Kevin Smith: How Jay and Silent Bob Changed His World
The director escaped death and used his heart attack to power the cameo-infused Jay and Silent Bob Reboot film in theaters.
Kevin Smith is lucky to be alive. The comedian nearly died after having a heart attack in between a pair of standup comedy shows at the Alex Theater in Glendale, California on February 25, 2018. With only a 20-percent chance of living, Smith was conscious and talking to the doctors at Adventist Health Glendale as they performed an emergency angioplasty to save his life. And yet what Smith was thinking about on that operating table was that he’d never be able to film his next project, Jay and Silent Bob Reboot.
Smith not only lived to tell this story and direct Jay and Silent Bob Reboot (in theaters October 15), he also completely changed his life and got healthy. He gave up his favorite foods like hamburgers and pizza and went vegan, coupled with a low-sugar diet. And with the help of his miniature dachshund Shecky, who he walks for an hour a day, Smith has shed over 50 pounds and kept it off.
The director has kept busy working, as well, continuing his endless series of podcasts, while keeping up with standup and directing TV shows like Supergirl, The Goldbergs, and The Flash. With Jay and Silent Bob back on the big screen, Smith took some time to reminisce on just how crazy it is that these two characters have made him and Jason Mewes rich, taking on a life of their own over the last 25 years across all media forms (Yes, there’s even a video game in development). Smith talks about Jay and Silent Bob in this exclusive interview.
Innovation & Tech Today: What's the secret to getting so many A-listers to appear in your Jay and Silent Bob movies?
Kevin Smith: It's easy. You have to nearly die like I did before this movie. If I didn’t have a heart attack, we wouldn't have gotten two-thirds of the cast we got. But as it stood I could call up people and most people were like, “Oh it's Kev. Okay, especially cause he’s sick.” And some people were like, “Oh man, I can't make it down to New Orleans to shoot for one hour. I'm sorry.” And then I'd be like, “You do remember I almost died, right?” So I’d guilt people into showing up. And it worked so well that we have way more cameos in this film than we had in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.
But you only get one of those, right? Unless I'm willing to have another heart attack when I’m about to make a movie, but I'd rather not. It was something really positive that came out of that whole affair. We got a really good cast for the movie.
Jay and Silent Bob Reboot Movie Poster
I&T Today: One thing about New Orleans is they’ve got great food that’s not very healthy. What’s the challenge of having to now eat better post heart attack?
Kevin Smith: It's like being in every other place and having to eat healthy. They have meat everywhere and they do barbecue lots of places. So when I went to New Orleans, it was like more of the same. I can't escape it. People are still omnivores wherever I go in the world.
But what was beautiful about New Orleans is that it became the secret weapon in casting the movie. We were afraid that by being in New Orleans, we weren't going to get anybody to show up to shoot with me. It was like, “Maybe we could pull from the local shows and movies that are shooting in the area." Strike Back was shot in Los Angeles, where it’s very easy to ask people to come down for a cameo for an hour. Getting them come out to New Orleans requires getting on a plane, multiple hour flight, etc.
I&T Today: But New Orleans does have its appeal.
Kevin Smith: New Orleans helped us because we were shooting during Mardi Gras. We’d called people up and they’re like, “You’re offering me a free trip to Mardi Gras with hotel included?” It was great being in the city while we were making this vibrant movie that celebrates all the old movies I made. It was also a celebration that I didn't die from that heart attack.
Being in New Orleans during Mardi Gras only accentuated the celebration because there were like 72 parades throughout the course of us making this movie. There was always a party atmosphere going on. So even though we would go to work sometimes at five in the morning, New Orleans never stopped. So you just felt like you were having fun all the time, and that just dialed everything up.
I&T Today: What do you think it is about these characters of Jay and Silent Bob that have stood the test of time and so many films?
Kevin Smith: I never would have guessed it. I always thought of a them as a low-rent Cheech and Chong or Laurel and Hardy. When I wrote Clerks I wanted to put Jason Mewes in it because he’s a true American original. Long before I knew I wanted to make movies, I always thought Jason would be funny on the big screen. So years later when I figured out that I wanted to make a movie, I wrote Jason into it because I knew he’d be funny to people beyond our hometown.
Since he’s always talking, I wanted somebody to be with him. But I didn't want him to get into a dialogue situation because the stuff Jason says is so unique. So I just stuck this dude next to him as his muscle. Jay was not a weed dealer when we were kids. He was just this little force of nature. But growing up we had kids who hung out in front of the Quick Mart just leaning on the wall and selling dope and stuff like that after school. So I put the two together, and had Jay as the mouthpiece and the bigger dude who’s there as the muscle.
I&T Today: How did you end up as Silent Bob?
Kevin Smith: I didn't intend to play that part. I was going to play Randall, which is why he has all the best jokes. But then as we got closer to production, I was like, “I can't do it.” And so I found Jeff Anderson for Randall and I took Silent Bob because I didn’t have to memorize any dialogue. Since Jason had never acted before, I also wanted to be able to stand there and work with him and let him talk to me.
Still from Jay and Silent Bob Reboot (Courtesy of Kyle Kaplan)
I&T Today: When did you know you had something with these two?
Kevin Smith: It wasn’t until we got to Mallrats that the reaction from fans was like, “Oh, Jay and Bob are back!” These guys are now like a Cheech and Chong kind of pair. And I never dreamed we'd be regarded as such. Every movie team that I ever saw growing up from Laurel and Hardy to Abbott and Costello to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, they're not the main story, but they're there and they help support the story. I never dreamed that they would take on like a life of their own. Like, that's nuts that these dopey characters achieved that.
Cheech and Chong were cool and broke ground and created a world where even I could then go on and one day make stoner movies like that. Bill and Ted had this cool time machine and could go pull figures from history. But Jay and Silent Bob never felt all that special. But it’s due to Jason's originality because there's nobody like him. He's what carried that forward all this time. I keep putting the characters in movies, of course, but it's his vitality, his personality that’s given it life for 25 years. It could have ended a long time ago, but he's affable as hell. Everybody knows Jay even if you've never met him. And that's what I've heard for years about these movies. They're like, “I knew a guy just like Jay, man.” Everybody has a Jay in their life. And so that character travels a lot further. I don't think as many people have a Silent Bob in their life. But they like his presence. They like the fact that he's always there for his guy, that he's got Jay's back no matter what.
I&T Today: How did you end up owning Jay and Silent Bob?
Kevin Smith: The way we wound up owning Jay and Silent Bob is weird. And it shows you how little anyone thought of the characters. When we sold Clerks to Miramax, I told my lawyer that I had written Jay and Silent Bob into Dogma and Mallrats because if I write Jason into movies, he gets paid and he stops borrowing money from me. So my lawyer asked Miramax about these characters and they agreed to let us own them forever.
The official position from Miramax was the movie's called Clerks and it's about the two clerks inside the store. Nobody gives a s*** about the guys outside the store, so they let us have them. And because of that, me and Jason have had an umbrella our entire life. We don't have to ask somebody for permission if we can do anything with Jay and Silent Bob.
It’s been great because I don't own any of the movies we made. So to own those characters so that we could do with them whatever we want, make a movie or do a podcast live in front of people on stages around the world. For the last decade we were able to do all of that because nobody thought those characters would be worth it. I think including me. I didn’t have a vision that these characters were going to take off. I just wanted to use them in other movies. And then it became this little empire where Jason and I have lived off for the last quarter of a century. I have a house, Jason has a house, our kids eat because of Jay and Silent Bob.