Judd: The whole setup sucks. And comedy is a constant exploration of it. I still can’t figure it out, because it’s so absurd and so awful that I can’t do anything but laugh in its face.
Albert: But it’s really not awful. If I’ve learned anything—anything—getting older, it’s the value of moment-to-moment enjoyment. When I was young, all my career was “If I do well tonight, that means that Wednesday will be better. That means I can give this tape to my agent and…” It was this ongoing chess game. And that is a really disappointing game, because when you get to checkmate, it never feels like it should. And there’s another board that they never told you about. So if I come here and talk to you, if I have an enjoyable three hours, god damn it, that counts.
Judd: Do you ever have a spiritual feeling when you’re creative?
Albert: I used to hate when people say, “I feel it come through me,” but there are moments where two hours go by and you don’t know what happened, and you got all these words, and it’s the highlight of my life.
This interview was originally published in Vanity Fair in January 2013 (Jim Windolf/Vanity Fair; © Condé Nast).
AMY SCHUMER (2014)
I was sitting in my car one day, listening to The Howard Stern Show, when Amy Schumer came on. I think I had seen her do a little stand-up on television once or twice before, or maybe just some jokes at a roast, but that’s about it. But sitting there in my car, listening to her talk to Howard, I was blown away by how funny and intimate and fresh she was. You could sense that she had stories to tell and was a lot more than just a comedian. I instantly thought: I need to make a movie with her.
So we did.
Amy and I spent the next few years working on Trainwreck, and I found that she was, indeed, so much more than just a comedian. She is someone who is willing to go emotionally deep, as well as work obsessively hard, and there’s a frankness to her work that I find inspiring. The stories tumble out of her. She is able to make important points about our culture and feminism and relationships and what it’s like to be a woman in America right now, and to do it in a way that is consistently insightful and hysterical. Here is someone at the beginning of a very exciting career.
Amy Schumer: I did an interview with Jerry Seinfeld the other day.
Judd Apatow: You did? Did you know him at all?
Amy: We met a bunch of times at the Cellar, but I didn’t know him well. He picked me up in a Ferrari, and then it broke down on [the] West Side Highway. It was a real piece of shit. It was smoking, it was real scary.
Judd: That’s awesome.
Amy: Yeah, that was awesome. It was the best time.
Judd: And how was the interview?
Amy: He completely changed my philosophy about stand-up. He was like, “This idea that your generation has about ‘you have to burn your material and start fresh every time’—it’s just so self-important. Not everybody’s watching everything you do, you know.” He said, “Focus on coming up with your best act for a live show. Remember: Seventy-five percent of the crowd has never seen you, and they’ll never see you again, so you should be working on the best possible show.”
Judd: He’s the main voice railing against the modern comic constantly turning over her act.
Amy: He changed my thinking. For TV, you always have to do new stuff, obviously. But for a live show, rather than trying to work out a whole new act, just do the stuff that’s pretty well worked out.
Judd: But he goes beyond that. He’s also saying that, at any time, half your act can be greatest hits. Like, who decided you couldn’t do that?
Amy: I don’t know why that became the thing. I don’t know why the idea of doing an older joke is supposed to make you feel embarrassed. It’s not about impressing the five comics in the back of the room. As Jerry said, if he sees someone, he wants to see their best jokes. Jokes are like works of art and they take years to figure out. He said you only get six closers in your whole life. Like six big jokes—
Judd: In your whole life.
Amy: Yeah.
Judd: I think the first person who turned over his material like that was George Carlin. He did a special every three years or so. Robert Klein put out a lot of specials, and I assume he was writing new material, too. But Seinfeld put out one special in his entire career. Leno has never put out a special. It’s a generational shift. The modern comic says, “Hey, this is what I’m going through right now.”
Amy: Yeah. “Check in with me, here’s where I am now.”
Judd: So maybe the secret is doing more specials than Seinfeld and less than Louis C.K.
Amy: I’m going to do one every couple of years, but I want it to be really great. Because the thing about specials is, they’re going to be there forever.
Judd: Do you think Seinfeld will ever do another special?
Amy: I don’t think so, no. He’s been doing Caesars for ten years, maybe fifteen, and the crowds are great. He gives them a great show and they leave happy. He asked me, “Do you want people to come and say, ‘Oh, she was good,’ or do you want them to come and say, ‘You have to go see that show’?”
Judd: But modern comedy fans will go see you again. That is something Jerry doesn’t understand. Young people will go see Marc Maron every year.
Amy: That’s a good point. I guess the question is, is it better to please the twenty percent of the crowd who comes to see you every time, or is it better to give a killer show, like an epic performance, for the rest?
Judd: This may not apply to anything, but I was watching a movie about women in comedy recently—I think it was called Women Aren’t Funny? And I noticed that you weren’t in it. Was that by choice?
Amy: I got cut out. Actually, I am in one scene. But I don’t talk.
Judd: Oh, I thought maybe it was a political choice, a way of saying, we shouldn’t even be debating this anymore.
Amy: No, that debate is insane to me. It doesn’t even make me mad. It’s like asking, “Do Jewish people smell like orange juice?” It’s just such a weird question. It’s not even a question. The thing that gets to me is the question “Isn’t this a great time to be a woman in comedy?” I mean, all the TV I watched growing up featured funny women.
Judd: People said the same thing when Bridesmaids came out. We never thought about that when we were making it. I just thought, Kristen Wiig is funny. It would be fun to make a movie with Kristen Wiig. And then she had this idea to make a movie about bridesmaids. We never thought of it as a female movie. At some point, in the middle of it, it occurred to us: Oh, it’s kind of cool to have so many funny women in one movie. But it wasn’t conscious or anything. At the end of the process, we realized that it meant something to people. But what is shocking to me was that, even after the movie did well, there was almost zero follow-up in the culture.
Amy: In terms of what?
Judd: In terms of funny movies that are dominated by women. The studio system didn’t embrace them. They don’t know how to do it.
Amy: In my experience, there will be a script and you’ll be like, This is funny, I think I’ll audition. And you’ll know other women, who are hilarious, are auditioning, too. And then they give it to, like, Jessica Biel. They’re great actresses and they’re really pretty, but they’re not funny. Nobody’s like, “Oh my God, you guys have to hear Jessica Biel tell this story.”