Judd apatow quotes

There are people that entertainment is something they do at the end of a long hard day at work, and they want to be entertained and have it over quickly. They're like, "Entertain me fast!"

I'm getting older, so how people face grave circumstances is of interest to me. And you meet a lot of people who are very courageous, and it doesn't reek of something funny to write about, but I always think that the higher the stakes, the bigger the laughs can be, and the more emotional the scenes can be.

The only thing worse than a crappy TV show which Paddy Chayevsky couldn't have conceived in his worst nightmare is two megacorps fighting over who thought of the crappy show first.

Nobody's going to like my next movie because they liked Trainwreck [2015]. It has to work on its own, and that keeps it really scary.

In my beginnings, those nos were ever-present-even today, those nos are ever-present-and it's the workaround. I always found a workaround for people who turned their back to me. It's a way of being persistent that makes them take notice.

Back in the old days, everyone was shocked if a band had a sponsor for their tour. Now, Bob Dylan can do a commercial for Victoria's Secret and people don't really blink; the Beatles' songs are in all sorts of commercials these days and it doesn't seem to offend anybody. The times are changing.

I like when people are very passionate about what they want to write about. Even if it's silly, you can be very passionate about it.

I think a lot of studios today are run by women, and we are entering a time when a lot of women have evolved in Second City and Upright Citizens Brigade and wanted to become writers and comedians.

I had a very specific type of terrible network experience where I was told that people like Seth Rogen and Jason Segel weren't leads, so it truly drove me mad. So to be trusted is all I value.

I often say that ... I'm just involved in comedy, so I can be around it.

Most people are really fighting to not be adults. And, when it happens, it's a big transition. And a lot of that is just awful. It's awful to have to get a job and really be responsible for other people. And it is funny, too. Like, we're all kind of little idiot kids trying to act like we know what we are doing.

In the writing, I'm just trying to go deeper, emotionally, and learn more about myself and reveal more and find a way to connect with people in new ways.

I think Jim [Carrey], in the best possible way, thought, "I need to do different things to establish to the audience that I'm not going to do the same thing every time."

I'm just trying to be truthful and collaborate with people who have interesting things to say.

I just try to be true to myself and write about things I'm passionate about. I think what most people don't like about movies is they can tell that most movies are a product, and they don't mean that much to the people who make them.

It's what I always dreamed of: that you can make TV and everyone would get out of your way and you follow your vision without watering it down.

I'm making a movie about relationships, and I'm surrounded by guys scared of talking to girls.

Sometimes, something seems dead, and then out of the blue, someone just figures out the way to fix a script and it goes.

Don't be a jerk. Try to love everyone. Give more than you take. And do it despite the fact that you only really like about seven out of 500 people.

If you make a bad movie about stand-up, then comedians will mock you for the rest of your life.

You have to write a lot of scripts to get any scripts that are worth making.

I feel like everybody's waiting for a job y'know, you can make a movie on your phone. And so there really is no reason to worry about how to get in with people- and you can do that, there's a lot to learn working for people -but you can just make a movie, where in the old days that was completely impossible.

Eventually, the nerds and the geeks will have their day.

The great thing about Eminem is, he's just hysterical. You forget, people like Eminem because he is riotously funny. And he's a great actor.

If the movie's not communicating, it's not working.

If everyone is mature, there is no comedy.

There are people who like short movies, and I think they should just watch our movies on DVD because they can pause, go to the bathroom, eat dinner, and come back to it.

I'm always begging people like James Brooks and Cameron Crowe to come to screenings, to see what they make of it, and they're always ridiculously helpful. They also keep me brave enough to commit to what I'm trying to do. They can be great cheerleaders for risk-taking.

If you develop 10 things, and you can get two or three made, that's a very high ration.

You can do weird things on TV - there are happy stories, sad stories, dark stories. But with a movie, it always has to end satisfying. Unless you're the Coen brothers, and it ends with somebody getting shot in the head.

I love the Lonely Island. I wish there was more Lonely Island movies.

You can work on a movie for years, and you won't know until you show it to an audience for the first time if it makes any sense to them at all, if they're touched, if they find it funny, so it's endlessly exciting, because failure is just right there all the time, and your chances of success don't rise that much based on the fact that you succeeded last time.

If we really talked about what's wrong with you, you'd need a 7-1/2-hour movie and nobody would know what category to put it in!

