After he dropped the trailer of 'Jay and Silent Bob Reboot' at the Comic-Con 2019 on Thursday, Kevin Smith shared that he is more than happy to have worked with his friend Ben Affleck for the first time professionally.
"We haven't worked with him since Clerks II, professionally haven't worked with him but personally he hasn't been in my life in like eight years," Smith told Entertainment Weekly.
He also revealed that there was a time when he totally believed that Affleck was totally out of his life.
"Sooner or later I just started putting stuff on front street and be like, 'I haven't spoken to Ben in years. I don't think we're really friends anymore.' He was out of my life completely."
And that was the reason that he didn't even consider casting Affleck in his upcoming feature.
He said, "There was sadness to that. This movie was Benless, there was no plan to have Ben whatsoever."
But he admired the power of entertainment journalism and recalled a journalist of the same beat who was recently interviewing Affleck, following which Smith's upcoming feature lead to the actor joining the cast.
Smith will be seen reprising his role as Silent Bob while Jason Mewes is back on board to play his character, Jay. Talking about Mewes, Smith was full of praises for the actor and said, "I am so delighted about all that energy and all that passion in the movie and he matched it."
"He did it because a) he can and now, b) because he knows it's important to me. This is the movie that I have survived to make. So, once I got cleared of health issues, we got into it."
The recently released trailer is a total barrel of laughs with the lead pair stepping out to stop the making of a Hollywood film on their comic book counterparts, 'Bluntman and Chronic'.
Affleck is seen playing a character Holden (from his film 'Chasing Amy') and Damon is seen playing the character Loki from his 1999 film 'Dogma'.
'Jay and Silent Bob Reboot' is intended to be the eighth movie in the 'View Askewniverse', a fictional universe created by Kevin Smith.
Jay and Silent Bob are characters in the View Askewniverse, where Kevin plays Silent Bob while Jay is played by Jason Mewes.
The film is being produced under View Askewniverse Productions and is a sequel to the 2001 film 'Jay and Silent Strike Back'.
( With inputs from ANI )