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Kevin Smith: So much more than I knew when I started making movies. The female characters in Clerks were written by a guy who didn't know any other females besides his mom and his sister. All of my characters tended to sound a bit like me, including the female characters. My wife is a hardcore feminist, which bleeds into who I am—and rightfully so. I do feel like my feminine side was always there. Most people say, "You're a girly man," because I've got boobs, but I felt like having a wife and kid really put me in touch with my feminine side. There's no way I would have made this movie had I not met either of those two.
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When I jumped out on the net, there were two filmmakers on there—me and Peter Jackson. Peter Jackson got smart and started directing Oscar-winning movies, and I'm still on the internet. So I've watched the slow decline from civility. You just see the free-floating hostility. As far back as 2001, though, people were just merciless—so has it changed that much? It's gotten much less civil, and it can be a blood sport for people, but that's always been the case.There are a few bad apples, but you can't let it spoil the bunch for everybody. This technology allowed a lot of us to find one another. When I was a kid, I didn't know any other people who liked the shit that I liked, so I felt alone. Then the internet happened and I was like, "Oh my God, you love Star Wars too? I thought there was nobody left." It's a wholly good thing, but unfortunately, from time to time, people fuck around with it.
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You can't not make shit just because you're not guaranteed success. Some shit is worth doing just for doing—I learned that from Mallrats. It died at the box office, everyone hated it, then ten years later, everyone is like, "Mallrats, I fucking love that movie!" I have experience with making something that the world doesn't fucking dig.The worst part of making movies, for me, is releasing them theatrically. It leaves you wide open for people to say, "You fucking failed!" Failure is immediate to people. They don't see the long game—or, in my case, the long con, which is, "It might not work for you now, but if you give it a minute, maybe it'll work then." If you're doing something different, you're going through the door first, and the first person through the door is the one who gets shot—so you have to decide if it's worth getting shot. To me, it always is. I look at JJ [Abrams] and think, Goddammit, I wish I was like JJ. Everything he does, everyone loves. But I'm Kevin Smith, and I like being Kevin Smith—it fucking rocks!Yoga Hosers is based in Canada, but you've featured your home state of New Jersey throughout your previous work. What is it about the state that keeps calling you back?
It's credibility! Very few states that have that aura. I think I get a lot of passes for being from New Jersey. It's instantly relatable to people, and it makes you more authentic and real in their eyes. It's a big part of who I am, and I always come back to it. Being from Jersey puts a chip on your shoulder because you grow up next to Manhattan—you always feel like you're living in someone else's shadow. But it gives you a thicker skin, and it makes you try harder.Follow Larry Fitzmaurice on Twitter.