Guest Report By JoeC

Hey Brad and Chris,

I was in group 4. We were the third group to do the tour and that one was the first done by both Brian and Jason. (Brian had done the first two solo). Brian has a powerful voice, no doubt a result of his experiences in the theater. Jay, by contrast, speaks very softly, often to the point that he is unintelligible. However, Jay is just what my mother would call "a character". He is just so naturally fucking funny. For instance, Jay came on this tour because he thought there would be a blowhole on the bus. Yeah, look it up. Don't ask me.

The first place we went to was the playground that they used in "Chasing Amy" for the legendary "fisting" scene. The bad thing is that most people in the bus were kinda afraid of the rain and they stayed in the bus. Fuck them. I mean we had already been standing in the rain outside the stash for like an hour before and fuck it, you only live once.

When we got to the swings, it appeared that only on swing remained, a victim of an overzealous fan or a random vandal. Nonetheless, the souls who were there went up and sat on the swing, did the fisting hand motion and then left.

Back on the bus, we swung by the house that they had used in Clerks for the exterior of Dante's place. Apparently they hadn't bothered to call them for the first tour, but Brian said that someone probably caught on because they were waving by the time the second tour came round.

Next stop: Postens Funeral Home. The funny thing is that there was actually a funeral there! Brian said that he could only see the family crying and wondering why people came over in a bus just to tip over the casket. But we did the Funeral Home much like Kevin and company shot it. Without permission. Shoot and run.

The stores were next. All of us disembarked at this point and we went into the Quick Stop. We packed the place in and Brian told us basically some of the background of the genesis of "Clerks" and the making of. He said that since RST opened at 11, they stored the film equipment there and often used it as a place to sleep when they pulled an all-too-often allnighter. He pointed out the still-broken light in the back and invited us all to purchase a Gatorade or sugar or salsa or a snack cake. (I got a Gatorade, natch).

RST Video - it really is a shitty video store, kids! But they make a lot of dough renting out porn, so that explains that. It and the Quick Stop are very small...not all of us could fit into the RST. But Brian told us that Kevin saw that the "NEW RELEASES HERE!" sign the day before (during the dry run) and he took it to hang proudly in the Stash (where it was during the Stash Bash).

So, we vacated the premises, jumping over puddles into traffic back to the bus. Brian then started telling us all about the "Clerks" animated series. He did indicate that he, Jeff and Jason would all do the voices...so this bodes well for the show.

The next and more-or-less last stop on the bus tour was the Marina Diner. This wasn't too impressive. The owner was an asshole said Brian and he always had been. Back when they made Amy, they gave him a lot of F-you money to close the diner and he never had. He was still pissed that someone broke a chair, so we never did get to go in.

Then we made our way back to Broad Street. The last place Brian pointed out was the stretch of road that Dante and Randal drove down in "Clerks". He said that the reason he wore glasses in that scene and the Postens scene was because he had a late night shooting the night before and he needed at least 6 hours for the contacts to clean before he could put them back in. So now the back story of Dante include the fact that he needs driving glasses.

Interesting facts from the tour:

We also got to find out the explanation of Noontch and Snootchie Bootchies...but that's a whole other story

Well, that was the tour...now the store.

The store was awesome! So much great stuff in there, props from the flicks, great comics and a shitload of pizza. All we really needed was the aforementioned "blowhole" and some brew and I woulda never left.

Kevin was a great guy and when we got to our audience with him, we weren't disappointed. We thanked him for the whole experience and he said "Well, I believe in giving back." Amen, my man.

I woulda got Jimmy Palmiotti and Joe Quesada's autograph, but I am a big pussy sometimes (The big pussy in the Columbia Sportswear blue jacket), so I didn't approach them, cause they seemed to be in discussion and I didn't wanna bother them. I also apologize for not saying hi to Brad and Chris. I stood by you guys for a long while and I was too chickenshit to say hi. Not because I don't love your work and reporting, but because, as I said, I am chickenshit. Let me take the opportunity to say hi here and tell you of my hope to see you at the next VA event (hopefully the "Dogma" premiere).

Kevin took time out like an hour after our stash time began to show the trailers. I love the "Vulgar" tagline. "Three Cocks...One Ass", it's sick, but funny.

The one that blew me the hell away was the "Dogma" trailer. My favorite line in the whole trailer was the smartly delivered line "Bartleby, you're declaring war on God" by Damon. This is gonna be one sweet movie. I am not going to miss this one!

We also so those "Dogma" FX shots. According to the date on them, they were just done on February 25th...so these are brand-new. First was Affleck flying down in front of the Cathedral with his huge angel wings, then it was Noman flinging his poo. Looked great, prolly didn't smell great, but it looked great.

After that, I bought some more swag and left a little early. I'm still kicking myself for it, because I missed out on getting my t-shirt. Fuck! I forgot all about it. Well, I guess two lucky people got ours. Hope they keep ya warm. :)

That about does it for me. Just wanna put a bug in Kevin's ear to invite all the Stashbashers to come back to the "Dogma" showing. Ya have our names, just keep them on file. :) We'll dress up if ya want, man. I swear to Silent Bob.