Tom Welling recalls Christopher Reeve defying nurse to stay on Smallville set during Comic Con reunion
Smallville's been off the air for more than a decade and the stars of the beloved superhero series are still coming to terms with it. As part of the show's reunion panel at New York Comic Con on Saturday, star Tom Welling (who played Clark Kent for 10 seasons) revealed that he's only recently been rewatching old Smallville episodes. What brought him back to Kansas was his new recap podcast Talk Ville with co-star Michael Rosenbaum (who played Clark's frenemy Lex Luthor).
"It's funny. You know when you take a long flight and there's a layover, and your flight gets canceled? But by the time you get to where you're going, you kinda forget about everything that happened in the middle? That's like watching the show now," Welling said. "I forget about all the bad stuff. I just remember the good stuff! It's fun to revisit it, and enough time has gone by that I can enjoy it more. I don't think I could've done the podcast even two years ago. And Michael's an idiot, so it's a lot of fun."
Everett Collection The cast of 'Smallville' season 1. Clockwise from left: John Glover, Annette O'Toole, Tom Welling, John Schneider, Sam Jones III, Michael Rosenbaum, Allison Mack, Kristin Kreuk.
Rosenbaum wasn't in attendance at the panel, but his shadow loomed large over Welling and the other panelists: Erica Durance (Lois Lane), Kristin Kreuk (Lana Lang), and John Glover (Lionel Luthor). Durance, who joined Smallville in season 4, recalled a time Rosenbaum aggravated her so much that she stormed off set.
"He's the only person that made me swear and leave set," Durance recalled. "In fairness, it wasn't him."
"It was kind of him, though," Kreuk interjected. "He pushes, and pushes."
"It's part of his process to be comfortable," Durance clarified. "He's in his thing and doing his stuff, and that's great. But I was coming in new, and very neurotic and stressed. I wanted to do well, and if I dropped a line I would beat myself up a lot. But then I did a scene with Michael and I was nervous because he's a really good actor. I was having trouble getting into the scene and having a really hard time with the dialogue. And he was just chatting with the cameraman, joking and burping and stuff off-camera. So I yelled, and swore, and I walked off set. I was sitting behind a truck and I had a meltdown. Then all of a sudden, around a corner, I heard, 'I'm so sorry! What did I do?' But he hadn't really done anything, he was just being him."
Dana Belcher/WB TV Christopher Reeve as Dr. Virgil Swann on 'Smallville.'
Not all the on-set conflict was between actors, though. Although Welling mentioned that he didn't do much research into past Superman films or comic books before taking on the role, instead leaning into Smallville's unique perspective on the young Clark, he did share a few scenes with original Superman movie star Christopher Reeve. According to Welling, Reeve — who played Dr. Virgil Swann, the scientist who first tells Clark that he hails from the planet Krypton — defied his personal nurse in order to spend as much time as he could on set.
"He was only supposed to be there for three hours, but I think he stayed for like six and a half. He was like, 'I don't want to leave,'" Welling recalled. "The idea was he would shoot all his coverage, then he was going to leave and I would shoot all my stuff with someone else. But he wanted to stay with me! It got to the point where his nurse said to him, 'I'm going to call the police.' He's like, 'on who?' She's like, 'On you! You're done, you can't be here anymore!' He just wanted to be there. It turned out great, and the story was fantastic."
Bryan Bedder/Getty for ReedPop
Last year, EW published our ranking of the 50 best Smallville episodes in honor of the show's 20th anniversary. In response to an audience question, the cast members revealed their own favorite episodes.
Kreuk's favorite is "Lexmas," the season 5 holiday season riff on It's a Wonderful Life. Welling's pick was "Transference," the season 4 standout where Clark and Lionel switch bodies. He and Glover recalled how difficult that episode was to produce.
WB TV John Glover playing Clark Kent in Lionel Luthor's body on 'Smallville.'
"I had such a hard time playing you," Glover remembered. "Because you don't have to do anything! That's your strength, it's all there. You played me brilliantly. It was so hard for me to just stand there like you."
They called me in early that day," Welling said. "I was like, 'Hey John, how are you doing?' You looked at me like, 'Ugh, I need your help playing Clark.' I was like, 'what's wrong? Just don't complicate it.' You said, 'I complicate everything!'"
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