Will Ferrell

February
25
Will Ferrell's "Funny or Die" tour: Anchorman, meet anchorman

WillferrellradiocityHey, look who showed up Sunday night at Radio City Music Hall for the last night of Will Ferrell's "Funny or Die" comedy tour: Tom Brokaw.

The NBC anchorman emeritus proved that the good sense of humor he always displayed in all those  "Late Night with David Letterman" appearances has not been lost in retirement. Ferrell by all accounts (here's the New York Times' take on the perf) had a lot of fun in his Ron Burgundy guise with this "anchorman-vs.-anchorman" moment, alternately grilling and chilling with the TV icon that Burgundy quickly dubbed "T-Bo."

All kidding aside, the eight-city  "Funny or Die" tour (designed to promote his latest comedy, "Semi-Pro," which bows this week, and the tour's namesake FunnyOrDie.com website in which Ferrell is a partner) did boffo business as it wound through college towns in chilly Northeastern climes this month. It's a comedy caravan that is likely to be replicated in some form in a city near you in the near future, as Variety noted earlier this week. There's been a clamor on this coast because Ferrell and his co-stars, Zach Galifianakis, Demetri Martin and Nick Swardson, haven't come anywhere near the 310, 323 or even the 818.

You gotta respect Ferrell for his love of the game. Instead of going for the cushy presenter slot (and swag bag) on the Oscar telecast, he spent Hollywood's Biggest Night on the opposite end of the country, digging the company of a few thousand fans, a fellow anchorman and three loopy cohorts who got an early, career-boosting Christmas present from Ferrell this year.

October
16
Judd Apatow joins FunnyorDie.com: Here's the vidclip

FerrellapatowNow here's some good news for a town that could use a good laugh. Judd Apatow is lending his talents to FunnyorDie.com, joining the the comedy website promulgated by his pals Will Ferrell and Andy McKay as a partner.

"I am beyond thrilled to have Judd join us at FunnyorDie. However I do find him to be odd in social situations," Ferrell quipped. "This is very awkward but I don't know who Judd Apatow is," said McKay, adding that "Although, after looking him up on IMDB, he seems very impressive.”

Apatow's milieu already has been popular on the site through faux outtakes and clips from his raunch-coms "Knocked Up" and "Superbad."

“Adam and Will and myself have been friends for many years and we thought this would be the perfect opportunity to create a situation where the friendship could not survive." Apatow said.

FunnyOrDie.com, in which users are invited to vote on the mirth merits of various clips, launched in April and can already hang up the "over 35 million served" sign.

Here's a vid clip of Ferrell, McKay and Apatow heralding the news of his arrival. Fair warning, it's a little randy, as you might expect from these guys.

(Pictured above: Ferrell and Apatow at the June 2004 preem of "Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy." Pic by Lee Celano/WireImage)

July
25
Will Ferrell's FunnyorDie coming to comedy club near you?

HenchyHad some fun this morning at the LATV Festival panel on how digital media is changing the face of TV. Not sure if we answered that question in 75 minutes, but the panelists were a good cross-section of the biz and they were talkative, which made my job easy. Chris Henchy, veteran writer-producer and head of Will Ferrell and Andy McKay's Gary Sanchez Prods., was one of the panelists, yakking about FunnyorDie.com, the comedy Web site that launched stealthily in April with some very funny Ferrell shorts and an open invitation for undiscovered comic geniuses to submit their own shorts. In "American Idol" fashion, users are invited to vote on their fave/least fave shorts, some of which become "Immortal" and some of which are banished to "the Crypt," never to be seen again.

It's kinda mind-boggling but the Ferrell short "The Landlord" (featuring a pic-stealing performance from McKay's toddler-daughter Pearl) has been viewed more than 40 million times since FunnyorDie.com bowed in mid-April. Henchy (pictured above at right with Ferrell), who's also busy juggling feature projects and an HBO pilot, said they're in the midst of trying to partner with a local comedy establishment to bring some of the undiscovered talents on FunnyorDie out of their basements and bathrooms to a showcase event that would be streamed live, natch, on FunnyorDie. And he confirmed that most of the Gary Sanchez-produced stuff on the site is filmed in under an hour, and slapped up on to the site while the DV cam is still warm. Gotta love the digital age.

Another panelist, "Heroes" co-exec producer Jesse Alexander, promised that the show had lots of fun in store for fans this weekend and Comic-Con and when season two of the NBC hit bows in September.


About

Cynthia Littleton is deputy editor, news development at Variety and a veteran television reporter.

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