Cheech and Chong exhale hit of nostalgia at Morris

SOUTH BEND — Cheech and Chong proved Sunday night at the Morris Performing Arts Center that they’re "Still Smokin’," as performers and otherwise. Between endorsements for the legalization of marijuana, the comedy duo delivered a two-hour show long on tokes of nostalgia — in both their material and the show’s structure — and laughs. Tommy Chong, wearing a University of Notre Dame t-shirt and playing his spaced-out stoner character to the hilt, and Cheech Marin, displaying his strong acting chops and evocative facial expressions, conducted the concert in the form of an eclectic, old-style variety show that featured comic skits, three monologues by Chong, music and Chong’s wife, Shelby, serving as the opening act and a transitional act while Marin and Chong changed costumes backstage. After her opening set, Shelby Chong remained on stage to introduce and interview Marin and Chong. The questions ranged from asking how they met and formed their act to what happened to Marin’s signature mustache, and although Marin and Chong phrased their answers to elicit laughs from the audience, the device succeeded at personalizing the duo and providing interesting historical information. The comedy skits ranged from the classic confused-stoner humor of "Dave" and a minimally updated "Santa Claus and His Old Lady" to the visually and verbally hilarious but utterly juvenile "Let’s Make a Dope Deal," which featured Marin as Wink Dinkerson and Chong — wearing a raincoat, a blind man’s glasses and hairy prosthetic gloves for his hands — as masturbation champion Hairy Palms. The duo performed several of their songs together — "Basketball Jones" with Marin singing in humorous, strained falsetto, "Me and My Old Lady," which featured some nice harmony by them — and "Does Your Mama Know About Me?" Chong, who began his career as a musician, co-wrote the song in 1968 and had a hit with it as a member of Bobby Taylor and The Vancouvers. Marin introduced "Does Your Mama Know About Me?" with a fascinating story about him hearing The Supremes’ version of it before he and Chong met and him puzzling over the "T. Chong" songwriter’s credit on a Motown record. Marin’s rendition of it was soulful and serious, and Chong smiled throughout while backing him on guitar. Chong also demonstrated his solid guitar chops with his blues playing as Blind Melon Chitlin, his crude parody of classic pre-war blues singers. Marin was outrageous as Alice Bowie during "Earache My Eye," which thoroughly lampooned rock stars with him dressed in a pink tutu and Mickey Mouse ears as he bounced and strutted around the stage while lip-synching the song. During his monologues, Chong discussed his nine-month stint in federal prison for selling bongs, lobbied for marijuana’s legalization while also acknowledging its negative effects (sitting at a stop sign waiting for the red light to change, for instance), and linking marijuana use to the bible. "There are so many stoner things in there," Chong said. "The first page: God is known as ‘the most high.’ " Despite each of them stumbling on one or two lines, Cheech and Chong’s overall performance was sharp and well-paced, a refreshing hit of ’70s music and absurd, profane and politically incorrect humor for 2010.