John Goodman is the latest to join Kevin Smith’s religious horror film Red State

A couple of days ago, Kevin Smith himself announced via the new podcast Hollywood Babble-On (hosted by Smith and Ralph Garman) that movement on his “religious horror” film RED STATE was coming along nicely and that shooting was set to begin this week. The filmmaker also let it be known that the great John Goodman (“Treme”, SPEED RACER) would be joining the cast.

Goodman – whose recent work on David Simon’s HBO show “Treme” was some of the best I’ve seen from the guy – will be joining Michael Parks (KILL BILL), Kevin Pollack (COP OUT), Melissa Leo (“Treme”), Dermot Mulroney (ZODIAC), Kyle Gallner (JENNIFER’S BODY), Michael Angarano (GENTLEMEN BRONCOS), and Stephen Root (OFFICE SPACE). The film is about a group of young people who cross paths with a crazed fundamentalist preacher (Parks), a la the odious piece of shit Reverend Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church of Degenerate Morons.

As a refresher, here’s Smith talking about RED STATE from a report earlier this year:

“The notion of using a Phelps-like character as a villain, as horrifying and scary as that guy can be, there’s even something more insidious than him that lurks out there in as much as a public or a government that allows it and that’s the other thing that I’m trying to examine in a big, big way. It’s weird because for a few months I’ve been saying ‘horror movie’ and technically it is, but it’s also not a very traditional horror movie in the sense that people have been asking me, ‘Is it a slasher movie? Is it like the Japanese horror flicks?’ It’d be much easier to just show it to them when I’m done and be like, ‘This is what I meant.’ At which point I’m sure there’ll be people saying, ‘This ain’t a horror movie!’ But to me, it is.”

Thanks to “Dan” for the heads up!