Clerks 3 To Wrap Production Tonight

Kevin Smith took to social media this morning to reveal that today is the final day of production on Clerks III, concluding the tenth movie he has filmed with longtime collaborator Jason Mewes. The film has been in production for all of August, closely mirroring the lightning-fast production schedule of the original Clerks. The movie, which is set to be distributed by Lionsgate, is Smith’s first new feature film since Jay & Silent Bob Reboot, in which Brian O’Halloran’s Dante Hicks, the point-of-view character in the original Clerks and its 2006 sequel, Clerks II. That movie was the last time fans got a look at Jeff Anderson’s Randal Graves, who appears to be the lead in Clerks III.

Randal, who has always been something of a wish-fulfillment character for Smith himself, is set to suffer a life-threatening heart attack in the movie, as Smith did in real life. It will spur the lifelong slacker to find the one thing he likes better than working retail and making fun of his customers: he’s going to make a movie.

A movie about working retail and making fun of his customers, natch.

You can see Smith’s post below.

“There’s a saying from the Tao that goes something like ‘To be great is to go on. To go on is to go far. To go far is to return.’ Thanks to Lionsgate, we get to return to where it all started with almost the whole cast that started it all,” Smith said in a statement when the film was announced. “And for the first time since the first time we ever made a movie in 1993, we’re shooting the entire flick on location in New Jersey, as an ode to both the enduring allure of cinema and the resourcefulness and lunacy of its storytellers. Years ago, Dante and Randal made me a filmmaker – so now it’s time I return the favor.”

Brian O’Halloran and Jeff Anderson will be returning as Dante and Randal, respectively, while Smith and Jason Mewes will once again playJay and Silent Bob. Rosario Dawson is also returning to play Becky, her character from Clerks II. At the beginning of the year, Smith broke down the movie’s plot and a tweet revealed that the Clerks III will (unsurprisingly) take place almost entirely at Quick Stop.

Clerks III does not yet have a release date. Are you excited to return to the world of the Quick Stop? Let us know in the comments below, or hit up @russburlingame on Twitter to talk all things Askewniverse.