Jason Segel and Paul Rudd bond over Rush, Boosh, and body stockings

I’ve been trying to come up with a clever word or short phrase to describe the effect of Judd Apatow on current film comedy, which is dominated by people who have cut their chops working with him. “The Juddiverse” doesn’t quite make it. I feel in my bones that there’s a way to cram “Apatow” and “diaspora” together, but I can’t seem to find it—“Apatospora”? “Diaspatow”?

Well, whatever you want to call it, the effect has now given comedy lovers I Love You, Man, a very, very funny movie opening in theaters next week. Directed by John Hamburg (Along Came Polly, episodes of Apatow’s Undeclared), the movie is the ultimate “bromance,” to use a term that’s just about at the end of its 15 minutes. Paul Rudd stars as Peter Klaven, a Los Angeles realtor who has been too focused on girlfriends to maintain any significant same-sex friendships. Overhearing his fiancée’s friends warning her that men without male friends can be too clingy, he sets out to acquire his own BFF.

After a series of failed “man dates,” he meets Sydney Fife (Jason Segel). Though the two are apparently more different than similar, Peter finds Sydney a tonic for the parts of himself he needs to get back in touch with. But is a more well-rounded Peter really the man his fiancée wants to marry?

Like a Gen X Lemmon and Matthau, Rudd and Segel are as funny a team off screen as they are on. I spoke to them during a recent Manhattan press junket for I Love You, Man.

You two have been working in the same circles for awhile. When did you first consider doing something as co-stars?

Rudd: In Knocked Up we improvised a little. None of it was particularly good or else it would have been in the movie, but that was the first time we sensed we could play off of each other.

Segel: For Forgetting Sarah Marshall [which Segel also wrote], Paul came out to Hawaii and was nice enough to play the surf instructor. We were sequestered at the hotel and at night we would all just collide at the pool bar. There were a lot of mai tais consumed, and we got to know each other pretty well then. Most of those scenes were pretty improvised, cause my script wasn’t nearly as tightly honed as Hamburg’s.

Are you looking for another movie to do together?

Segel: We’re trying to bring it back to the old school comedy teams. Next year we’re doing Paul and Jason Meet Frankenstein.

Rudd: It’s been really cool to get into this group with Judd and the Freaks and Geeks guys, to feel a part of this collective. We’ve worked together on few things and I hope it continues, it’s really fun.

Segel: There’s something really fun we’ve found in the “mix and match.” We’ve all worked together in various capacities. It was nice of Paul to do Forgetting Sarah Marshall because Paul is a leading man, and he was willing to come do that movie because he loves acting and he loves comedy—

Rudd: —and I love Hawaii!

In the new movie you guys bond over a Rush concert. How was it getting to work with Rush?

Segel: I love Rush but I was a little too young to experience them in their prime. I learned about them during Freaks and Geeks, cause my character was a huge Rush fan, I had to learn to drum “Spirit of Radio.” Paul is a huge Rush fan.

Rudd: I saw the “Tom Sawyer” video when I was little kid and it scared me. Geddy Lee can be a really intense figure to a six-year-old. But then I got into their songs and I was really excited to meet them.

Segel: They are scary, because lyrically they’re like the J.R.R. Tolkien of bands.

Rudd: And a 15-minute drum solo is scary as hell. They’re reclusive, there’s a mystery about them, but they couldn’t have been nicer. When they were on the set I was so hypersensitive that they would have a good time, that they wouldn’t get bored or feel as if we were mocking them. So they’re playing and we’re dancing around like crazy and Rashida Jones [who plays Peter’s fiancée] is acting bored. I was telling Geddy Lee that this was part of the story, we’re gonna be dancing around and she’ll be standing there like she’s not into it, and he said, “Oh, so you mean it’ll be like every one of our concerts?”

What do you two personally bond over?

Segel: We love comedy, we’re both comedy dorks. Things like [the British cult hit] The Mighty Boosh, Little Britain, we’ll quote lines, so we bonded over that.

Rudd: I love Withnail and I—have you ever seen it?

Segel: Of course I have! Amazing.

Rudd: Have we ever talked about that?

Segel: No, but we ought to. When this all done.

You appear on the current cover of Vanity Fair with Seth Rogan and Jonah Hill in a parody of the 2006 photo with Scarlett Johansson, Keira Knightley, and Rachel McAdams. They were nude but you guys are wearing body stockings. How come you didn’t do the full monty?

