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“The good folks at Lionsgate who financed [Clerks III], they put out Red State on DVD like years ago. And the deal lapsed, and the people that own Red State, the two financiers, weren’t from the world of film,” Smith recalled at a Clerks III screening about the status of rights to Red State, per /Film. “One was from the world of fashion, one was a Canadian financier not even in the world of film. So, when Lionsgate reached out about renewing, they got no response back from the copyright holders. I could tell them as much as I wanted till I was blue in the face. Like, ‘No, renew it!’ But I didn’t own it. They did. So it just fell into a spam folder and f-cking fell out of circulation.”
He continued, “Because we did this movie [Clerks III], we were talking to go home video. [Lionsgate’s] like, ‘Hey man, how come you guys wouldn’t re-up Red State with us?’ And I was like, ‘They still didn’t get back to you?’ [Lionsgate] goes no, we been trying for f-cking years. So we put it all back together and sh-t.”
In the film, “The ATF surrounds a group of heavily armed extremists who have lured three teenagers to their compound on the outskirts of a small town.”
Despite original star Michael Parks having since passed away, Smith noted the promising conversations he’s had about a sequel with the studio.
“They were like, if we do this, would you do it again? And I was like, yeah, in a heartbeat,” the filmmaker admitted. “I mean, obviously, Michael Parks is gone. But it’s just a story of crazy people with guns and sh-t like that. As long as I could use John Goodman again. I could make a hundred f-cking Red States. And I’m like, let’s do it. So we’re gonna make one.”
Stay tuned for details on the possible future of a Red State sequel.
Would you like to see the film get a follow-up? Let us know in the comments or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!
