Kevin Smith lashes out at skeptics

Posted Monday, April 7, 2003 at 11:32 AM Central

by John Couture

Jersey Girl, Kevin Smith's sixth directorial project featuring real life Hollywood power couple Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez as lovers, is done. It's in the proverbial can. End of story. Despite what you might have heard, Kevin himself has set the record straight on his web site.

"I thought I'd state for the record, that we have not re-shot, nor do we have plans to re-shoot, scenes for Jersey Girl. Ben and Jen's chemistry in the flick is the exact opposite of zero."

Smith's tirade follows a slew of mud-drenched reports that claim that Miramax is spending an additional $3 million to reshoot the ending and various other scenes because Affleck and J Lo's chemistry was found to be lacking by several test audiences.

Adding to the confusion, and apparently the real target of the 'insider reports', is Ben and Jennifer's other movie, Tough Love (formerly Gigli). "I assumed (wrongly, I guess) that anyone who really gave a [expletive deleted] knew that it was Gigli that had done re-shoots, not Jersey Girl. Now I'm seeing this isn't the case," Smith continued.

Jersey Girl has been completed for a couple months and the test audiences' responses have been positive, but Smith has a contractual obligation that prohibits him from releasing Jersey Girl until after Tough Love/Gigli.