Judd Apatow Tees Up Netflix COVID Comedy - Report

The prolific and influential comedy writer-director Judd Apatow is not letting 2020 close out with adding a new project to the pipeline: He is now reportedly developing a "pandemic comedy" for Netflix. The untitled film will "follow a group of actors and actresses stuck inside a pandemic bubble at a hotel attempting to complete a film," according to Variety. This will be Apatow's first feature film with the streaming service.

Apatow will be co-writing with Pam Brady (South Park), and his longtime producing partner Barry Mendel will be executive producing. Mendel and Apatow have worked together on hit comedies for over a decade, beginning with Funny People and continuing their tradition of personal, poignant, and rites of passage stories with Bridesmaids, This Is 40, Trainwreck, and The Big Sick.

Of anyone to attempt a pandemic comedy, Apatow definitely particularly well-suited to tackle it in such a manner given his background in TV with Freaks And Geeks--it basically sounds like a film-length bottle episode, or a sitcom convention where an entire episode takes place in one set or location. And depending on your temperament, a comedic approach to the pandemic might be more appealing than, say, Michael Bay's upcoming Songbird--a thriller that imagines COVIDs 20 through 23 as the virus develops a taste for human brain tissue. That is a direction, most likely, Apatow will not be steering this new film towards.

In contrast to when many assumed the coronavirus' spread to the US earlier this year would mean a prolonged stoppage or lengthy pause in new TV and films, it seems we have now turned the corner from "Zoom shows" made during the pandemic (like HBO's Coastal Elites or Freeform's Love In The Time Of Corona) to now, hopefully safely, having somewhat meta stories being told about COVID while it's still playing out.