Kevin Smith is no stranger to talking about Kevin Smith.
But the Jersey director just presented a series of revelations about himself and his history of trauma as a result of recent treatment at a mental health facility.
“In the parlance of our times, I went crazy,” he says in a 34-minute video for People magazine (see below). “I lost my marbles.”
“I had a complete break with reality and became very dissociative,” Smith says.
In seeking treatment for a January mental health crisis at Sierra Tucson, an Arizona mental health facility, Smith, 52, unearthed past trauma in the form of childhood sexual abuse.
The “Clerks” director, who grew up in Highlands, says that when he was 6, an older child he didn’t know forced him and a 6-year-old girl who was his friend to put their mouths on each other’s genitals.
Smith says the older child intended to make the two younger kids do the same to him until an adult walked past the alley where they were.
“I went home and never said anything because I was scared and humiliated and ashamed,” he says.
While he has since told the story, he always framed it as “I played doctor when I was a kid.”
It wasn’t until he related the incident to a therapist at Sierra Tucson that he realized it was sexual abuse. The therapist explained to him that since it involved a third party and was against his will, it was abuse, and that he had explained it away as something harmless as a coping mechanism.
“Everyone suffers trauma and then tries to keep it small in order to survive,” says Smith, who underwent EMDR — eye movement desensitization and reprocessing — therapy at the facility.
He also says that on reflection, the incident of childhood sexual abuse from when he was 6 shaped who he would become — a director. In essence, someone who could be in charge, to prevent anyone from victimizing him like that again.
The director, known for his New Jersey-set View Askewniverse films, goes on to share another traumatic incident from his childhood.
“I grew up an era that when if you cried, people would be like ‘I’ll give you something to cry about,’” Smith says.
When he was 9, two of his grandparents died, his dad was in a car accident and his mother was in the hospital. The same year, when he was in fourth grade at Catholic school Our Lady of Perpetual Help, a teacher made a comment about his body in front of the class.
“Ugh, the gut on you, Mr. Smith,” she told him with a look of disgust.
The comment devastated the young Smith.
On another occasion, a teenager hurled a body-shaming remark at Smith when he was at a water slide in Long Branch.
“Stop, pregnant ladies can’t ride the slide,” said the teen, who was supervising the slide.
The “Clerks III” director says he’s still tempted to minimize such an event, but now knows all trauma is trauma — the body and mind do not discriminate in their response.
“Even now, I want to discount it,” Smith says, but he now knows these comments contributed to his body dysmorphia.
“I see myself as disgusting,” he says.
Smith lost more than 50 pounds and embraced a vegan diet after suffering a near-fatal “widow maker” heart attack in 2018. The director says he was once 330 pounds and now weighs 180 pounds.
“I still see a fat 9-year-old kid because that’s all those two people (the teen at the water slide and the teacher) saw,” Smith says.
The director says he became a people pleaser and entertainer to distract people from criticizing his body and act as another survival mechanism. When he found success with “Clerks” in 1994, he started presenting a different version of himself he calls “the other guy,” a figure he says he invented back when he was 9.
Kevin Smith in Red Bank in September. He says he experienced burnout as a result of his hectic “Clerks III” tour schedule and the general tendency to be working all the time. Julian Leshay | For NJ Advance Media
When Smith set out to tour with “Clerks III” in 2022 — he launched the tour in Red Bank in September — he was rushing around and didn’t have time for mental health. He says “the other guy” was the one facing the public during the tour because he has never been able to validate himself. All of his validation has come from other people, his audience and the public.
“I have never really loved myself,” he says. “I abjectly loathe myself. I love the other guy.”
As a result, he made being Kevin Smith its own job. The downside of that was that he was constantly working.
“I burned out over time,” he says.
When he tried to find himself behind this “other guy,” Smith was dismayed to realize he could not, and that’s what triggered the mental health crisis, he says.
“I was convinced that I’d stopped existing.”
Since he was 38, Smith turned to marijuana to numb himself all day long, to prevent himself from being alone with his thoughts. He recently quit weed in favor of being “in the moment.”
The director says treatment at the Arizona facility saved his life.
He encourages anyone listening to his message to seek help for their trauma, too. Smith wants to be as open about the recent mental health news as he was about his heart attack.
“I just went through a thing that I think a lot of people go through but nobody ever talks about,” he says, introducing the video.
The director started using his SModcastle Cinemas movie theater in Atlantic Highlands to host meetings of Co-Dependents Anonymous (CoDA), a program he joined to help him with his co-dependency.
While he has connected with other people through the group, Smith intends to step away from connecting so much with everyone online.
He has always been a very online person — since the ’90s, linking with others in this way was another method of seeking validation for him — but Smith says he’ll be be less present on social media.
“I just don’t need your validation anymore,” he says.
People in crisis and those looking to help someone else can call the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. Call 988 or visit 988lifeline.org.
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Amy Kuperinsky may be reached at akuperinsky@njadvancemedia.com and followed at @AmyKup on Twitter.
