The latest Louie episode ("In the Woods") is an hour-long After School Special for the primetime crowd. When Louie (Louis C.K.) catches his 12-year-old daughter smoking pot, it prompts a lengthy flashback to his teenaged years.
A redheaded dork who gets pushed around by the class bully, young Louie turns to marijuana when his friend steals a joint from his brother. Next thing, Louie's smoking all the time. He visits a dealer played by Jeremy Renner, who suggests Louie steal some triple-beam scales in school in exchange for weed.
Mom picks up on Louie's weird behavior and he almost gets busted when the principal catches on to the scheme. In the end, Louie goes to a counselor and then apologizes to everyone for his immature transgression.
In a Season 1 episode, Louie complains to his pot-smoking neighbor about the smell, then gets drawn into taking a bong hit. "I used to get high when I was kid," he says. "I just grew up and stopped. I'm a dad."
In his live act, Louis tells a story about getting high with fans after a show in Kansas City. "I'm taking huge hits because I had no idea," he relates. "I didn't know they were working on this shit like it was a cure for cancer. I didn't understand the technology that's got into making pot so powerful. When I was a kid you could smoke a joint for a while. Now you take two hits and you go insane! It's not doable anymore. I was taking BIG hits - like 1970s, jean-jacket, Bad Company hits."
And on Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, he tells Jerry Seinfeld, "I go to the 3D IMAX movies stoned. If my kids have been with me for a stretch and then they go with their mom and I have a day between them and some work to do or something, I smoke some pot and see a 3D IMAX movie... It's my favorite thing in life."
Watch Louie, Mondays at 10 pm, on FX.
