'Smallville's' Michael Rosenbaum on working with Tom Welling again ~ Smallville Fans

"Smallville" star Michael Rosenbaum delighted fans when he confirmed that he'd return to the show as Lex Luthor for one final time in the two-hour May 13 finale.

Zap2it caught up with Clark Kent's ex-nemesis at the "American Idol" Top 12 party on Thursday night. Rosenbaum was fresh off of his first day on the set of "Breaking In."

Once he answered that one, we got to the real big question. Why did he hold out so long before agreeing to come back to "Smallville"? It was a rough wait not only for the fans, but for the producers and his long-time friend Tom Welling.

He sighs. "It's so funny how the fans can get so intense." He deepens his voice to an angry tone. "'What is he doing that he can't come back? George Clooney came back to ER, and he can't? How big is he?' I'm like, 'Guys, God, relax.' It's not about that. So one day, I called the producers up, and I just said 'Hey, I'm doing this new show, but I'd love to come back and finish what I started.'" He pauses and laughs. "Which I thought I finished three years ago, by the way, but, let's do this. And they made it happen."

Rosenbaum went to Vancouver about two weeks ago to shoot his final scenes, and he had a great time getting into character... with the help of a new accessory. "I had a bald cap that looked amazing," he says. "I couldn't shave my head because I was on 'Breaking In.'"

He confesses that he did initially have a few reservations about going back to the "Smallville" set. "There were personal reasons why I quit 'Smallville' that no one really knows about, that I never really talk about. It was just personal things, that I just never talked about. It was nobody else's business. But I never heard the end of it," he says, chuckling. "Look, I always said I never thought it would last 10 seasons. I can barely have a relationship lasts 10 days. Ten years on a TV show? That's a long time. But then they started calling me out. I finally said, 'You know what guys? I want to do this. Let's just do this.' I want to do it the right way, I want to do it for the fans. I swear to God I did it for the fans. I never want to hear 'Why didn't you go back?' I wanted it to end the way it should have."

Now that all is said and done, Rosenbaum says he thinks that the final scenes between Clark and Lex are "excellent." He was warmly welcomed back on the set by old friends. "It was so great. I went up there and guys that weren't even working on the show anymore came to set to hang out. One guy brought me a joint," he jokes. "I mean, it's a real family."

Rosenbaum and Welling had a great time working together again. "Tom and I had a wonderful time together," he tells us. "We laughed a lot. I shot a couple of scenes with him."

It wasn't all laughter, though. Fans are going to have a very emotional finale experience come May -- and they're not the only ones. "I shot for 19 hours, and honestly, I had a tear in my eye at the end. I was like, 'Man, this is really it,'" Rosenbaum says wistfully.

Source: zap2it.com