I'd like to start with Jason Segel. I've always felt a unique affinity for his persona. This is a guy who has been oddly engaging yet completely endearing and - most importantly - both effortlessly funny and likable since his cameo as a high-school stoner who couldn't help Jennifer Love-Hewitt find Ethan Embry in
Can't Hardly Wait. In many ways Segel is an unlikely movie star whether it be his awkward charisma, his laid back persona as opposed to the traditionally handsome and self-serious stars who are typically granted the more dramatic leading roles, but while "movie star" may be a stretch for anyone these days Segel has carved out a particular spot for himself among the recognizable faces on posters to which we now attribute the word "star". As one of the many funny guys doing as they please in Hollywood after originally making their bones in Apatow projects, Segel has had an interesting journey. He never had the headlining Apatow treatment necessarily but served enough time in supporting parts to garner an Apatow-production via a script that was obviously very personal to him. It was with
Forgetting Sarah Marshall (some thirteen years ago now) that Segel finally came into his own with what fully displayed his personal brand of comedy and it killed. Absolutely destroyed, one might say.
Sarah Marshall is one of the best comedies of the last twenty years and much of that has to do not just with Segel's willingness to be vulnerable which felt a lot more fresh and a lot more bold in 2008, but largely it deals in that extreme sense of sincerity the guy generates. One can't help but think Segel is probably a little strange, but that he also has this cool streak that makes you want to hang out with him. He's not an immediately striking presence, but the more you unravel his philosophy the more you want to hug him. The one-two punch of
Sarah Marshall and
I Love You, Man seemed to set Segel's career trajectory in stone, but after a good mix of ill-performing studio productions (
Gulliver's Travels, Bad Teacher) and better, more personal milestones (
The Muppets, The Five-Year Engagement) Segel's ride seemed to culminate only some six years after it began with the bomb of a summer comedy that was
Sex Drive and the fact his long-running hit sitcom,
How I Met Your Mother, ended its run that same year. In 2015, Segel portrayed David Foster Wallace opposite Jesse Eisenberg in
The End of the Tour, but while this served as a potential hint as to where the actor would take his career next he has since largely been absent from the public eye (only appearing in two Netflix films in 2017 and 2018). I say all of this to say that as Segel returns in a more substantial role both in film as well as in the public consciousness that it finally seems the space he now occupies personally has synced with the space he occupies onscreen. It's possible there isn't a more perfect part for Segel than that of Dane Faucheux as it utilizes his vulnerabilities, his comedic sense, and his genuine spirit to convey the wholly compassionate titular friend of Gabriela Cowperthwaite's
Our Friend ; a man who visits his friends over Thanksgiving break and ends up staying with them for over two years in order to help care for the couple and their two young daughters as they deal with a terminal cancer diagnosis.
