Close-Up: Seth Rogen
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Although SETH ROGEN often plays a slacker, in real life this 24-year-old actor, producer and Emmy-nominated writer has a work ethic that won't quit. Although he made his mark on the short-lived sitcoms like Freaks And Geeks and Undeclared, you probably remember him as the scene-stealer in films like You, Me And Dupree and The 40-Year-Old Virgin. This month, Rogen tackles his first leading role in Knocked Up, a cautionary tale of a one-night stand gone horribly awry. INTERVIEW: Jonah Bayer Is it true you got your start as a stand-up comedian in Canada? Yeah. I started doing stand-up when I was 13. I always thought that's what I'd do with my life because I'd never seen any actors that looked like me. [Laughs.] I didn't get good enough grades to go to college, so later on I started to realize that very few stand-up comics are famous solely for their comedy. I got an agent and Freaks And Geeks was literally the first audition I got sent out on. Why do you think Freaks And Geeks wasn't as popular when it initially aired as it is today? Freaks And Geeks wasn't really advertised at all; the president of the network openly admitted he didn't get or like the show. Also, they kept changing the time of the program, which was confusing. But all of that is speculation. I mean, ultimately Freaks And Geeks was a strange show and it wasn't very easy to categorize. It's pretty intense at times. Yeah, you really don't see too many serious sitcoms where the protagonist finds out he's dating a hermaphrodite... Exactly. That's not something the family gathers around the TV and watches. [Laughs.] You've done a lot of support work leading up to Knocked Up, but this is your first leading role. Were you at all apprehensive about carrying a movie? I was definitely unsure, but I really didn't view it as me carrying the movie. It's almost less pressure in a way, because I gave myself permission not to be hysterical all the time. When you're only in one or two scenes in a movie, you have to work really hard to make an impact, but I just kept saying, "I'm in every fuckin' scene, I don't have to try too hard; I have a long time to get across what I'm trying to say." At the same time, it seems like there's a serious undertone to this movie that wasn't present in, say, The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Yeah, that movie was wall-to-wall comedy with one or two obligatory emotional scenes, and we didn't want Knocked Up to be that way. We wanted realism to be the foremost priority. The first thing we'd say is what would you do? If someone tells you they're pregnant how would you react? If you're drunk at dinner and you're insulting someone, what would you say? Then if you can think of funnier ways to do it, that's great, but if it seemed forced we didn't even bother. Dude, can we talk about the sex scene with Katherine Heigl for a second? Sure! [Laughs.] Was it good for you? Well, it started out as awkward because you're essentially dry humping someone on film; if I was 13 years old, that would have been as far as I'd been with a girl. But we had this umbrella of humor shielding us, so that made it slightly less awkward because it's not actually supposed to be "sexy." If it was supposed to be a sexy sex scene, I don't even know how I would approach that. [Laughs.] But you gotta do what you gotta do, I suppose. Yeah, I can think of worse ways to earn a living. Oh, yeah, I've definitely done worse. You've said that even though you were in Donnie Darko, you didn't understand it. Do you think anyone really understood it, or do people just pretend to in order to look smart? You know what's funny, a friend of mine ran into Jake Gyllenhaal at a record store a few years after Donnie Darko came out and said, "I saw Donnie Darko and I just didn't get it, could you explain it to me?" I really like Jake and this is in no way a slam on him, but he said to the guy, "No! Only [writer/director] Richard Kelly and I know what it is, and we decided we're not going to tell anyone." My friend told me that and I said, "That's not true." [Laughs.] Richard tried to explain it to me; it's just hard to explain. So my answer is no, I don't think anyone truly gets [it], despite what they might claim to fans in record stores. ALT CHEAT SHEET As a grinning teenager, SETH ROGAN starred on the Judd Apatow-produced series Freaks And Geeks and Undeclared; more recently, he stole screen time as Steve Carrel's tattooed co-worker in The 40-Year-Old Virgin, in addition to memorable cameos in Anchorman: The Legend Of Ron Burgundy and You, Me And Dupree; this month, Rogan stars in Knocked Up where one night of playing doctor with Katherine Heigl results in a nine-month ordeal. THE UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE When asked what he's been listening to lately, Seth Rogen says, "I guess Muse has been doing pretty good for me over the past few weeks, and I've been listening the shit out of the new Ghostface Killah [album Hidden Darts: Special Edition]," but ultimately he has a special place in his heart for the nine-piece rap collective known as the Wu-Tang Clan. "I got word that there might be a new Wu-Tang album in the mix and they're my favorite band ever," he adds. "My favorite record of all-time is Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers). I still listen to that album constantly." Although these days he's busy playing "a paranoid weedhead who goes on the run for his life" alongside his former Freaks And Geeks co-star James Franco in The Pineapple Express (which Rogan also wrote and is helping produce), he still tries to make time to take in a live show every once in a while. "I saw RZA about a month-and-a-half ago and that was amazing," he says. "Oh, I'm also [going to try] to see Rage Against The Machine at Coachella; I really hope that works out." -Jonah Bayer |
