Interview: Seth Rogen

The 23-year-old costar of The 40-Year-Old Virgin discusses the upcoming DVD.

For a guy who has more failed TV series and movies under his belt than most Hollywood hopefuls have credits, Seth Rogen may be the most successful guy you've never heard of. Beginning with a co-starring role in 1999's ensemble dramedy Freaks and Geeks, Rogen quickly emerged as the show's comic soul, offering one witticism after another as his on screen classmates suffered the indignities of high school life. Subsequently, he returned in another show created by Judd Apatow, Undelcared, which similarly was cancelled but not before Apatow hired him as a member of his stable of TV and eventually film writers.

Today, Rogen sits atop the considerable success of this summer's biggest and best comedy - The 40 Year-Old Virgin, which he co-produced and co-starred in alongside comedic up-and-comer Steve Carell. The young actor, writer and producer recently spoke to IGN DVD via phone to discuss his participation in the comedy, which arrives on DVD this week in not one but two versions: the theatrical cut and a special extended edition featuring some 17 minutes of never-before-seen footage.

IGN DVD: Talk a little bit about how you guys put together the material that eventually went into the extended cut of 40-Year-Old Virgin.

Seth Rogen: Judd [Apatow] is very DVD-minded in a way that most directors aren't, in that he actively in pre-production is thinking about what we could shoot when we're in any given location that could be just for the DVD. And as we're shooting, most people would say, 'okay, we're done here', but Judd would say 'now let's shoot ten more minutes of improve and we'll put it on the DVD. So there's just a truly massive amount of extra footage and different versions of scenes and outtakes and alternate versions of lines, not even counting the seventeen additional minutes that have been added to the movie itself. So it's pretty huge; there's an enormous amount of stuff in there, and I'd say it's pretty much all funny.

IGN: One of the ways in which this film stands out is that it uses comedy to draw in the audience and to reveal the characters' feelings rather than hold them at arm's length and show a sort of emotional detachment. Talk about your approach to comedy; are you doing this purposefully, or is it just a matter of possessing a different sensibility?

Rogen: I would say somewhat. The way we approach story is always from a very emotionally-driven point. As funny as the movie may have ended up being, we were very aware that unless you bought that these guys were kind of real guys and that you actually cared about them, none of it would work at all. It could be the funniest thing ever, but if there's no kind of emotional truth to it, then people just wouldn't care about it in the same way. As far as the exact specifics go, I can only hope that we do it on purpose, but on a grand scale, we definitely try to approach things from a more grounded, character[-driven] emotional standpoint than 'what would be funny here'. We kind of work out, I mean, we assume that something funny will happen on set, and that's kind of the least of our concerns. It's more just 'does this make sense as a story', and 'is this how someone would react in this situation'.

IGN: As a writer, actor and producer, how do you know where to draw the line between what would end up in the theatrical release as opposed to the DVD?

Rogen: I really didn't, and that's part of the reason that it wound up funny in the way that it is, because we had no line. There was no discussion whatsoever what was appropriate or inappropriate; we just kind of thought we'll say everything on set and we'll film it all and the test audiences will reveal where we've gone too far, and we'll scale it back from there. But when we were on set, it was a free-for-all. I mean, if you thought what I said in the movie was dirty, there's stuff that did not make it in and I'm glad that is so far beyond that, and it would literally appall people, but just knowing I was allowed to say that was probably helped in all of the comedy because it's a very safe environment. You know Judd's not going to come up and say 'that was horribly offensive - don't say that', it's more along the lines of 'now try one where you don't talk about impregnating an animal'.

What are some of the comedies that inspired you and helped develop your own comedic voice?

Rogen: Well, my dad was huge into Bill Murray and all of those guys who every comedy writer grows up watching, but it is a little weird for me because in a way I am thrust into the world of comedy that I grew up watching. So it's almost the same comedy that I am now able to do is the comedy that I grew up watching; I was in high school when Will Ferrell was first on Saturday Night Live, and I remember thinking man, that guy is the funniest guy ever. And you know eight years later I am able to be on a set with him and kind of work with him in some capacity, and the same with Adam Sandler, Jim Carrey and Owen Wilson in a way, you know. I grew up on those guys; I remember when I got my first Adam Sandler CD and it was the funniest thing I'd ever heard in my entire life, and continues to be. I would say all respect to "Medium Pace" for me, because that was the seed of my comic persona.

