20 Questions: Judd Apatow

20 Questions with Judd Apatow in Playboy that is. So if you’re in an office, beware of visuals! Here are a few choice Q&A’s for the writer-director-producer behind such hit movies as The 40 Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, and Pineapple Express:

PLAYBOY: Your movies are so popular your first name has become a verb: “Judd it up” has become a familiar refrain on Hollywood movie sets. Is it humbling to realize you’ve spawned your own comedy genre?
APATOW: I don’t think I’m doing anything particularly different or original. There’s nothing new about comedies about underdogs who make an enormous number of mistakes and learn from them. That goes back to Buster Keaton. We’re just doing our generation’s version of Buster Keaton.

PLAYBOY: When you were growing up, you used to transcribe Saturday Night Live scenes. In hindsight, was that time well spent?
APATOW: Back when I was watching Saturday Night Live for the first time, VCRs hadn’t been invented yet. So whenever the show aired, I thought to myself, If I don’t watch this now, I may never get to see it again for the rest of my life! I would put a tape recorder right next to the TV, and then I’d sit up all night and transcribe the skits that amused me the most. I don’t know why I did it. I did the same thing with Twilight Zone episodes.

PLAYBOY: Has success mellowed you, or do you still have the fierce ambition of a young filmmaker with something to prove?
APATOW: I know what it feels like to have your movie bomb. I know what it feels like to have your movie bomb even though you think it’s really good. I know what it’s like to have your movie bomb when you know it’s not very good. I know what it’s like to succeed with a movie you’re proud of. I know what it’s like to succeed with a movie even you don’t think is very good. I’ve been through all the permutations. After everything that has happened to me, I feel I can relax and take a deep breath. But as I get older, I realize nothing has really changed. The second I finish a movie, I always want to occupy my head with a new problem, a new project. If I were truly mature, I probably wouldn’t feel the obsessive need to keep making more and more movies. I would just smell a leaf for a few years and be satisfied.

And here’s the trailer for Apatow’s new movie Funny People: