Freaks and geeks gave way to middle-aged virgins, but Judd Apatow always kept the chuckles coming and this summer the TV producer, writer and filmmaker will be honoured by Montreal’s Just For Laughs Comedy Festival.
Apatow, a former standup comedian, will be bestowed with the title of Comedy Person of the Year during the festival’s inaugural Just Comedy conference on July 18.
“We are very proud to honour someone who started his career in standup and has become one of the most important and dynamic forces in comedy,” Just For Laughs chief Bruce Hills said in a statement.
“Judd is the ideal choice because he embodies the many talents that have made him one of the most successful comedy filmmakers.”
Apatow, a New York native now living in L.A., has earned commercial and critical success in recent years with hit comedies like “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” and “Knocked Up.”
His film production company, Apatow Productions, is also behind recent movies like “Superbad,” “Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story ” and the upcoming “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.”
Before that, he built up a career in TV starting in the early ’90s, including co-creating “The Ben Stiller Show,” writing and producing for “The Larry Sanders Show,” producing the cult series “Freaks and Greeks” and creating the college sitcom “Undeclared.”
The Just For Laughs Comedy Festival, now in its 26th year, will take place July 10 to 20.
The two-day Just Comedy conference, set to run July 17 to 18, is a new event which aims to bring together those in the comedy industry for panel discussions, master classes and networking sessions.