IGN: What are the differences between the different commentaries you contribute to the 40 Year-Old Virgin DVD?

Rogen: well, we did one that's just on the movie with pretty much the entire cast and then some, and then me and Judd did commentary on pretty much every second of extra footage that's on the DVD, and that's pretty much me and Judd just screwing around. I don't know if you would actually call it commentary because I don't know that we are commenting on a whole lot that's going on, but we're talking. But we approached the commentaries from a very non-technical standpoint; there's very little actual information in there. It's just another opportunity for us to do something funny, so we just kind of tell embarrassing stories about one another (laughs).

IGN: How much has DVD been an opportunity for you to connect with audiences in a way that theatrical releases or network broadcasts have not?

Rogen: I'm on the cutting edge of cult DVD fandom (laughs). It's amazing - I would say more people come up to us now than they did when we were on the air, because I feel like it's got out there. The word of mouth has finally caught up with people to the point where it's finally saturated in some way, but moreso than ever people come up to me and say, 'yeah, I just got the Freaks and Geeks DVD and it's awesome'. I can't believe that it's still getting out there, and it's exciting that people who have never seen it are getting to, and it's great. I think the whole DVD thing is great; things that are good will be seen eventually, it seems is what DVD has finally done. It seems like now there is very little actual works of quality that go completely unnoticed because of DVD. Even when a movie that's good does really bad in theaters, like Office Space or something, it tends to do incredibly well on DVD, so it seems like everything gets its time now, which is nice.

IGN: Is there a particular project you're proudest of, or you consider your favorite?

Rogen: Well, it's all different. Freaks and Geeks is different because it was just my first big job and it was a very weird, interesting time in my life to be doing it, but I don't know - 40 Year-Old Virgin was I would say the best time of my life. I mean, I couldn't wait to go to work every day, because of the level of involvement I had on the production, and the amount of freedom we had on set to improv. We knew it was R-rated so we could say whatever we wanted, I mean, it was a dream come true. I would say stuff and be like I can't believe we're on a movie set having me say this stuff. And nothing against the TV shows whatsoever, but I always [considered myself] a much bigger movie fan than TV fan, and just that we were making a movie was an amazingly thrilling prospect.

IGN: Were you surprised at all how successful 40 Year-Old Virgin was during its theatrical release?

Rogen: Oh yeah! We were were literally waiting for the exact same thing to happen - the movie will be somewhat well received, few people will flip out over it and then two weeks later it will be as though it never existed, and on DVD I bet it will do well. That was like exactly our thought towards it. As I started watching the footage and it started to come together into a movie, we started thinking this actually seems kind of funny and it's working a movie form, and then the consensus was it would be surprising if it did terribly, but no one thought it would be considered a hit in any capacity whatsoever. I'm so used to doing stuff with Judd that's good but goes unnoticed, and the fact that we've done something mainstream on a large scale is very weird.

IGN: Well, another one of the shows you worked on that received more critical than commercial success is Da Ali G Show. What's the status of that, and are you contributing to the Borat movie?

Rogen: It doesn't seem like [there will be another season]. It also got increasingly difficult to do the show as more and more people knew who he was, and he's even more popular than ever, so in the first year - and I only worked on the second season - in the first year they would get caught like a third of the time, and by the second year they got caught like half of the time, and I think they realized that if they did a third season it would be incredibly difficult to get enough footage where someone wasn't exposing them to actually make an entire season. And, I think he just wanted to do features and stuff like that. But I cannot say enough good things about that man; he's a genius.

[As far as the movie is concerned], I just saw it this weekend and talked to him about it, and it's hilarious, but I helped out on that movie for a little while just because I'm friends with those guys, and it's insane and it's going to be the funniest movie of all time - you heard it here first.

IGN: What's next for you?

Rogen: I am doing this Owen Wilson- Matt Dillon You, Me and Dupree movie right now that I hope is funny. It's weird to be working with those guys, but it seems like it's very funny, I hope; they're hilarious, so I think I'll just ride their coattails through.

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