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KEVIN SMITH:
“Before I even started writing the script I needed to tell Brian and Jeff because it was a 50/50 proposition. I knew that Brian would be onboard, but [not] Jeff. After 12 years I think that he’s finally come to peace with the fact that he is Randal, because Jeff is not a dude who’s like, ‘I want to be an actor.’”
JEFF ANDERSON:
“Clerks didn’t seem to me a movie that was craving for a sequel. I think a large part of the success of Clerks is the back story to it. It was the low budget, it was the black and white look, a camera sitting on a tripod and us talking, and how do you replicate that? I just didn’t want to screw it up.”
BRIAN O’HALLORAN:
“I think we pulled it off. I’ve been fortunate enough to be at four fan-type screenings, and they were very pleased.”
SMITH:
“I wanted to tell what it felt like to be in my thirties and do it down and dirty. I was thinking about new characters and new situations, and then I was like, ‘Wait a second, Clerks was a story about what I thought it was like to be in my twenties, I can use Dante and Randal again as my proxy, as my stand-ins, as a way to the story.’”
O’HALLORAN:
“The dynamic between Dante and Randal is good Kirk/bad Kirk. Randal is the person Kevin would have loved to have been when he was an actual convenience store clerk, and Dante was the clerk he actually was during most of that time. Blend the two together and that would have been Kevin in a whole way.”
ANDERSON:
“The most surprising thing, other than the fact that I know nothing about Star Wars, is that I’m not Brian’s best friend. He lives in New Jersey still, I’ve moved out here [to Los Angeles] and have lived here for about 10 years, so we only see each other on Clerks type stuff.”
O’HALLORAN:
“We’ve done these characters sprinkled in and out of Kevin’s films, and the cartoon series over the years, so getting back to us just talking, it’s the easiest thing. Give us a script and give us a couple of minutes, and we’re bantering back and forth like an old married couple.”
SMITH:
“In the first film I was more Dante wishing that I was Randal, and this time around I’m definitely more Randal than Dante in terms of I don’t want things to change. Change comes very hard to me, and it’s a weird struggle all the time where it’s like how much can you remain the person that you were and still grow at the same time?”
O’HALLORAN:
“Clerks III? Grumpier old clerks; I think the next time you’ll probably see these guys in any type of format will probably be in an animated format in about two years. Kevin has also talked about doing a straight to DVD unrated feature.”
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THE CONCEPT:
