongoing prejudice against the gay community, as did the arrests and police shooting of Peron. 

The film does an excellent job of taking us to the origins of the AIDS epidemic and the relief that patients were getting from cannabis. The death of Dennis's young, beautiful lover Jonathan West from AIDS catapulted him to begin distributing cannabis to AIDS patients and operating what was described as the first AIDS hospice, where patients could gather and support each other in community.

A "Jewel Robbery" with a Marijuana Twist

Kay Francis is offered a marijuana cigarette by William Powell in "Jewel Robbery"

In the pre-Hayes Code film "Jewel Robbery" (1932), William Powell ("The Thin Man") plays a suave jewel thief who romances a bored, jewel-grubbing Baroness played by Kay Francis. "In my own eyes, I'm shallow and weak," says Francis. "I fly about all day, pursuing furs, jewels, excitement....In the morning, a cocktail, in the afternoon, a man, in the evening, Veronal [a barbiturate]."  

After invading a jewelry store where Francis and her elderly husband are picking out a large diamond ring, Powell congenially holds everyone hostage and robs the store's inventory. He then takes the unusual step of offering the shop's owner a marijuana cigarette, saying, "Do smoke one of my cigarettes. Now, inhale deeply...." 

Despite having just been robbed, the man begins giggling so vociferously that Francis asks Powell, "What did you give him?" Powell replies, "A pleasant, harmless smoke. He'll awake in the morning fresh and happy, with a marvelous appetite."  

He then offers her a cigarette, saying, "They're harmless, really. Two puffs, and you'll be hearing soft music. The world will begin to revolve pleasantly. Three, a beautiful dream." She asks, "How do you know this?" and he replies, "Experience. I assure you, all the ladies fall asleep happily." "So that you steal their jewels in peace, I suppose," she replies. Refusing to smoke, she says, "I prefer to keep my wits about me, thank you" (which, considering her circumstances, was rather wise). 

Powell then hornswoggles a security guard into carrying his loot out to the getaway car, and gives him as a tip his box of marijuana cigarettes. The guard fully enjoys smoking one of the joints, inhaling deeply. When he is questioned by the police, he offers the chief one of his stash and the two are soon yukking it up fully. Francis of course falls for Powell, but never gets a chance to try another of his cigarettes. 

Cannabis in the Epstein Files

The DOJ's online searchable (and heavily redacted) Epstein Library reveals that convicted sex trafficker / financier Jeffrey Epstein seemed to be tracking marijuana legalization globally, and may have invested in a cannabis company in the US Virgin Islands months before he was re-arrested and died in his prison cell in 2019. 

Epstein pleaded guilty and was convicted in 2008 by a Florida state court of procuring a child for prostitution and of soliciting a prostitute in a sweetheart deal that didn't seem to affect his business or other activities. 

An MD with a redacted name wrote to Epstein on 9/5/2010, "AND do you know WHO aside from the Israelis owns most of the water capture technology.... Hint...I adore him and he just cut off all his hair and I will see him in concert at the state fair on the 16th... (scroll down) WILLIE NELSON! Maybe marijuana does make you a better you." (Nelson played the Puyallup, WA state fair on 9/16/2010. His hair did look shorter in photos from the fair. Reportedly he did own a water capture company.) 

On Sep. 21, 2013, [REDACTED] wrote: "[REDACTED] suggested perhaps medicinal weed for me ;)" Epstein replied: "Yes, my 2nd great idea after Zombie Porn! They say these things come in 3's So we should all cash in on the next one!" Hong Kong based academic and tech bro Gino Yu sent Epstein a link on August 23, 2016 to an article titled, "Researchers find lab rats on marijuana just can't be bothered" with the comment, "Roaches on dmt next?" One of Epstein's attorneys Erika Kellerhals wrote in an email on September 7, 2016,  "All these marijuana guys are stuck using credit unions because no banks will take their money. IBE angle..." probably referring to International Banking Entities. In December 2018, Epstein received a pitch about a cannabis investment fund.  

David Mitchell, a longtime investor and financier who connected Epstein to Todd Boehly, co-owner of the LA Dodgers and Lakers in 2011, forwarded Epstein an article on February 1, 2019 titled, "Meet Israel's many medical marijuana millionaires - including former Prime Minister Ehud Barak." On March 1, 2019 the article Mitchell forwarded was, "Martha Stewart Will Advise Cannabis Grower on Products for Humans and Pets." And on March 7 that year, he forwarded a Statement from FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb on signing of the Agriculture Improvement Act and the agency's regulation of products containing cannabis and cannabis-derived compounds. Analyses of the cannabis market from Harvest and Akrell Ventures are part of the files. 

American businesswoman and former US Virgin Islands first lady Cecile de Jongh, who was on Epstein's payroll, responded to a Jan. 19, 2019 email from Epstein asking, "any feed back from albert?" [USVI's new Governor Albert Bryan, Jr.]. De Jongh responded, "I see that he got back to STX [St. Croix] this afternoon to sign the medical marijuana bill." Mitchell wrote to Epstein about the new law on the following day, asking, "what name should I put the shares into?"

Bye Bye Bobby

Some deaths hit you hard. Bob Wier, who was still in his teens when he hooked up with Jerry Garcia to start making music, passed on January 10 after a brief illness, and Deadheads everywhere mourned and celebrated his life. 

