“Ahh, Kelly Clarkson!” The 40-Year-Old Virgin Reunion We’ve All Been Waiting For
The Kelly Clarkson Show Reading Time: 3 minutes
In 2005, Judd Apatow and Steve Carell gave us comedy gold with the iconic movie The 40-Year-Old Virgin. With hilarious and cringey situations and one-liners, the movie quickly became a comedy classic. Now, judge of The Voice Kelly Clarkson is calling out Seth Rogen for including her in the comedy lore.
Kelly Clarkson Confronts Seth Rogen About Writing Her Into ‘The 40-Year-Old Virgin’
In one of the movie’s funniest scenes, Carell’s character gets a chest wax in order to make himself more attractive. Because of the extraordinary amount of chest hair he has, the process is quite painful. In a series of rips, he screams some of the funniest lines in the movie. As it turns out, the most notable line was written by Rogen.
On The Kelly Clarkson Show, Clarkson got to the bottom of why she was a line in the movie at all.
“He [Judd Apatow] told me that it’s your fault people scream my name everywhere I go,” Clarkson said to Rogen during a video interview. “It doesn’t matter how many hits, what I do in life. I could save a family from drowning, fires, anything, and literally the one thing people know me from is ‘ahh Kelly Clarkson!'”
One of the reasons why the line is so funny is that it’s so incredibly random. Why would a 40-year-old virgin in the middle of his first chest wax be thinking of Kelly Clarkson? Why is that the name he screams out?
Rogen, who was co-producer and co-star of the film, apologizes to Clarkson for being the reason people scream at her wherever she goes.
“We knew that Carell was going to be waxed and he wasn’t going to be able to think clearly,” he said. “So we wanted to feed him [jokes] and we don’t like to always have profanities. I honestly think I was sitting on my couch writing the jokes and you came on television and I saw you.”
Rogen Talks Comedy Writing, Brainstorming Process
He went on to explain the insider-tip that words with a “k” sound are funnier than other words. A comedy writing technique is to throw words with that sound in to bits for a larger chance at landing.
Rogen even shared his actual notes from the joke’s brainstorming session. Viewers could see Clarkson’s name between “BURGER-PANTIES” and “THROBBING-MONKEY-TAIL.” The host also told Rogen not to apologize as she’s a huge fan of the movie — just maybe not a huge fan of the popularity it’s brought her.
“I could be in Japan, it doesn’t matter where the hell I am,” she said. “‘Since You Been Gone,’ never heard of it. But Kelly Clarkson’s name being yelled in the middle of a waxing: that people know.”
You can catch Clarkson Monday and Tuesday nights on The Voice for more hilarious moments and behind-the-scenes fun.
