Cheech Marin, one half of the legendary comedy duo of Cheech and Chong, has again agreed to be the celebrity grand marshal of the First Ever 19th Annual World's Shortest St. Patrick's Day Parade on March 17, 2022, Visit Hot Springs said Thursday.
Marin had been scheduled as the grand marshal for the parade in 2020, but the coronavirus pandemic forced Visit Hot Springs to hold "drastically" scaled-back versions in 2020 and 2021.
"We did have a parade -- of sorts -- those two years, just to keep up the tradition of having a parade, rain or shine," Visit Hot Springs CEO Steve Arrison said Thursday in a news release.
"In 2020, we had a single marcher cover the 98-foot distance of Bridge Street, the world's shortest street in everyday use. In 2021, we had a greatly reduced version of the parade, minus the cheering crowds that we normally would have had," Arrison said.
"Now, we're halfway to the 2022 parade, and we plan to kick out the jams and get back to the tremendous little parade that has been named among the Top 10 St. Patrick's Day parades in the world. Cheech will fit in perfectly with the zany, fun-for-all atmosphere that defines the World's Shortest St. Patrick's Day Parade," he said.
In addition to the usual groups of marchers, musicians, green Irish wolfhounds, the World's Tallest Leprechaun, floats and dancers, the newly established Bridge Street Entertainment District will "allow more freedom for our crowds to enjoy the tremendous fun atmosphere the parade brings to downtown Hot Springs," he said.
Marin, in an interview with The Sentinel-Record in early 2020 prior to the parade first being canceled, said he was delighted with the idea of having a parade deemed to be the "world's shortest" of its kind.
"Bridge Street, I love that man," Marin said in the interview. "That's a way to have a parade because I've been in a lot of parades before and you ride (a long time) and, depending on the weather, you get frozen or frostbite or burnt."
Marin said he has been to a few places in Arkansas, but never Hot Springs.
"They say they've got good spas there, and my wife and I are good spa guys," he said. "I really want to see the area, I (also) hear they have a lot of museums."
Being an avid collector of Chicano Art for nearly 50 years, the actor has a large interest in art museums, as his collection is being prepared to be enshrined in a museum of its own.
"Chicano Art is probably most arguably the ... most varied and wide and maybe the most important school of American art ever," Marin said. "I've been collecting it for going on 50 years almost, and over that time I've put together a really wonderful collection that's toured all over the nation and then parts of the world and now it's going to be enshrined in its own museum in the city of Riverside in California in the Inland Empire."
According to a biography provided by Visit Hot Springs, Marin, in the mid-1980s, began developing "what is now arguably the finest private collection of Chicano art." Much of it formed the core of his inaugural exhibition, "Chicano Visions: American Painters on the Verge," which "broke attendance records" during its 15‐city U.S. tour. Following the success of "Chicano Visions," 13 additional exhibitions drawn from the Cheech Marin Collection have toured more than 50 major art museums across the United States and in Europe under the direction of Melissa Richardson Banks.
"Furthering his goal to introduce Chicano art to a wider audience, Marin has entered into a partnership with the City of Riverside and Riverside Art Museum to create the national Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art, Culture and Industry, aka "The Cheech" (http://www.TheCheechCenter.org). The Cheech will become the permanent home for his more than 700 works of Chicano art, including paintings, sculptures and photography; collectively, the most renowned Chicano art collection in the United States," the bio said.
Six of the Cheech & Chong albums went gold, four were nominated for Grammys, and "Los Cochinos" won the 1973 Grammy for Best Comedy Recording. The duo starred in eight features together. During a split with Chong, Cheech wrote, directed, and starred in the comedy "Born in East L.A." He appeared in over 25 films, including his "scene-stealing role" in "Tin Cup," and in eight films directed by Robert Rodriguez, it said.
Cheech was a sitcom regular before joining Don Johnson on the CBS drama "Nash Bridges." He has been featured in Disney Pixar animation films including "Oliver & Company," "The Lion King" and "Cars," and is an author of children's books, including "Cheech the School Bus Driver."