Throw the clichés about marijuana out of the window, because it certainly seems like cannabis avenger Elana Frankel never sleeps. A powerhouse of cannabis business and advocacy for more than a decade, Frankel founded the magazine Women & Weed, created a home grow club and e-commerce business, Indigo and Haze, and penned a book on the subject. Frankel additionally serves as chief growth officer for medicalcannabismentor.com and just released her first major documentary, Cannabis + Creativity, which screened at the Big Apple Film Festival in June and has earned six awards.
Long before her documentary detailing the drug’s impact on art, Frankel’s journey into the world of cannabis began with a recognition of its impact on creativity. “When I was young, cannabis was a way that I brought joy into my life through laughter,” says Frankel, “And then, as I got older, I realized that there was a medicinal, wellness element to the plant.”
In fact, it was a fall Frankel suffered while in Florida that set her admiration for marijuana on this new trajectory. “I had a 4-inch fractured skull, which left me pretty much debilitated; unable to walk, unable to talk, and in chronic pain,” she says of the accident. It was marijuana that Frankel credits with getting her back on her feet within just three months. During this period, however, she also noticed another side effect to her treatment.
“I started to feel super creative but in a different way than I was used to,” Frankel says. “My whole life I’ve worked in magazines, I’ve written books, I’ve made short videos, and I just started creating in a different way that was extremely interesting to me, but at the same time a little bit scary because I was doing things very differently than not only what I was used to, but what society was used to.” She found herself painting hundreds of small pictures. “I just had this incredible desire and need to watercolor every day,” says Frankel, who soon found herself embarking on a very different creative journey.
Inspired by her newfound love for art and her longtime relationship with acclaimed filmmaker Barbara Kopple, Frankel began conceiving a documentary. “I began thinking about all these incredible creative people that I’ve worked with over the years; everybody from photographers and stylists to theater people, singers, musicians, chefs, even people in business and science who think differently, and I started to wonder: What makes them creative?” The answer was a plant that was already very close to Frankel’s heart.
Frankel’s documentary Cannabis + Creativity focuses on how everyday people gain newfound abilities due to cannabis use. “I really wanted to talk to the people who are working creatives,” says Frankel. “It’s not about fame and celebrity. It’s about this incredible need, just like I had with watercolors, to create whatever it is people want to create. And 99% of the time when I talk to them, they say that the plant was a tool to help facilitate that story or that output.”
Cannabis + Creativity has been a hit since arriving on the festival circuit, winning a host of accolades, including best documentary at both the Catskill International Film Festival and the Montreal Women Film Festival. Heartened by the film’s reception, Frankel unsurprisingly doesn’t plan to slow down anytime soon. “I’ve received so much positive feedback that I’ve started fundraising for the next [documentary] because I want to continue this series,” she says.
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