The first publicity image has been released from Judd Apatow’s This is Forty, a movie about Leslie Mann and Paul Rudd’s characters set a few years after Knocked Up. And yes, Judd Apatow cast his real wife and kids again (Maude and Iris, 14 and 9), with Paul Rudd as his stand in. Which isn’t that weird a fetish when you think about it.

Apatow’s first directing effort since 2009′s “Funny People” — picks up with the family a few years after “Knocked Up.” Pete’s music label is struggling and Debbie’s vanity business, a dress shop staffed by the comely Desi (Megan Fox) and the awkward Jodi (Charlyne Yi), needs to help cover the household budget.

Holy sh*t, this sounds incredible! Wait, what’s ‘comely’ mean?

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The red-band trailer and poster just hit for The Change-Up, which comes from Wedding Crashers director David Dobkin (don’t tell anyone he directed Fred Claus) and The Hangover writers Jon Lucas and Scott Moore (don’t tell anyone they wrote Four Christmases and Ghosts of Girlfriends Past). It stars Jason Bateman and Ryan Reynolds as two buds who mysteriously switch bodies while peeing together in a magical fountain one night.  Under the circumstances, I would’ve called it Body Swap Piss Fountain, but Hot Tub Time Machine bombed, so what do I know.   Anyway, Bateman plays a boring handsome married dude, while Reynolds plays a handsome exciting womanizer.  They switch bodies, and wouldn’t you know it, discover that the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.  The trailer is distinguished by its multiple poop scenes.

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Today in trade news, it sounds like Bat Mitsvah DJ Paul Rudd is finally catching a break.  Good for him, such a nice boy.

Universal Pictures has signed Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann to star in the Untitled Judd Apatow Project.
featuring an original story with characters created by Rudd and Mann in Knocked Up.
Apatow is writing, directing and producing the June 1, 2012 release, produced by Barry Mendel and Clayton Townsend. [ComingSoon]

So basically, a Knocked Up sequel/spinoff focusing on the Paul Rudd/Leslie Mann relationship.  I’m a Judd Apatow nuthugger from way back, so you throw in Paul Rudd to boot, and I’ll be the first one in line for a ticket, all dressed up like a cholo on Easter.  Hopefully there’s even a part in it for Katherine Heigl, as Leslie Mann’s totally-not-shrewish younger sister who drives well and loves math.

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The first time I heard Jim Carrey was starring in a movie called “I Love You Phillip Morris,” I figured, “Phillip Morris?  Why, that movie’s probably about smoking.”  As it turns out, Jim Carrey’s character in the film does love smoking. …PENISES!  HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, get it?  He likes smoking penises?  Seriously though, he’s gay.  Not sure if you caught that.

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I hate that Funny People is 25 minutes too long, because it does a couple of amazing things.  From his album They’re All Gonna Laugh at You through a few years after Happy Gilmore, Adam Sandler was a comedy God. I laughed so hard the first time I heard “The Buffoon and the Dean of Admissions” that I farted placenta.  But at some point around ’97, he seems to have decided he didn’t give a sh*t anymore and started doing a string of increasingly sappy, unfunny paycheck abortions like Click and I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry. The only glimmers of talent came in dramatic roles like Spanglish and Punch Drunk Love, in which he proved he could act, but didn’t really seem like himself, like he was just trying to prove a point.

Funny People not only reminds us what Sandler looks like when he’s doing honest comedy — and by that I mean comedy that he himself finds funny rather than “You want me to do a silly voice again? Fine, I’ll do the a voice again. Lap it up, you pigs.” — but combines it with the Sandler who can act.  Not only that, the story is the kind of pointed, meta-fictional take on his life that JCVD could’ve been for Van Damme if it hadn’t devolved into such a pretentious euro wankfest. I hate to be a reactionary, but while I was writing this I noticed other people calling Funny People Entourage with Cancer, and I felt compelled to point out all the differences between this and Entourage.

1.  Decent writing
2.  Decent acting
3.  Conflict
4.  Likable characters
5.  The celebrity character in Funny People is famous for having an actual skill
6.  The minor characters are trying perfect an actual skill, and aren’t driven by the sole desire to be famous, or to hang out with famous people, or to help the main character get more famous
7.  No one talks about shoes or cars, not even once

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