"Dramedy" falls painfully short of describing the genre Judd Apatow has dominated for the past decade. Using real life, so closely mirrored that his real-life wife and children star in his latest film, This Is 40, Apatow extracts the absurdness of our day to day existence in a way that is drama-centered, but profoundly funny. "I look at everything as a drama with humor. I think life is funny. I don't have to look at the comedy part at all because, naturally, I find life absurd." Think of his body of work as a kind of comedy verite, and him as an auteur who is keenly aware of the hilarious disasters of our daily interactions with each other.
Banner image: Bil Zelman