Judd Apatow said Steve Carell’s performance in Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy was so funny that the actor needed his own movie.
During a recent episode of The Lamorning After Podcast, the comedy legend told host Lamorne Morris how Anchorman opened the door for The 40-Year-Old Virgin.
“Carell was so funny that it was blowing everyone’s mind,” Apatow said. “It was this thing where everyone was killing it, but people were especially shocked at how riotous Steve was being all day with these crazy improvs. And it was just something magical happening with Carell doing Brick.”
The producer is known for taking rising talent and, as Jason Segel put it, “systematically” putting them in his films. Segel was told he was “at bat” for Forgetting Sarah Marshall after playing a supporting role in Knocked Up. Seth Rogen led that film after doing The 40-Year-Old-Virgin.
Carell and Apatow cooked up The 40-Year-Old-Virgin after the Freaks and Geeks executive producer asked The Office actor if he had any ideas for a feature he could lead.
The idea came from a Second City sketch Carell had worked on. It featured a guy at a poker game struggling to make up a sex story to share with the table until it’s clear that he’s a 40-year-old virgin. A version of that scene made it into the movie.
“In that moment, I thought, I understand exactly what this is,” Apatow said.
Universal
Andy (Steve Carell) and David (Paul Rudd) playing poker in ‘The 40-Year-Old Virgin’
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The two wrote the script over a summer. Apatow said they wanted to give the protagonist Andy, played by Carell, “a lot of depth and complexity.” During the casting process, the director said the talent coming through to audition for the rest of the cast, including Jane Lynch and Elizabeth Banks, were “revelations.”
He continued: “They all felt like superstars, not just, ‘Oh, that person’s good for that part.'”
Listen to the full episode of The Lamorning After Podcast with Judd Apatow below.
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