BUDDY COMEDY

From his early stand-up days to his work on such instant classics as Freaks and Geeks and Girls, JUDD APATOW has spent a lifetime capturing high hilarity and hoarding the accompanying snapshots and ephemera. In this exclusive excerpt from his visual memoir, Comedy Nerd, where he shares his trove for the first time, LENA DUNHAM describes the generous guy behind the slapstick

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BEFORE I EVER met Judd Apatow, I was a fan—not a casual fan, the kind who checks out his films when they come out on demand (well, it was DVD back then).

I was the kind of fan who went to the first midnight showing of Funny People on a Thursday, then went back the next night so I could really hear all the jokes. The kind of fan who bought box sets of Undeclared and Freaks and Geeks in order to study his structure and tone. I was the kind of fan who listened to podcasts and interviews to understand his trajectory, knew the names of his scene-stealing daughters like they were famous football players, and imagined living in a family like the one he and Leslie had created, where they made art together like a modern von Trapp clan.