Jason Segel is mostly known as an actor in the Apatow gang and one of the leads in How I Met Your Mother. However, he's also a talented writer who recently revealed it was Judd Apatow that led him down the path to honing that particular talent. Speaking on an episode of Today this week, Segel shared the advice Judd Apatow gave him early in his career that he really took to heart.
Well I've always written. When I was like 21 years old and we had just finished a show called Freaks and Geeks, Judd Apatow, who made that show and a bunch of our movies took a bunch of us aside. What he said to me, actually, is, 'You're kind of a weird guy. The only way you are going to make it is if you write. It changed the course of my life and my whole career. So, I'm kind of constantly writing.
Judd Apatow's relationship with Jason Segel is well-documented. The two started working together when Jason Segel nabbed a role in Freaks and Geeks back in 1999. It was apparently after that gig ended that Apatow took some of the cast under his wing to give them advice. Segel revealed that was the moment when writing became important to him. It was advice that would serve him well later when he began writing motion pictures in Hollywood.
During the Today segment, which also touched on Jason Segel's new book OtherEarth, the actor discussed the movies he has written, which include The Five-Year Engagement, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Get Him To The Greek and more. He also joked about Forgetting Sarah Marshall, which is probably his most well-known film, at least in terms of projects he has written:
I don't think anyone else was going to put a Dracula musical at the end of a romantic comedy. So, yeah, I had to do it myself.
Jason Segel isn't the only member of the Apatow gang to still be making a living in Tinseltown. Other regulars include Paul Rudd, Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill and James Franco. Other regulars in Apatow projects include Leslie Mann, Mindy Kaling, Aziz Ansari, Carla Gallo, Bill Hader, Danny McBride, Jay Baruchel, Christopher Mintz-Plasse and many, many more.
Right now, Jason Segel is busy exploring the world of young adult novels. Following the end of How I Met Your Mother, he left Hollywood and has taken on fewer acting projects, appearing this year in Come Sunday. A new TV series, Dispatches from Elsewhere, a new puzzle-based TV series that will air as an anthology show, will mark his return to television. AMC has given the project a series order for 2019. To find out what else is heading to the schedule, here's CinemaBlend's full guide.
