Jim Belushi blazing new path as marijuana farmer in new Discovery TV series

After spending decades making films and sitcoms, actor-improviser-musician Jim Belushi is blazing a new path.

The Wheaton native has become a marijuana farmer, harvesting his crop on a 93-acre farm along the Rogue River in southern Oregon. His agricultural efforts will be chronicled in the new reality TV series "Growing Belushi," which debuts Wednesday on the Discovery Channel.

The show - which features family and friends, including Dan Aykroyd and The Blues Brothers Band - centers on efforts by Belushi and his cousin Chris to build the business. It's a change for Belushi, a Second City and "Saturday Night Live" alum who starred in such films as "K9," "Curly Sue" and "About Last Night," as well as the long-running sitcom "According to Jim."

"The thing about unscripted TV is you shoot a lot of hours," he said. A nine-day trip to Colombia yielded 29 hours of film, which they had to edit to 40 minutes.

"That is the worst because there are so many good jokes we have to cut," Belushi said.

Belushi fell in love with Oregon years ago after he and his family visited a friend's estate.

He purchased 13 riverfront acres not far from his friend's home. After a friend and neighbor died, Belushi bought her land, increasing his spread to more than 90 acres.

It served mostly as grazing land for a neighbor's cows until Oregon legalized recreational marijuana about five years ago.

That sparked Belushi's decision to establish a marijuana farm.

"My family thought I was going crazy," he said. "They were very worried about me."

Growing up, Belushi, who followed his older brother John into showbiz, never imagined he'd become a farmer.

"I thought I'd be working in a print shop in Elgin," he said.

Yet, here he is, reaping such signature marijuana strains as Captain Jack's Gulzar Afghanica (known in the 1970s as "the smell of 'SNL'"), Black Diamond and his personal favorite, Cherry Pie.

There's also a limited-edition Blues Brothers strain. Produced in cooperation with Grassroots Cannabis, it will be available next month at the Greenhouse dispensary in Skokie, said Belushi, who intends to drive the Bluesmobile to Illinois, pop the trunk and deliver the product himself.

The memory of his brother John, who died in 1982 of a drug overdose, fuels Jim Belushi's passion for his farm, at least in part.

Belushi points to marijuana as a way to ease pain and soothe spirits.

"I believe everybody is screaming inside about something," Jim Belushi said. "Everybody is experiencing some kind of trauma in their life."

To cope with that trauma, they often reach for alcohol or opioids. Marijuana, he argues, is safer.

Jim Belushi believes John's drug use was likely self-medicating to address head injuries he suffered while playing high school football. If John had been a "pothead," Jim Belushi said, he'd be alive today.

"It would have been great medicine for my brother," Belushi said.

Belushi admits using marijuana while a student at Wheaton Central High School. Then it was illegal, he said; now "it's a whole different world."

"This plant has been guiding me through all kinds of changes as a person," he said. "I'm more grounded. I feel more centered."

Belushi jokes about his product, dubbing one strain the "marriage counselor" and referring to his plants as "ladies." He regularly serenades them with Marvin Gaye in the morning, reggae around lunchtime, and blues and funk in the late afternoon.

"When I harvest I play gospel," he said, laughing, "so they know they're going up to the light."