Judd Apatow Explains Why Film Comedies Are Falling Off
Regardless of what folks think of him, Judd Apatow was responsible for a surge of great comedies in the mid to late 2000s. It was a time for comedy we were truly spoiled by, as few films in the past handful of years have been able to resonate with audiences in the same way his films and others released around the same time. When asked why that is, Apatow put a lot of it on the way film studios are buying projects now, and says (via Slashfilm) most of the good stuff is landing on TV:
After the last writers’ strike, it felt like the studios decided not to develop movies. They used to buy a lot of scripts, and they had big teams of people giving notes, and they worked for years with people in collaboration on those scripts. I feel like the studios don’t buy as many scripts now. It used to be you’d open up Variety, and you’d see a movie studio had just bought a big high-concept comedy. Now it seems like they’d rather things come in packaged: a script, a cast, a director. As a result, a lot of great comedy writers are going to television instead of sitting at home and trying to write a script for a film, write the way I was.
That certainly sounds accurate, and when you look at what's buzzed about at the box office right now, it doesn't seem like a great time to make people laugh. With drama, superheroes and scifi top of mind, it's hard to create a comedic masterpiece, and even if you did it's not going to get as much attention in a world of Marvel and Star Wars. Apatow talks about classic films like Airplane and why it's "easier," to make someone sad than laugh below:
When you make the list of the best movies of all time, you’re always going to put Airplane! on it. And if movies like that aren’t being made right now, it’s because people aren’t smart enough and funny enough to make them. I don’t think it’s a result of studios or audiences rejecting anything or trying to copy anything else. If someone made a movie as funny as Airplane! right now it would make a billion dollars. Occasionally people try; most of the time they fail. When you do a big, broad comedy and it fails, it’s an easy target for criticism. I also don’t think critics have a great respect for the effort it takes to make people piss their pants laughing. They think it’s more honorable to show someone in torment, but being able to do that doesn’t make you more of an artist than being able to make The Naked Gun. It’s not hard to make people cry. Kill a dog.
Definitely an interesting take from one of the more successful guys in the industry, but what do you think about what he had to say? I tend to agree comedy is better on television than on film these days, but are the days of creating a huge comedy film over?