I first saw the Grateful Dead on their "Live at Last" tour in the late '80s, after Garcia came back from a coma to re-learn the guitar. I thought, "This is where the 60s went" when I saw the parking lot scene: hippie selling colorful crafts, grilled cheese sandwiches and other goodies in a makeshift community that followed the band from show to show. I saw them play with Bob Dylan and several other shows back in the day when you could send in for tickets as part of a lottery for big shows. 

Bill Clinton float with a phattie at the 1993 Grateful Dead Mardi Gras show.

My hemp activism started when a cute hempster guy invited me to the 1991/92 New Year's Eve show at the Oakland, CA colosseum he'd pulled tickets for. It was an unforgettable show, with Baba Olatunji starting it out drumming through the crowd, and Bela Fleck and the Flecktones blowing us away with a drummer whose kit looked like a guitar. It was the year the band's manager Bill Graham died, and since he would traditionally come out as Father Time at midnight at their epic NYE shows, film of him playing Father Time year after year was shown instead. 

I also got to their Mardi Gras show in 1993, when one of the floats depicted the newly-elected Bill Clinton with a saxophone in one hand and a huge burning joint in the other (pictured). As a hemp activist, I wo-maned a table selling tie-dyed hemp shorts and shirts at a string of shows in Sacramento and at Shoreline amphitheater in the Bay Area. The band's keyboardist Vince Wellnick stopped by the booth and picked out our most colorful shirt, which he wore onstage. I ran into Wellnick later on his way to Wier's wedding in Mill Valley. 

Elaine Pagels, Gnosis, and LSD

Elaine Pagels, the classical and biblical scholar who was among the first to translate and interpret the Nag Hammadi manuscripts writes in her 2019 book Why Religion? A Personal Story that she tried LSD shortly before feeling impelled to write her bestseller The Gnostic Gospels (1979). Gnosis, the direct experience of God, is something often powerfully enhanced by entheogens like LSD. 

Pagels grew up in Palo Alto, the child of academic parents (who were horrified by her dabblings into religion as a child). She had an early fascination with the trippy Gospel of John, which was also Emily Dickinson's favorite Bible book. In high school, she hung out with a group of artists, and writes that she knew the (years older) Jerry Garcia, and attended his first wedding (to a very pregnant young woman). In high school, he dated Garcia's friend Paul Speegle, who died in a car crash that Jerry, also in the car, survived, and she surmises that the name The Grateful Dead “must have resonated from the crash he’d survived five years earlier.” The car crash also caused her to leave her new-found religion when born again Christains told her her Jewish friend would burn in hell. 

“Many of us, of course, have left religious institutions behind, and prefer to identify as ‘spiritual, not religious,’” she writes at the outset of Why Religion? “I’ve done both – had faith, lost it; joined groups, and left them....What matters to me more than whether we participate in institutions or leave them is how we engage the imagination – in dreams, art, poetry, music – since what each of us needs, and what we can engage, obviously differs and changes throughout our lifetime.”

After graduating Stanford, Pagels applied to a Harvard doctoral program in the study of religion, and was rejected by Prof. Krister Stendahl because, he wrote, “women students have always quit before receiving a degree.” However she was encouraged to apply again the following year if she was “still serious," and after completing a Masters in classics at Stanford and continuing to study advanced Greek and Latin, she re-applied and was accepted. There she studied the “secret” gnostic gospels discovered at Nag Hammadi in 1945, written in Coptic around the 2nd - 4th century AD.

Her husband Heinz, a physicist and author of The Cosmic Code who was interested in consciousness, took part in an LSD experiment at Palo Alto Veteran's Hospital while in graduate school. What he took "wasn't a placebo," he told Elaine later, "saying how astonished he was to see stars and galaxies being born and dying, while others emerged, through what felt like innumerable ages." The summer they married (1969), he encouraged his new wife to try it, "promising to cope with any difficulty that might arise." 

Pagels writes she "anticipated that what would happen might involve what I was writing about, some kind of Christian vision. Instead, as I sat in the apartment, looking out at the sky, the trees in light wind, and the garden, I saw everything alive as fire, gloriously intertwined. Watching, ecstatic and speechless, for about five hours, I finally managed to say, 'I guess that solved the dying problem.' What horrified me before, when [her high school friend] Paul died—that a beloved person could simply disappear, and disintegrate—now seemed to resolve into a deeper unity of the whole." 

Bread and Roses, and Mayor Mamdani

AOC and Letitia James spoke, and Bernie Sanders swore the new mayor in, just after Lucy Dacus and Sarah Goldstone performed "Bread and Roses" today at NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani's Inauguration Ceremony. 

As we come marching, marching, in the beauty of the day, 

A million darkened kitchens, a thousand mill-lofts gray 

Are touched with all the radiance that a sudden sun discloses, 

For the people hear us singing, "Bread and Roses, Bread and Roses." 

As we go marching, marching, we battle, too, for men— 

For they are women's children and we mother them again. 

Our days shall not be sweated from birth until life closes— 

Hearts starve as well as bodies: Give us Bread, but give us Roses. 

As we come marching, marching, unnumbered women dead 

Go crying through our singing their ancient call for Bread; 

Small art and love and beauty their trudging spirits knew— 

Yes, it is Bread we fight for—but we fight for Roses, too. 

As we come marching, marching, we bring the Greater Days— 

The rising of the women means the rising of the race. 

No more the drudge and idler—ten that toil where one reposes— 

But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and Roses, Bread and Roses.