Judd Apatow Talks About: Writing, Producing, and Penises at WGA

Writer, director, producer and all-around funny-times wunderkind Judd Apatow spoke to members of the Writer's Guild tonight. The discussion was moderated by writer/actor/producer Jay Kogen. Both Judd and Jay were quite funny and personable. I was surprised that Judd was in his 40s, as his movies Superbad and Forgetting Sarah Marshall revolve around characters in their teens and twenties. He self-identifies as most like the character played by Paul Rudd in The 40yr Old Virgin. The following are my paraphrased remembrances of some of the more insightful parts of the evening:

Writing

• You only know what makes you laugh, so write what makes you laugh. However, if a joke doesn't get a laugh at the table read, it isn't working, so kill it.
  
• Judd felt that Cable Guy was a great film all the way from shooting through post. He couldn't figure out why folks didn't like it – until a couple years ago. He now thinks that the sense of impending danger (will Jim Carrey kill someone?!) squashed a lot of the laughs.
  
• As soon as you finish writing a film start on the next one. Don't wait for them to produce it. That way you'll have product scripts ready to produce if anything hits.
  
• It takes Judd about 6 weeks of writing to get a 1^st draft, after thinking about a story for about a year.
  
• You don't know if you have good taste, but you have to go with your gut. If you have good taste, people will laugh. If you're crazy everything you make will be horrible, but that's the risk you run.
  
• When Judd was younger he'd wake up at noon, watch an entire season of the Real World, start writing at 11pm and go to bed at 4am. Now that he has a family, he tries to fit his writing into the school day while his kids are away.
  

Producing

• "The TV Set" is a movie that shows you the process of how a pilot gets turned into a crappy TV series. It's scary accurate.
  
• "You Don't Mess With the Zohan" was written just before 9/11, given its subject matter (an Israeli counter-terrorist fighting terrorists in NYC) it couldn't have been produced any sooner than now. That's 8 years of waiting.
  

Career

• Judd started out doing Stand-up comedy. He did this for about 7 years.
  
• He realized that he just wasn't that charismatic and so began writing comedy for others to perform.
  
• After a chance meeting with Ben Stiller, he and Ben came up with a concept for a show, pitched it to Fox, and sold it within two weeks.
  
• Judd then wrote on a number of TV Series including "The Critic".
  
• He helped produce "Freaks & Geeks" and "Undeclared" and discovered he wasn't a huge fan of making TV.
  
• He started writing/producing films and after working at it a few years, he eventually found greater success.

Penises

• Jay Kogen asked Judd Apatow why so many male members made it into his films. While the question might have been facetious, the responses were plentiful enough:
  
• Women's breasts can randomly show up in jokes, why not penises?
• You get an NC-17 for an erect penis in a film, but note that the penis on display in "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" is only semi-flaccid. This gives a good combination of length and MPAA friendliness.
• There is a fantastic "cockumentary" on the special features of "Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story".