I’ve read some speculation about where the big ‘Jay and Bob’ push is, so let me put some of those fears to rest.

Comedy Central is running a special called ‘Reel Comedy’ featuring Jay and Silent Bob in about two weeks or so. Jay and I are doing a sit-down for that (as the characters) Thursday.

After that, we’re doing that ‘The Test’ show for an all Jay and Silent Bob night on FX, featuring airings of ‘Clerks’ and ‘Mallrats’ (the cut editions, no doubt), and a pair of ‘Son of the Beach’ episodes with Mark in them, all wrapped up by pre-and-post commercial break intros with yours truly (that we’re also taping on Thursday). This will all air closer to release.

On Wednesday, August 22nd (the day the flick opens), I’ll be on the Stern show, in-studio. Very cool, and always very helpful.

Later that afternoon, both Jay and I will be on Total Request Live. Love this show or hate it, I’m sure I don’t have to tell you how many people it reaches.

Throughout August, lots of the cast will be popping up on talk shows. I’ll let you know who and when once the schedule is completed.

But I suspect the reason folks are feeling a lack of ‘Jay and Silent Bob’ are because you haven’t seen any commercials yet. That’s because the network ad buys (ie – commercials) start airing the last week in July. Two or three weeks out (from release) is usually how a movie is marketed (we had even less than that on ‘Dogma’). It makes no sense to throw up spots prior to the opening of ‘Planet of the Apes’, as it’s kind of a waste of money; this weekend, nobody wants to know from anything EXCEPT ‘Planet of the Apes’.

The trailer was, indeed, on ‘Scary Movie 2′, but has also been on many ‘Jurasic Park 3′ prints. It’ll be “chasing” at least half the run of the ‘Apes’ prints, and be attached to ‘Rush Hour 2′ for August 3rd. I imagine it’ll get it’s fair share of play on ‘American Pie 2′ as well.

Look for the poster to be up in some places this weekend, everywhere next weekend.

The press is responding incredibly well to the flick, so there will be a lot of print and TV media running when the flick opens, as well as the aforementioned commercial spots.

On the subject of those spots: like the theatrical trailer, it may not be your cup of tea. However, they’re not made to preach to the choir. We’re hoping you guys are all going, so there’s no need to “sell” you on the flick. Who we’ve got to go after are folks that don’t know/care what or who a ‘Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back’ is. And those folks have to be spoon-fed the stuff you’ve been hip to for the past seven years.

That being said, I’ve seen the TV spots. They’re pretty funny (as funny as you can be on network television), quite effective in relating the story in thirty seconds, and best of all, testing huge. Major props go out to Josh Greenstein for the trailer and the TV spots, not to mention the poster. He’s been working tirelessly on a campaign that’s going to be aired so often and much, you’ll wish you’d never heard of Jay and Silent Bob.

And Bob’s backing us 100%. The P&A budget on this flick is pretty huge – far more than has ever been spent on any of our other flicks – and that’s a vote of confidence from our fearless leader at Dimension.

Rest assured, kids – all is well. A big push for the flick IS coming. Dimension is sparing no quarter.

Which means that the burden’s on our shoulders. If the movie doesn’t work at the box office, it won’t be because Dimension didn’t sell the shit out of it; it’ll be because Jay and Silent Bob struck back… and nobody really cared.

Let’s all keep our fingers crossed for a healthy opening, and even more importantly, a nice, long run at the box office. I can think of no better way to send Jay and Silent Bob off into the sunset than with a fat bag of cash.

Kevin takes a few seconds to introduce me to Ben Affleck. He’s tall. Like 6-foot-4 tall. We slug down coffee at the massive free food tent, and Affleck pours through it like a college student. He says he’s filming two other movies simultaneously, and will only be in L.A. for three days. He read his lines for the first time on the plane ride in this morning. Still, he’s smiling, even though he’s a little disappointed that they’ve run out of strawberry jam for his bagel. Whiny little pretty-boy actor.

7:36 AM

Scene one, take one. Despite the fact that he just learned the lines, Affleck delivers. And Jason Mewes (”Jay”, duh) is a machine. He never misses a line. Some scenes are done in one take. Others, even though they look perfect, are filmed several times so there are multiples to choose from in editing. A simple Mewes saying, “C’mon, Silent Bob-We’re going to Hollywood!” takes three tries, with Mewes using a different tone of voice each time.

Customers who already have the bare-bones versions of their favorite movies are willing to dish out the extra money to own the special editions. And sales of fully-loaded editions of even the most cult-like titles can sometimes rival sales of theatrical blockbusters, as Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment has found to its delight with Kevin Smith’s Dogma.

Columbia TriStar released a movie-only edition May 2, 2000, even though the supplier planned a special edition of Smith’s controversial religious satire. Indeed, Columbia TriStar notified retailers and the public early on that another edition was on the way. The studio chose to release a bare-bones edition because it had a window to meet and Smith has been too busy to participate in the disc in time for that deadline.

That movie-only edition sold more than 800.000 units at $24.95, according to studio representatives.

The long-awaited double-disc special edition of Dogma, packaged in a double amaray keep case in an eye-catching sleeve, finally arrived June 26, prices at $29.95. To the studio’s astonishment, it had an 18 percent sell-off its first day on store shelves and to date has sold more than 200,000 units.

Quick sales of the relatively low budget Dogma rival those for a $100 million box office hit, v.p. of sales John Reina says. “That’s new. It says a lot about the movie, the producer, the packaging and the retailers getting behind it,” Reina says.

Smith’s July 1 in-store signing at Dave’s Video The Laser Place in Studio City, Calif. drew approximately 1,200 fans.

`”A film like Dogma appeals to a certain audience,” Reina says. “It’s like (Monty Python and the) Holy Grail – give me something more no Holy Grail, I don’t care what it is, I love it so much I’ll watch it 30 different ways.”

“Dogma seems to fit that,” he says.

Someone suggested Ben Afleck for Hardy but Hardy said no way because Hardy was an extra in the movie “Dogma” and he didn’t like him. He said maybe he was just all involved in learning his lines. He said Matt Damon “was a great guy”…