Kevin Smith’s Marijuanaissance
Kevin Smith’s Marijuanaissance: On ‘Tusk,’ ‘Falling Out’ with Ben Affleck, and 20 Years of ‘Clerks’
EXCERPT 09.09.14 by thedailybeast.com
The outspoken filmmaker sat down with Marlow Stern to discuss his wacky walrus horror film Tusk, his upcoming film with Johnny Depp starring their daughters, his love of weed, and more.
Any conversation with Kevin Smith, the loquacious filmmaker/geek god, tends to go to interesting places. The guy has no filter, and regularly regales colleges and podcast listeners with his industry yarns, from the hellish experience working with Bruce Willis on Cop Out to the living soap opera that was developing his script for the superhero flick Superman Lives, replete with a giant, killer spider (at the producer’s behest).
Following the disappointing box office for Red State, Smith said that his follow-up film, Clerks 3, would be his last. Later, he amended that statement to say that he’ll keep making movies, but only ones “I would/could ever make.” Which brings us to Tusk.
A couple of years back, on his comedy podcast SModcast, Smith and pal Scott Mosier discussed an ad for a man renting out a room in his house gratis—on the condition that the tenant dresses up like a walrus for a few hours a day. They had a field day with it, disassembling and reassembling it, until they landed on an idea: What if it was a horror film about a demented elderly seafarer who posts a misleading ad,
