'Clerks' ringing up a sequel

Posted Saturday, August 28, 2004 at 9:09 AM Central

by John Couture

Go ahead, check a calendar. April 1st is still a long way off. Kevin Smith is re-opening the book on his View Askewniverse after God herself closed it following Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.

Kevin has been working on a "smaller project" over the course of the last few months and he finally spilled the beans on his website NewsAskew.com today. His next project will be a sequel to the 1994 Indie smash hit Clerks tentatively titled Clerks 2: The Passion of the Clerks. You can stop pinching yourself now, it's true.

Details are still a little sketchy, but the main cast, including Brian O'Halloran (Dante), Jeff Anderson (Randal), Jason Mewes (Jay) and Kev himself (Silent Bob), are locked in for a January production start. Kevin shared his vision for the new Jersey "trilogy" tome, "It's about what happens when that lazy, 20-something malaise lasts into your 30s. Those dudes are kind of still mired, not in that same exact situation, but in a place where it's time to actually grow up and do something more than just sit around and dissect pop culture and talk about sex."

"It's: What happened to these dudes?"

With the highly anticipated Clerks X 10th Anniversary DVD hitting stores on September 7th, the time for a sequel couldn't be better. But don't think it's all about the money.

"I'm sure there will be naysayers who say, 'Oh my God, it's an opportunistic grab at a buck,' but it's not. We're doing it for nothing. We're going to do it insanely inexpensively. The budget will be somewhere between 250 grand and $5 million."

Although fans might be skeptical following this year's family-friendly Jersey Girl that Smith will jump right back into his familiar potty humor territory, Kev eases their fears.

"It's funny, it's very raw, insanely foul-mouthed. In many ways it's the antithesis of Jersey Girl."

You had me at Passion.