420 Fest brings Smokey River to life
Wiz Khalifa, Joey Bada$$, Berner, Smoke DZA, and Chevy Woods headline Missouri’s biggest 420 celebration
The Smokey River Entertainment District is a multifaceted entertainment venue that will be located in River Bend, Missouri, along the scenic Missouri River. It will feature an outdoor amphitheater, two indoor clubs and music halls, and designated cannabis consumption spaces.
Smokey River is the brainchild of Besa Hospitality Group’s (BHG) President, Joey Pintozzi, Vice President, Bobby Lessany, CEO, Jack Mitchell, and the Besame Wellness team.
“We have a large portion of our company that comes from the hospitality world and has a passion for entertainment and hospitality – serving others,” explains Pintozzi. “When we launched BesaMe Wellness our focus was merging hospitality and cannabis. With our CEO Jack Mitchell being a visionary, we found an opportunity to pursue that vision in the Village of River Bend. With Smokey River Entertainment District our goal is to ‘Normalize Cannabis through hospitality.’A place where people can enjoy the arts, music, food, and cannabis if you choose.”
The endeavor has been well received. “Overwhelming, the support and interest from inside and outside the cannabis community has been amazing,” Pintozzi said. He called the experience and the amount of interest and support the group has received humbling.
“We have received interest and support from some iconic local and national brands, some of which we hope to partner with in the future.”
For Pintozzi, and the rest of the team at BHG, the journey hasn’t been easy, but it has been rewarding to see their labor come to fruition.
“When you are the first, there is always a rough path ahead,” Pintozzi said. “I think just getting people to see the long-term vision and the progress we have already made is huge. Sometimes progress isn’t received by all.”
“Now we have a beautiful piece of land that sits by the river and allows legal consumption, compliantly within the law. We look to host a variety of festivals and outdoor events here.”
Long-term, Pintozzi says that Smokey River will be able to support virtually any event within the space.
While construction continues, the team will treat the space similarly to many open-air or nonpermanent venue spaces.
“Think of any outdoor, carnival, concert, or event you’ve been to. We will be creating pop-up festivals and trucking in production as we celebrate the end of prohibition and get people familiar with the area,” Pintozzi explained.
The Smokey River 420 Fest is the first of these celebrations. The festival will celebrate cannabis culture by bringing multi-platinum selling, Grammy, and Golden Globe-nominated recording artist Wiz Khalifa, along with Joey Bada$$, Berner, Smoke DZA, and Chevy Woods to the stage.
Smokey River 420 Fest will also feature food and beverage vendors, and Cannabis Village – a celebration of the cannabis industry in Missouri and cannabis culture.
“We are most excited about the cannabis village. We have 75-90 featured brands from all segments of our industry, amazing brands such as Sinse, Clovr, Wondergrove, Timeless, Dab Stars, Dr. Smoke, and Waxy Brown to name a few.”
The Cannabis Village is where patrons can bring and consume cannabis, as such it is restricted as a 21+ space.
“Cannabis Village opens at 3 pm. You must be 21 to enter. No alcohol in, no cannabis out,” Pintozzi explained. Additional information and full venue rules are available at www.smokeyriverentertainmentdistrict.com
In addition to a stellar music lineup, celebrities including Mike Tyson and Ric Flair are tentatively scheduled to appear.
“We want to people to enjoy this historic day, see and embrace the vision of Smokey River while getting familiar with the area and understanding what is coming.”
Pintozzi says he wants people to be able to enjoy the day, celebrate the end of prohibition, and walk away with a feeling of “Yes! Missouri, we did this!”
Long-term plans for Smokey River include more than the festival. When the space is completed, Smokey River Entertainment District will house an outdoor amphitheater of with an expected capacity of up to 14,000, 2 indoor music venues with a capacity of 800-3000, and a riverwalk that includes 3 stories of 20-25 food and beverage concepts. Construction is expected to be complete between late 2024 and mid-2025. Pintozzi says that the group will explore hotel accommodations in 2026.
With Smokey River being anchored so deeply in cannabis culture, it’s no surprise that the leadership group behind the venue has recently launched Smokey River as a cannabis brand in Missouri.
“We wanted to make Smokey River Cannabis a brand for everyone; both in branding and in the products that we produce,” Nathan Dreshfield, Director of Sales for BesaMe told Greenway. “From the novice to the connoisseur, we have built a product line that would interest everyone in between. The brand is crafted to speak to everyone in the cannabis community in Missouri; instead of focusing on a specific market we wanted to have the brand represent how Missouri cannabis culture feels, while striving to provide the highest quality products at an accessible price.”
Smokey River Cannabis debuted in dispensaries in March. To find out more about the cannabis brand go to smokeyrivercannabis.com
For information or tickets to Smoey River 420 Fest check out smokeyriverentertainmentdistrict.com.