Kevin Smith Talks TV In His Podcast

TV Blend reported back in February that Kevin Smith was signed on to direct a new CW pilot, titled ‘Reaper.’ The show centers on a young slacker who learns that his parents sold his soul to the devil and he must now pay the debt back by serving as a bounty hunter, collecting souls on earth and returning them to hell. In his podcast this week, Smith spoke rather candidly about his transition to TV directing and taking on a project that he didn’t write, which is a new thing for him.

In the podcast, which can be downloaded here, Smith describes ‘Reaper’ as being “witty” and “very Shaun Of The Dead,” which I translate as being dark but funny. He also gets into the bias against TV vs. movies. Though Smith has written and directed seven movies, he’s pretty enthusiastic about getting into television because he believes it has a greater reach in terms of audience than film does, due to the convenience of the medium.

Smith and his co-SModcaster, Scott Mosier (producer of all of Smith’s films) talk about some of their favorite TV shows, listing ‘Rome,’ ‘Lost,’ ‘The Sopranos,’ ‘Heroes’ and ‘Deadwood.’ They discuss how TV is coming up against film in a big way. Smith said, “I would rather watch ‘Rome’ than go see almost anything at a movie theater. It’s gripping, well done, well acted. Even the worst ‘Sopranos’ episode is better than like half the movies I’ve seen in a movie theater in any given year.”

One of the really interesting things that Smith got into on the podcast was the fact that the CW took a pass on casting Kyle Gass in ‘Reaper,’ due to what they determined to be a poor audition. He goes on to say that aside from being a funny guy, Gass would’ve brought an audience to the show. While Bret Harrison and Tyler Labine (both cast in lead roles in ‘Reaper’) are great actors, they don’t have the kind of following that Gass does due to the success of his and Jack Black’s band Tenacious D. He also mentions the fact that with Gass on board, if the show goes to series, there would be a chance that the network could get Jack Black to guest star in an episode at some point.

Going from making his own films to working in television, directing someone else’s work and dealing with the network big-wigs certainly sounds like quite the learning experience for Smith but he sounds enthusiastic about it (well, as enthusiastic as a laidback guy like Smith could get).

To download Smith’s podcast, right-click this link.