Film Threat Schools Judd Apatow on Comedy
'Knocked Up' director in deep denial about Hollywood's aversion to laughter
They don’t bestow royal titles in Hollywood, but Judd Apatow once reigned as the King of Film Comedy.
His producing credits alone merit the title:
- “Anchorman”
- “Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping”
- “Step Brothers”
- “Superbad”
- “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”
Directing? That’s just as strong:
- “The 40-Year-Old Virgin”
- “Knocked Up”
- “This Is 40”
- “Trainwreck”
The king can’t seem to find his crown these days. Recent busts like “The Bubble” and underwhelming fare (“The King of Staten Island”) suggest his best creative days are behind him.
Editor’s Note: Apatow blocked this reporter on X, then Twitter, several years ago for no discernible reason.
He still should be a critical voice when it comes to comedy and Hollywood. And that includes explaining why the big-screen comedy genre has fallen on such hard times.
When was the last comic blockbuster like “The Hangover,” “Step Brothers,” “Bridesmaids” or “Old School?” It’s been a while, no?
Yet a recent interview he gave to the “Modern Wisdom” podcast, hosted by Chris Williamson, found Apatow blaming the genre’s decline on … streaming.
“In the old days, comedies would do really well on DVDs,” Apatow told Williamson. “People like to own them and watch them over and over again.
“When people switched to streaming, nothing replaced the DVD money,” he continued. “Now, studios can place a different kind of bet on a giant movie that costs $200 million and they’re hoping it makes $900 million and they have every market in the world to sell it to.”
He shared a similar explanation on “The Last Laugh” podcast via The Daily Beast.
The Film Threat podcast pounced and seized on Apatow’s explanation, and rightly so.
For starters, the DVD problem impacts all movies from all genres, so it’s not specifically tied to comedies. More importantly, Apatow is ignoring the massive cultural reasons why Hollywood abandoned big-screen comedies, especially the R-rated versions.
Woke.
Woke broke comedy. They even wrote a book about it. “The Hangover” director Todd Phillips left the genre because he couldn’t tell jokes the way he once did.
Yet the progressive writer/director won’t name check it. He can’t is more accurate. To do so would tar his preferred political party. And the avowed Democrat and Trump hater, apparently, is unwilling to do that.
So Team Film Threat explained the new comedy rules to him.
“Streaming didn’t kill comedy. Hollywood killed comedy,” said Dante James of the “Verbal Riot Show.”
Others on the panel denounced the industry’s fear of “offending” viewers. A few suggested studio executives themselves were too thin skinned to greenlight outrageous comedies in the modern era.
Sitcom superstar Patricia Heaton recently told “The Rubin Report” that she witnessed jokes being erased behind the scenes because someone deemed them “homophobic.”
Film Threat co-host Alan Ng correctly noted that both horror and comedy films can make a tidy profit in 21st century Hollywood, assuming the industry dares to make them.
“You can make ’em for the same amount of money and have a wide diversity of comedies,” Ng said. “The dollars are there.”
Another unspoken reason for comedy’s decline? Look no further than “Saturday Night Live.” The NBC sketch show once produced movie star after movie star after movie star.
- Bill Murray
- Dan Aykroyd
- Will Ferrell
- John Belushi
- Chevy Chase
- Eddie Murphy
… to name just a few.
Now, the show’s far-Left bent restricts the words and topics it can deploy to make us howl. The cast members no longer puncture the zeitgeist.
One of the last major “SNL” skits to go viral starred clean comedian Nate Bargatze, not any one cast standout.
Show creator Lorne Michaels previously had a Midas touch when it came to selecting new “SNL” players, a veritable pipeline for big screen comedies. That’s no longer the case.
The result? No more “SNL”-born movie stars. The show recently announced long-time player Bowen Yang is leaving the cast. And so what? Did he anchor any big-screen comedies? Is he a box office draw? Will Hollywood studios rush to make new comedies with Yang at the center?
Don’t hold your breath.
The show no longer impacts the culture like it once did, but Apatow didn’t mention that, either.
The veteran director could have taken a long, hard look in the mirror and said he shares some of the blame. That’s hard to admit, but at the very least, he could have given a more honest answer for comedy’s shocking decline.