A lot of times, it's easy to trim the movie 'cause you just start losing things that you thought would be there just for amusement's sake that actually are not funny. My favorite part of the process is seeing it with an audience. I do about eight previews to see how things are working.

It would be so irresponsible not to speak up. I don't know what I would do in my home and in my life if I didn't rant a little bit and as thoughtfully as I can with some humor.

It's so difficult to shock America these days.

I'm trying to think if there was ever the Lenny Bruce-y, observational, George Carlin kind of magician: "You know what I hate is ..." I don't think that ever existed.

One of my fears is that I'm suddenly not going to be funny, but still think I am. That's like my nightmare that I can wake up in a cold sweat from.

When people lose their jobs, they can either get another job or be entrepreneurs. In the music industry, a lot of people have attempted the latter by starting their own labels, but in the age of digital downloads, it's very difficult to succeed.

I used to watch 10 hours of television a night, my entire childhood. And I don't think it did all good things to me. I certainly still have social problems that are a result of being in my room alone too much.

When the entire country was watching one show there was a major discussion happening; is it possible for that to happen in a 1 million channel universe?

Every day I live by only one rule, be a good guy.

Just trying to tell the truth about, you know, the struggle of - being alive is funny, it's just inherently tragic and also hilarious - in a fun way and in a sad way. That seems to connect with people.

Nowadays, when kids decide they like an artist, they'll absorb everything that artist has ever done in a single night.

I don't think because a story has humor in it means it's brief. For some reason, people think anything that's 30 minutes is a comedy, comedies can be longer or shorter, so can dramas.

Some people make movies and think, "Well, I'll just keep asking for more money if this isn't enough." And then there are other people, like Clint Eastwood, who always come in under budget.

I still feel like a nerd.

I like to shoot scenes where I can see the beginning, middle and end of the entire scene. But, when you edit a movie together, you can just cut right into the middle. You don't need to see them walk into the room and put their jacket on the chair. There's always a lot of shoe leather that you can remove.

Some stories feel like they need more time or less time to tell. To not obsessively have to trim or add that final two or three minutes is very helpful, because you can just organically follow how the story feels.

I thought the idea Jim [Carrey] had, which was to do a comedic version of movies like The Hand That Rocks The Cradle and Unlawful Entry, was really funny. The movie was a little lighter when we first came on, a little more like What About Bob? or something.

All of my jokes were about not being able to meet anybody. I didn't have any insight into anything - even my own insecurities.

I literally cannot remember one joke.

I test the movies a lot, and if the audience says they love the movie, we know we're on the right track. And if they tell me they hate it, I try to figure out what I've done wrong. But every time out, the audience wants me to go deeper, they want to know more about the characters, and they don't want these movies to be shallow. So they really urge me to tell them a complicated story, and then when I do so, they're thrilled

I don't think it matters what the frequency is of me writing or directing a movie. It doesn't really matter to anybody else. I'm just trying to put good things out there.

There are only so many hilarious actors so when they cross-pollinate, people assume it's always the same actors and directors.

The first comedians I became fascinated with were the Marx brothers. I couldn't get enough of them. Later in life, I thought, "Well, maybe it's because they were so rebellious and they were just flipping the bird to society and all the rules we're supposed to follow." They were saying that none of it is fair.

College is the reward for surviving high school. Most people have great fun stories from college and nightmare stories from high school.

We are at this weird moment where there's an economic model that supports creativity. People are demanding something new and fresh.

Every time I'm in editing, there's always a moment where you think, "Maybe this should be six or seven minutes shorter, but I'm losing character and story that I think is important." When I like things, I'm not in a rush for them to end.

When Jim Carrey signed on to star in [The Cable Guy], and then they asked me to produce it, I made a very brief plea to direct - which was rejected really as quickly as anything can be.

The moment you think of a joke is the best moment.

I remember the Time review [on the Hit and Run]said that there wasn't one laugh in it. And I had watched the movie 50 times with audiences, and it always played great. There was certainly a moment where you could tell the audience was like, "Wow, this is really getting weird."

I remember the review from Michael Wilmington in Chicago, and Gene Siskel wrote really smart reviews where I thought, "Oh, they totally get what we're attempting to do."

There's something honorable about holding out for love and not breaking up for the sake of the baby. I see people get divorced, and there is a part of me that thinks, I wonder how hard they tried?

