Jason Segel Biography

Jason Jordan Segel (born January 18, 1980) is an American television and film actor and screenwriter, known for his work with producer Judd Apatow on the short-lived television series Freaks and Geeks and Undeclared, the movie Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and also for his role as Marshall Eriksen in the CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother.

Early life
Segel was born in Los Angeles, California and raised in Pacific Palisades, California. He attended a Catholic school, though he is Jewish. Following the completion of elementary school, he completed his middle and high school studies at Harvard-Westlake School, where his 6'4" frame helped him as an active member of the state champion boys' basketball team. He was hoping to become an actor during his school days and acted in local theater productions at Palisades Playhouse.

Career
He is known for his role as "Freak" Nick Andopolis on the short-lived NBC comedy-drama series Freaks and Geeks, about a group of suburban Detroit high school students circa 1980. He also personally wrote a song for his character, Nick, to sing to the lead female character, Lindsay (Linda Cardellini), in an episode of Freaks and Geeks. She and Segel dated for a few years following the show's cancellation. It was rumored that she dumped him for gaining twenty pounds, but it has since emerged that the statement was in fact a joke taken out of context.

Segel had recurring roles on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation as Neil Jansen and on Undeclared as Eric. He currently plays Marshall on the CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother, which debuted on September 19, 2005. Feature film appearances include Slackers, SLC Punk!, The Good Humor Man, and Dead Man on Campus. In 2007, he appeared in Knocked Up, directed by Freaks and Geeks producer Judd Apatow. Segel starred in the lead role of 2008's Forgetting Sarah Marshall, a film he wrote and Apatow produced, with Shauna Robertson, for Universal Pictures. His new movie I Love You, Man will be out on March 20th, 2009 from Dreamworks.

Segel, along with Nicholas Stoller, has recently been enlisted by Disney to write and direct the next Muppets film. In Forgetting Sarah Marshall Segel's character writes a "Dracula" musical performed by puppets. In an interview with WRIF Radio in Detroit, he stated the Dracula musical with puppets, as well as being broken up with while naked, were real experiences he wrote into the movie. Those cloth creatures were custom-made by the Henson puppeteers, and the experience emboldened Segel to pitch his concept for a Muppets movie.