The 40 Year-Old Virgin

When we started testing the movie it got gigantic laughs – I don’t know if I’ve ever gotten more laughs than those first test screenings for The 40-Year-Old Virgin,” admits director Judd Apatow, recalling the 2005 release of his game-changing feature debut. “It really was an opportunity to showcase all these people we thought deserved big comedy careers.”

You don’t need us to tell you just how on-point Apatow’s radar is for finding funny people. After cutting his teeth on cult series Freaks And Geeks in 1999 – a project that introduced him to future collaborators Seth Rogen, James Franco and Jason Segel – he quickly set his sights on the big screen. All he needed was an idea and a comedian exciting enough to help him make the jump.

“I’d been trying to get several different movies greenlit in the years prior to without success,” Apatow tells us between editing stints on his Pete Davidson-fronted next film, . “I met Steve Carell when I produced and he was just as funny as a human being could be. I asked him if he had any ideas where he would be the lead and I don’t think he had thought about that at all. I don’t believe he thought that was on the cards for him.”