Back then, you seemed like a crazy person when you were trying to push the boundaries of network TV. People looked at you, and they were offended by the fact that you didn't follow the generic rules of what was expected on network TV.

I definitely learned to embrace the quiet moments onstage from Garry Shandling - relaxing and not fighting with the crowd, not raising your voice, not ever trying to win them over.

Penn [Jillette] and Teller and I get along very well. We can call each other and say, "I'm working on this classic effect. Please, I'd like to do it for a while." We'll all respect it. There are people we don't get along with, but mostly there is a respect amongst the group.

'The Night Of.' I pray there will be more.

To me, I've never understood why there is any question about are women as funny as men.

I am always driven by the terror of humiliation.

I think a lot of Hollywood is in retreat right now trying to figure out how to make money and make the safest bets.

I think the story should always determine the visual approach. There are situations where you want things to feel alive and like life, and there are situations that should have some magic and the separation with the grain.

The audience doesn't care that most of happened. They just want a good movie.

I get literally a physical sensation of low self-esteem that is a result of not engaging the world and getting comfortable that way.

I've come to believe that the simpler the title, the better. Whenever I try to get cute with it, it seems to be a problem but if it's just The 40-Year-Old Virgin, people seem to know what they're in for.

I didn't want to be a director for hire. It really just took me a long time to learn how to direct and to feel up to the job.

All my cuts are always about three hours, at the start, mainly because any scene in the movie that's 90 seconds, I probably shot a five-minute version of. If you just extrapolate that through the whole movie, I have a very long version of every scene, usually because, if there's one funny joke, I'll shoot five because I don't know if the one I like is going to work. I'll get back-ups because my biggest fear is to be in previews, testing the movie, and a joke doesn't work, but I have no way to fix it because I have no other line.

I'm the guy who gets uncomfortable. That's why I was able to write 'The 40-Year-Old Virgin' and 'Knocked Up.' I believe in those guys.

I love magazines and film critics, so I eat it up. I'm not one of those people who says 'I never read anything.' I generally read all of it.

I always felt as a kid that I was underappreciated, invisible or weird, but I've always secretly thought people would one day appreciate what is different about me. I'm always putting that message out there.

So many people are in comedy because of difficult mothers or broken homes.

If a woman says, I love myself; I love my body; I'm comfortable with my life, comfortable with my mistakes, and I deserve a seat at every table and everything should be completely equal, there are guys who lose their minds.

Something economically changed. It used to be that you needed 20 million people to watch a TV show for it to be a hit. Now, with just a few million people watching, you're considered very successful, for a lot of these streaming services, or cable channels. Now, that allows people to do much more creatively ambitious work, because it's not lowest common denominator.

I start thinking about the next movie before it's a success, so I can never have one moment of happiness or peace. I'm instantly thinking about the next one.

I've had movies bomb with terrible reviews, I've had movies make a lot of money with terrible reviews, I've had movies get good reviews and make money. And I like it best when the movies do well and the reviewers like them.

I think watching too much TV as a kid led me to being very uncomfortable in new situations. To this day, when I drop my kids off at school, I still feel like I'm in 9th grade and I'm uncomfortable and insecure. Like anyone is paying any attention.

People like everything to work out, and anytime you don't make everything work out perfectly, you really are fighting against what most people are going to the movies for, especially in the summer.

People like the comedy more when they care about the characters.

My first writing jobs were writing Tom Arnold specials for HBO, so I love working there.

I worshipped guys like Bill Maher, Jay Leno, and Jerry Seinfeld, and was doing my variation of that. But as a young person with no political point of view or life experience, it was as funny as you can imagine.

I think people like Lena Dunham really opened up the door to what was possible, and they've inspired young women to go into filmmaking and writing and directing and acting in a way that maybe they didn't before, because now there is a path and there are jobs.

I always feel like I'm very far from my potential.

I'm always surprised when you do something very different that people don't get behind you more, because you're always told, "Take chances! Stretch!" And when you do it, sometimes people get really supportive and excited, but sometimes people go at you because you've tossed out the formula.

I very rarely made any move to direct anything. I didn't have any faith in myself.

