I think it will go as long as they want it to go. It’s doing very well ratings wise and its NBC’s number one scripted show. After six years, that’s pretty good.

- Then what are your plans?

I might do some writing. I haven’t had much of a chance since I did The 40-Year-Old Virgin.

- Most people would probably assume you have done stand up but that is not the case is it?

I don’t think of myself as a comedian. I don’t think I’m that naturally funny guy who can entertain a group of people - it’s just not really my forte.

I approach it mostly in terms of acting if the character ends up being funny it’s a result of the script and the situation.  Standup is like another world entirely. I don’t think I would be good at it.

- So you didn’t ever intend to be the funny? Your ambition was to act?

I was not going into comedy I was going to be an actor. That was the idea. I went to Chicago to be an actor and it just so happened I got hired to do more comedies than anything else.

- But they must have seen that quality in you?

I guess and there was also a bigger market for it in Chicago. There was a big improv comedy scene with Second City.

Most of the commercials you would audition for were comedic based so it soon became evident that even from a financial aspect the best bet was to pursue more comedy.

- Did you ever expect to be a leading man in film?

When Judd Apatow and I wrote The 40-Year-Old Virgin we had no idea what would become of it and whether people would even respond to it.

Then they did and people started thinking of it as a genre, as the raunchy every man comedy with a heart.  But we never expected that to happen, we were just writing something we thought was funny.

- So do you feel there is a new comedic genre for leading men?

I’m not sure that is a new phenomenon because when you look at people like Jack Lemmon, Steve Martin or Robin Williams, or performers going back to Charlie Chaplin, very few of them are typically leading man types.

When people say it’s a new era of comedic leading men I think comedic leading men have always been a little off kilter, a little off skew.
 
Despicable Me is released on DVD and Blu-ray 3D 21st February 2011

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