This blog post is part of a series called, “Celebrity Substance.” I will be using celebrity careers from a variety of professions as examples, discussing what can be learned from their successes and failures.
Actor and writer Jason Segel, known for starring in the television series How I Met Your Mother, and films Forgetting Sarah Marshall and The Muppets, stars in The End of the Tour as literary legend David Foster Wallace, the first dramatic part for the traditionally comedic actor. Though the transition is far from unprecedented, with actors such as Robin Williams, Bradley Cooper and Jonah Hill going between genres, it is unusual in Hollywood and considered risky.
The End of the Tour opens in limited theaters today in Los Angeles and New York to rave reviews, especially Segel’s performance. For a comedian, he’s always been goofier, sweeter, some how more soulful that his counterparts, and he seized an opportunity to explore that part of himself. This weekend he saw his efforts pay off.
Here are a few things we can learn from Jason Segel:
Do Side Projects In Your Free Time
Segel broke into the business at 18 when he got cast in (then unknown) Judd Apatow’s Freaks and Geeks television series. When it was cancelled after 12 episodes, Apatow took Segel aside and told him that he was a weird guy, and if he wanted to keep acting he was going to need to write his own stuff. After having difficulty getting cast (he was a 6'4", 18 year-old) he started writing scripts. When he was 24 he sold the script Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and it was a box-office hit.
“Judd’s big thing was work, work, work, work, work. In your off time, write. In your off time, make a short film,” Segel told GQ.
Do Not Be Afraid To Be Bad
In addition to writing movie scripts, Segel has also written a series of children’s books titled Nightmares! about a group of kids who have to face their fears in order to save their town. When he was promoting the book on The Ellen Show, he talked about why he wrote a children’s book and why he’s not afraid to try new things.
I think that the world can be pretty mean, and kids can be mean to each other sometimes and make fun of people for trying…and so it makes people afraid to try things. I write music for these movies and I sing songs. I dance in the movies and I act in them, and it’s not that I’m gifted at all these things, it’s that I’m not afraid to be bad at them until I’m good at them.
Do Not Let Others Define You
When it was announced that Segel would play Wallace, there was wide spread dismay. Not only did people not have faith in Segel’s drama debut, but Wallace is a revered and beloved author whose readers are very protective of him. In a talk at the 92nd Street YMCA in New York City, Segel told Rolling Stone editor David Fear that he stopped looking at the internet three years ago because it didn’t make him feel good. It is just not productive.
I knew nobody was going to be a harder judge on my performance than me. That’s something after 18 years of doing this I’m painfully aware of, and so I felt like the best use of my time was for me to figure out how I was going to proceed unapologetically--because I was very scared. I was super scared when I said 'yes.'
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