As a Jewish man who has no interest in Judaism whatsoever, there's something in me that says when bad things have happened in the past, people were supposed to get more active and speak up and prevent them. That's what's important to me is that everybody - and I don't care what side you're on. You can disagree with me, but everyone better get active. Everybody better vote and be thoughtful.

At network television you could make a show like Freaks and Geeks, and even though 7 million people watch is every week, you were considered a terrible failure, and they got rid of you and staff. Now ... It's like a world where the replacements are the biggest fans in the world. It's, the Elvis Costellos of television are the winners. Creativity is king and it's very very exciting.

'Deadwood.' I could have watched that forever.

I still feel like a weird kid who is about to take a punch in the face. So, I think it's permanent.

The only way you survive on all these services is if you're groundbreaking. There's pressure to be groundbreaking, which is the greatest thing that's ever happened. It's a bizarre aspect of what's happened with all of these subscription services is everyone is trying to outdo each other by doing great things.

I think the world is changing and all that matters is that I'm creating things.

My way of dealing with the world has always been to make fun of it and observe it but not take part in it.That's how I became a writer. But when you have kids, suddenly you have to be part of things. It leads almost to a breakdown because your whole defense mechanism is now really destructive.

There was definitely a period when I just felt out of sync with earth.

I've made movies on every part of the spectrum, and you do understand when you go into certain movies that you're trying to elicit a certain kind of response from the audience, and people get a real sense of satisfaction when they're rooting for a character and the character pulls it off.

I feel like it's a golden age for television.

For me, until I know that the audience really gets what I'm trying to communicate I'm not done.

The hard part about getting much attention is that people start dissecting what you do.

[My] dream writers room: "'Taxi.' I need to write for someone named Judd."

Television is much more difficult because at every moment, the network can force you to change things based on their belief about what would make it popular. You’re in a constant debate with a gun to your head, and the gun is cancellation. So it’s hard to win the arguments.

Well, every movie is an experiment. And the only way you can grow at what you're doing is to take chances. You can't try to stick with what worked last time.

Every joke is an experiment. When you sit, alone, and write a script, or just a joke, you really have no idea if it will succeed.

I think it's fun to have people see everything at once, and then I think certain shows are very well-suited to being on every week and being spread out over months.

I think, there were probably problems with show business where producers and directors would try to get the writing credit also. So they created a rule where the bar, to get your name added to the writing credits, if you've done a revision, is very high if you're also the producer or director.

People talk about universal intelligence ... I'm reticent to believe almost anything, just because my parents weren't religious at all, but that's when I feel it. People talk about being in the "flow."

My grandfather was Bob Shad, one of those legendary jazz and blues producers - he worked with Charlie Parker and Dinah Washington, and he produced Janis Joplin's album [1967's Big Brother & the Holding Company]. He always owned small labels as well - he had a label called Mainstream Records in the 70s.

I start casting early in the writing process, so I can tailor the script to the gifts of the actors.

Sometimes you need to get away for a few weeks just to figure out who you are again.

Sometimes a story idea will come to me, and suddenly I've figured out the whole thing, and I feel like I'm collaborating with something other than myself.

I was listening to Tommy Chong talking about how he feels like there is like a creative flow happening and how certain people just know how to hook into the pipe. He played music with Jimi Hendrix and felt that he was personally connected to some higher intelligence or creativity.

I always see other people as predecessors and admire them.

The Cable Guy was underbudgeted, so it was always a debate about whether we could have more days or certain things that we needed, because the budget was determined before the script was written. So that made it a hard production on everybody. But it's also a funny thing, because it's one of those movies that cost $40 million to make and made $100 million around the world, but at the time, it seemed like a disaster that it didn't make hundreds of millions of dollars, because Jim was on such a tear. But it was actually a successful movie.

I put on a big show when I write something I think is funny.

I think that everything I do tends to root for the underdog.

I wanted to see how funny I could be without making the choice that every 10 minutes something big and visual had to happen.

I feel like Superbad and Freaks And Geeks are somewhat timeless. That's always gratifying, when you feel like 30 years in the future, people will still get it, and it won't seem creaky. It won't come across like The Incredible Mr. Limpet.

Everyone is wounded. No one is healthy enough to never screw up, when you're in combat. But, I like to show that, and I like to show how people get back from that. You have to forgive each other. When you're in the middle of a long-term commitment, the essence of it is that everyone is going to have good days and bad days, and it's about how you continue to rejoin forces.