"It’s simple. I’m playing a retired boxer who is growing marijuana. It’s basically me acting like me, so people can get a look at what my life could be like in different scenarios."

Said Mike Tyson, quoted in "Mike Tyson shops TV show about life as marijuana grower" (NY Post).

It's not a reality show, but something like "Curb Your Enthusiasm," based on the lead character's real life, but scripted and acted. I know: Where's the line? Reality shows are scripted, blah blah blah. But Tyson offered "Curb Your Enthusiasm" as the model his show either used or wants to be thought of as using.

Here's another model:



Anyway, Tyson's marijuana farm is "a 40-acre plot of land about 60 miles southwest of Death Valley National Park." And:

Besides growing premium pot, Tyson Ranch will feature a cultivation school to teach growers the latest technology, an edible factory, a hydro-feed and supply store, plus cabins and “glamping” campgrounds for stoner tourists....

Tyson is a big proponent of weed’s health benefits and said 85 percent of pro athletes use some form of cannabis to relieve pain, inflammation and anxiety. “I smoke it all day, every day,” Tyson said.

What would you pay to glamp and smoke weed within the aura of Mike Tyson? Or — better question — would you sit and watch a TV show about the people who'd pay a lot of money to glamp and smoke weed in the actual presence of Mike Tyson?

Which reminds me... that new Lena Dunham-produced TV show "Camping" (about some glampers) is unwatchable, and I like Jennifer Garner (and I'm fine with her name). It looks promising in the trailer:



"The weird thing about life: You can feel fine but also know that you're a ticking time bomb."

Maybe I can't watch it because I'm not understanding it properly. Here's a New Republic piece, "Welcome to Camping, the Most Misunderstood Show on TV":

It’s premiered to some fairly harsh reviews, all of which entirely miss the point. Camping, in its original incarnation [a British TV show], was a vicious satire about a middle-aged harridan who micromanages a trip at a campground run by a deranged mama’s boy.... The jokes are blindingly cruel.... The miniature society of the camping trip totally breaks down. Repulsive sex ensues, along with diabolical mishaps, nudity, violence, and drug benders. The show isn’t so much dark as completely, disorientingly devoid of light.

Dunham and [her Girls co-producer Jenni] Konner have now remade the show for an American audience that is notoriously thinner-skinned than its British counterpart.... The central change is that Dunham and Konner have imbued each character with a sympathetic twist. Kathryn still micromanages—forcing everybody to go bird-watching, for example—but now she’s a woman stricken by grief over her hysterectomy, her emotional dysfunction sublimated into worries over her body (echoing Dunham’s own medical woes). The brainless and nasty alcoholic of the British Camping has become a sweet, struggling guy who is just trying to find his way. Miguel the shagger is now a smart doctor finding a new light in his life, instead of a pathetic young Englishman who got hair plugs and speaks with a slight American accent....

Understanding that doesn't make me more able to watch the American version. It just makes me sad about how dull America has become in The Era of That's Not Funny.