It’s been called a Shark Tank for ganjapreneurs, but The Marijuana Show’s producers, Wendy Robbins and Karen Paull, think of their online reality program as more of a dolphin tank. Budding weed capitalists who come in seeking investments for, say, a car with a body made from cannabis or a seed-to-sale inventory system for marijuana dispensaries always get encouragement and help achieving their dreams.
Starting July 8, Robbins and Paull will see their own efforts pay off with broader over-the-top distribution of the show, on platforms including Amazon Prime, iTunes, Google Play and Xbox. The pair held auditions June 14 in New York for the show’s third season and said going OTT worked for them. “In terms of the [traditional] network model, they pretty much wanted to control the creative and take [us] out,” Paull said. “We want to retain the brand, the marketing, and really the back end is where we make a lot of the money” via relationships with invested companies.
Feedback from meetings, via show developers, included recommendations to change the name, and “they wanted us to make it [dumber],” Robbins said. “You know, like we are goofy people … and it’s so opposite of what we’re trying to bring in, which is a financial, educated, medicinal show.”
Half-hour episodes from season 2 will be available on the new OTT platforms first, and the producers said they have pitched outlets including Hulu, DirecTV and Netflix as well.
To find out where auditions will be held this summer — including in Portland, Ore.; Seattle; and San Diego — and to see a sample of the program, go to themarijuanashow.com.
