Kevin Smith wants Sarah Michelle Gellar on board for Mallrats 2

Kevin Smith wants Sarah Michelle Gellar to play the late Shannen Doherty's role in his 'Mallrats' sequel.

The 54-year-old filmmaker has long been working on a follow-up to the 1995 cult comedy and while he planned to shelve the project after the actress - who played Rene Mosier - lost her battle with breast cancer in July, he now wants 'Twilight of the Mallrats' to serve as a tribute to her and thinks it would be appropriate to have the 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' star step in to honour her close friend.

He told The Hollywood Reporter: “Shannen’s closest friend was Sarah Michelle Gellar, and I worked with Sarah on 'Masters of the Universe: Revelation'.

“So her being Shannen’s bestie and having already tried out for 'Mallrats' 30 years ago next year, I would ask Sarah to step in for Shannen if there’s a possibility that we get to make 'Twilight of the Mallrats'.

"I think that’d be personally meaningful for her on some level because of her relationship with Shannen … She’d bring Shannen’s warmth with her, and it’s maybe the next best thing to having Shannen there.”

And Sarah is open to the possibility.

On The Hollywood Reporter's Instagram post about Kevin's suggestion, she commented: "Here for this idea!!"

The director recently expressed his hope that Universal will let go of their option for the sequel and allow him to shop the project to other studios.

He told Deadline: "The thing has been for years that, of course I’d love to make the Mallrats sequel as I’ve said many times. Any time I turn in a script, the good folks at Universal are like, 'This is neither fast nor furious.' So, we never go anywhere.

"At one point, we were gonna make a $5 million version of it through one division they used to have maybe, I don’t know, I forget what it was called, but like they did smaller straight to streaming or straight to video type movies.

"And then it kind of fell apart and we’ve tried to get it out of there but they’re like, you know, Universal has never released a title. But I think we’re going back to have a discussion again about like, look, you guys are never gonna do anything with this.

"Like, but we can and would and would and would love to. So can you let us take it out? We’re not asking Universal to finance it, but it’s just like, hey, can we have it so we can go out because I can get that movie financed in a heartbeat, 'Mallrats 2'.

"So, fingers crossed the good folks at Universal go like, 'You know what? We’re never gonna do anything with this. Go ahead.'

"I mean, it’s hysterical. There are times when I’ve dealt with folks at Universal to talk about a 'Mallrats' sequel and the people I deal with are like, 'We have 'Mallrats'?' "