Judd Apatow has been responsible for some of the funniest moments to hit screens in recent decades, in films like “Happy Gilmore,” “The 40-Year-Old Virgin,” “The Cable Guy,” “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy,” and “Bridesmaids.”
But as the 57-year-old writer, director and producer reveals in his new memoir, Comedy Nerd, there was even more fun behind the scenes.
The comedy bug bit Apatow early on. The Long Island native was just 12 years old while visiting his grandparents when he chanced upon his idol at the time, Steve Martin, outside his home in Beverly Hills.
Apatow wrote that his lowest point was when he jumped out of his car to ask “The Jerk” star for an autograph and Martin refused, explaining that he didn’t sign autographs in front of his house.
Enraged, Apatow wrote Martin a note containing threats and dropped it in his mailbox.
“If you don’t apologize, I’ll send your address to Homes of the Stars, and the tour bus will be there 24 hours a day.”
Six months later, Apatow received a copy of Martin’s book, “The Cruel Shoes.” There was an inscription written on it: Your friend, Steve Martin. ”
Apatow attended the University of Southern California (USC), then dropped out and tried drawing comics as a stand-up comic, where he met fellow struggling comic book artist Adam Sandler.
The two lived together, and because Sandler paid more, he got a bigger bedroom.
“No one was funnier than Adam before he became famous,” Apatow wrote, “he had an enormous amount of comic energy and had no outlet other than trying to make his friends laugh.”
Apatow struggled for years to find his voice and took on rewrites while honing the script for a friend. He admits that he found the situation stressful because “for some reason I always thought to myself, ‘If this movie fails, it’s 100 percent my fault.'”
After helping Sandler on 1996’s “Happy Gilmore,” Sandler began having panic attacks and believed he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
My worst panic attack occurred during a meeting with Lorne Michaels about rewriting the Chris Farley/David Spade film Black Sheep.
“Throughout the two-hour meeting, I hid the fact that I was mentally exhausted,” he wrote. “From the outside, I probably looked like I was listening intently, but inside I kept thinking one thing: ‘If I have to get up and leave the table, I’ll just tell them I had a bad pollo loco.'”
Apatow has collaborated with Will Ferrell many times over the years with great success. In 2005’s Kicking and Screaming, Ferrell plays a child’s soccer coach and Robert Duvall plays his erratic father and competitive soccer coach.
Apatow was hired to make the child-centered film after the original director was fired for giving acting notes to Robert Duvall. He admits that he is “afraid” of the “Godfather” star and avoids interacting with him.
One day, a parent of a child attending a school near the filming location filed a complaint with SAG after Duvall yelled abuse at one of the assistant directors.
“I didn’t have the courage to address this issue,” Apatow wrote.
The Emmy winner, who directed the 2005 hit The 40 Year Old Virgin, admits she struggled with how to portray Steve Carell’s much-anticipated sex scene. His mentor Garry Shandling constantly questioned him about the finale and kept pushing him to show sex.
“One day I was talking to Steve[Carell]about this, and he said, ‘Maybe we should sing a song,’ and we immediately added something like ‘Let the Sunshine In’ from ‘Hair,'” Apatow recalls in the book. “This ultimately led to an elaborate dance sequence with a Bollywood feel. Steve and I had never seen a Bollywood movie before, but I think the choreographer had.”
A few years later, he directed another blockbuster, “This is 40,” and shot the opening sequence on a brutally hot 117-degree day. “Everyone almost collapsed from heat stroke,” he recalls.
At one point, Apatow writes, “An ice cream truck drove by, and the ice cream man was, for reasons I still don’t know, Joey Buttafuoco.”
He met another infamous figure in 2007’s “Knocked Up.” The film starred Seth Rogen and Katherine Heigl, but also featured adult film star Stormy Daniels in a small role.
Apatow remembers her coming on set and telling everyone that she had just slept with Donald Trump.
“We didn’t think this revelation would be shocking,” Apatow notes. “Years later, when he ran for president and it became a national scandal, all of us who were there instantly knew it was true.”
One of the strangest behind-the-scenes stories involves Joe Lo Truglio in 2012’s “Wanderlust,” starring Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston. The production had to decide whether Lo Truglio would expose a real penis or an artificial one.
At first, Lo Truglio said he was comfortable using his own body, but at some point he decided to use a fake body. Special effects were hired to create the fake members, and special effects artists had to glue fake penises on top of real penises every day.
“This special effects artist had to constantly stare at it throughout the day to make sure it was ready for the camera, and if necessary, adjust the prosthetic penis, add glue, push it in, pull it up, and re-glue it,” Apatow recalls.
Another unforgettable moment involved Robert Plant. Apatow met him a few years after the release of his 2007 musical biographical parody Walk Hard, in which he co-starred with John C. Reilly. The film was a huge flop, making less than $3 million at the box office, and left Apatow so depressed that his daughter called it one of the “most traumatic experiences of her childhood.”
However, as the years passed, the song became a cult hit, and Led Zeppelin’s lead singer told Apatow that he was a big fan.
“That’s the ultimate secret to success,” he explains. “If rock stars watch this movie over and over again on the bus, we’ve succeeded.”
