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• The Reign of Apatow

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(Catherine Lamy, Buzz illustrator)

My friends and I acknowledge our relationships as the oft-popularly phrased “bro-mance.” It’s male bonding springing from conversations in pop culture, sports, women and, if we’re feeling intellectual, politics. Then alcohol is introduced, and the landscape changes.

Suddenly, we’re alive and laughing a little easier (okay, a lot easier). We throw out sarcastic quips and jokes steeped in personal history, cultural commentaries and absurd observations. We laugh until the neighbors tell us to shut it. It’s only too bad we can’t make a career out of this.

Well, someone did.

Along comes wunderkind Judd Apatow. With films such as The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up and Superbad boasting an already impressive resume with such TV classics as Undeclared, it’s surprising that the 40-year-old New Yorker didn’t strike comic gold sooner.

His unique brand of humor fluctuates between the high-brow and severely inappropriate. Apatow cut his teeth as a staff writer on The Larry Sanders Show and the cult, albeit brief, phenomenon, The Ben Stiller Show. His initial move into Tinseltown wasn’t warmly regarded. Lukewarm reception for The Cable Guy and Heavyweights didn’t punch up his status either.

While salvaging his reputation, Apatow pursued projects for network TV. The results were the critically adored Freaks and Geeks and, later, Undeclared. Unfortunately, home audiences had simultaneously discovered reality TV. Brains around the globe shifted into autopilot, and both series never made it past the first season.

Then a revelation! Apatow found the channel for his comic voice: regular actors defining a generation of immature men (and sometimes women) burdened with responsibility and completely unable to handle it. Not exactly Freudian but deep if you like bawdy sex jokes.

These schmucks represent the classic “everyman.” They’re schlubby, nebbish, self-conscious and unattractive (sorry, fellas). But they’re real. Lacking the stereotypical bronzed tans and chiseled physiques, this unique pack opts for the eternally stylish Jew-fro. They don’t sport designer threads nor are they concerned with foreign policy. These are people you could hang out with. And chances are they’d bring the bong.

Regardless of classification, their authenticity rings true: the turmoil of adolescence in Freaks and Geeks; Seth’s (Jonah Hill) desperation to procure booze in hopes of inebriating his dream girl in Superbad; Andy’s (Steve Carell) anxiety over his diminished sexual appetite in The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Their conflicts hammer close to home for many of us, and that’s what makes these characters endearing.

By creating genuine characters, Apatow mines an undercurrent of tangible emotion to accompany the crass antics of his protagonists. By casting friends and encouraging wild improv, the expertly orchestrated hysterics convey a sense of intimacy amidst a haze of pot smoke.

Obviously, the Apatow oeuvre covers a broad comedic spectrum. From TV to mainstream, boffo box office, he’s quickly run the gamut of successes and failures. In just 10 years, his evolution from relative obscurity to mogul marks a rejuvenated cinematic invasion.

Working as writer, director, producer, casting director and who-knows-what-else, the native New Yorker has taken multitasking to a level even Martha Stewart would envy. Recently, he’s taken a relaxed role, focusing more on producing and stimulating his repertoire of actors into their own work.

In the forthcoming Pineapple Express — wherein two stoners go on the lam from corrupt cops — Apatow funneled the idea of a “marijuana action-comedy” to Seth Rogen, his Knocked Up leading man. Rogen promptly lined it up and knocked out the script. With indie director David Gordon Green at the helm, it only proves Apatow continually stimulates creativity through challenging themes and ideas with unusual collaborators.

The Apatow zeitgeist remains in full swing with a string of box-office successes. Faltering was the faux-rock biopic Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, but with repeated viewings — and a copious amount of, ahem, substances — it will likely join that elusive pantheon of cult comedies.

We can’t really quantify or overanalyze it. It’s comedy. What’s funny is funny. Doesn’t matter where it’s from. Or more importantly, how it looks. Judd Apatow’s shtick is like hanging out with dudes you’ve known forever. Now that you’ve been invited to crack a beer — or 12 — the jokes roll in as quickly as the laughs. And that’s the sustainability of the Apatow blitzkrieg.