Judd Apatow has always been funny.

At Syosset High School on Long Island, he was not only the class clown, but had his own standup show on the school's 10-watt radio station. And through the benign intervention of his mother, who worked at a New York comedy club, he brought to that program interviews with the likes of Steve Allen, Howard Stern, Harold Ramis, John Candy, Jerry Seinfeld, Steven Wright and Garry Shandling -- pretty much a Who's Who of late 1970s and early '80s comedy.

After high school, Apatow went to the University of Southern California and majored in screenwriting. On the side, he introduced comics at the Improv and honed his own standup routine. After two years at USC, he dropped out and moved into an apartment with Adam Sandler.

Unlike Sandler, however, Apatow was unable to develop a strong own on-stage personality. At that level, he was funnier on paper than in person, and so he began gravitating toward the writing and production end of the business.

"It would have been more fun," he has said of his standup career, "if I was funnier."

He wrote jokes for Roseanne Barr, however, and forged a bond an up-and-coming young comic named Ben Stiller. In 1992, Stiller asked Apatow to produce "The Ben Stiller Show" for Fox. It lasted a year.

By the time the ax fell on that show, however, Apatow was already knee-deep in another -- "The Larry Sanders Show," for which he was hired by Garry Shandling. His work there earned Apatow six Emmys.

By then, Apatow was also easing his way into film. He rewrote the scripts for "The Cable Guy" and "The Wedding singer" (a vehicle for Sandler, his old roommate) and produced two movies of his own -- "Heavyweights" and "Celtic Pride," both of which bombed.

In 2004, Apatow broke through with "Anchorman," starring Will Ferrell, and followed that a year later with "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," with Steve Carell in the title role. His connection with Ferrell then led to "Talladega Nights," a well-received satire on the NASCAR culture.

Since then, he has turned out "Knocked Up," "Year One" and "Funny People."

A typical Apatow film is a guilty pleasure, full of adolescent humor and embarrassing situations. But audiences can't help but laugh (those who aren't heading for the exit).

With Apatow's success, of course, came criticism -- "Knocked up" opened him up to accusations of sexism. Nor did it help Apatow's reputation as a serious artist when he vowed to put "at least one penis" in every one of his movies.

Apatow married actrress Leslie Mann, whom he met on the set of "The Cable GFuy," with whom he has two daughters.

"I always try to think: Is there a way for me to be a comedian and be a sane normal person?" he mused in an interview weith ChannelNews Asia. "It's a lifelong quest to see if it's possible to do this in a healthy manner."