Segel: Uh, cause Vanity Fair wanted to still be able to sell magazines. There’s nothing particularly appealing about me, Seth, and Jonah naked on the cover of a magazine. Paul in that photo has never looked better. [He’s wearing a tux.] Anyone would look good next to me, Seth, and Jonah in our body stockings.

Rudd: They should have called it Vanity Hair, judged by how far down my shirt goes and I look, uh…I could have constructed that joke better. [Grabs a tape recorder.] Can you rewind these things?

Segel: Was that the first time you told that joke?

Rudd: First time. [Opens his shirt to reveal a chest pelt that would put Austin Powers to shame.] You can see what I’m saying.

Segel: When people ask me what this movie is about, I always call it When Harry Met Hairier. I’m hairless, like a smooth baby.

Rudd [wincing]: Eeeuuh, you might want to rethink the way you said that.

Segel [considering]: I’m smoooooth, like a baby’s head. [The lightbulb goes on.] Smooth as a baby’s bottom, that’s the expression, right?

Rudd: I’m not touching that. [Pause.] That came out wrong too, didn’t it?

How much did you improvise on set?

Segel: The script was really tightly honed. John Hamburg had been working on it for awhile, and by the time it finally go to us it didn’t really need much improv. There are a few scenes, like that first man-date scene, John just set up two cameras to capture both of us and said, all right, your job is to look like you get along. So for four hours it was just our job to make each other laugh and have a good time. A lot of the scenes of Paul being awkward were improv, because it’s impossible to write how awkward Paul can actually be.

Jason, will you be doing more writing?

Segel: Yeah, I’m writing the new Muppet movie for Disney, which is my dream come true, my childhood fantasy. I’m trying to bring them back. And I’m writing another movie for Judd, The Five Year Engagement, with Nick Stoller, who directed Sarah Marshall. It’s another exploration of relationships, because I’m like the least masculine guy in Hollywood.

Do you know what deleted scenes we can look forward to on the DVD?

Segel: There’s one scene that’s not on the DVD that I regret. In the scene when I wrestle Lou Ferrigno, it ends with me passing out. What I thought was funny, the scene continues and Paul comes to get me, I wake up and I’m confused, I can’t remember where I am. Now I’m a gigantic guy, so we did this run of Paul [who is seven inches shorter] trying to lift me up and me continuing to fall over, and it was such a funny physical bit. But it was kinda self-indulgent—it went on for 10 minutes.

The chair farting! Was that in the movie? [He spends a minute trying to describe the gag before Rudd cuts him off.]

Rudd: It was really sophisticated stuff. That’s why it’s not in the movie. The trick is really finding the right tone, which is left to John and the editor. There were lots of funny sequences that were either cut for time or they just seemed too broad. We all wanted the movie to be realistic and not so over the top.

Segel: That’s one of the things I love about the movie—it’s not a cynical look at these relationships. It’s also not a wink-wink, nudge-nudge, jokey look. We tried to do a realistic, natural depiction of a guy trying to find a new friend, and then layer funny on top of that.

Paul, you’ve played both dramatic and comic roles. Which do you prefer?

Rudd: I don’t differentiate too much. I often don’t think so much in terms of drama or comedy, straight man or, um…non-straight man? That also came out wrong.

Segel: (cracking up) My favorite super hero, Non-Straight Man! This was the problem on set, we’d just get into a joke and be laughing for 45 minutes.

Rudd: Oftentimes my favorite element of drama is the humor in it—that’s the way I dealt with anything dramatic in my life, any kind of trauma. I’m not really funny enough to be the super crazy funny guy, I’m more like the setup guy. But you can find lots of humor in the setup stuff.

Can we retire the word “bromance” now?

Rudd: It seems like “bromance” just came out a couple of months ago—it wasn’t around when we were working on the film, and it’s kind of annoying. Someone earlier today came up with “manpanions,” that was pretty good.

What part that you have played do you feel the most personal connection with?

Rudd: I feel pretty connected to the character in I Love You, Man. There are aspects to some of the more cynical characters I’ve played like role models that I’ve put a lot of myself into, but I tend to think of myself as more of an optimist, in the way that Peter in this movie is.

Segel: I think the Sarah Marshall character. That’s a pretty accurate depiction of how I was at 25. I’m 29 now, so I’ve started to gain some self-confidence and come into my own. But back then I was a proper mess.