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This is fresh air. I'm Tanya Mosley. If you've laughed at a comedy in the past 30 years, there's a good chance my guest had something to do with it. Judd Apatow directed the 40-year-old virgin, knocked up, and train wreck. He produced Superbad, bridesmaids, and anchorman. He executive produced the cult classic Freaks and Geeks, which launched the careers of Seth Rogan and Jason Siegel.

And he's written for comedy legends like Gary Shanling and Roseanne Barr.

And he's mentored a young Lena Dunham, executive producing all six seasoned of girls.

But here's the thing about Jud Apatow.

He's also a collector, since he was 10 years old, autographs from his idols,

sealed in plastic, letters he wrote as a teen to and from his favorite comedians, photographs

from every movie and TV show, scripts covered in notes and journals, documenting every high

and devastating low. Now at 57, he's letting us get a

glimpse of his collection, which he compiled in a new book called Comedy Nerd, a lifelong

obsession in stories and pictures. It's really unlike any Hollywood memoir I've ever read. It's part

scrapbook, part confessional, part love letter to the art

form of movie making and a glimpse into maybe the psyche of a man who's been making people laugh

for more than three decades. Jud Abatow, welcome back to fresh air. You've been here four times.

Happy to be here. I feel like I'm Norman Mailer. Putting those numbers on the board.

Yes. Okay. This memoir, it's unlike any memoir I've ever seen, as I said, almost 600 pages.

And you write in the introduction that this isn't even everything that you've collected.

Yeah. What made you want to put all of this stuff in a book?

I don't know.

I was always a fan of these books like the Marks Brothers scrapbook, and there was a

...