The Judd Apatow comedy community may have given us a few uninspired movies like The Sitter, but every crappy project is worth it for the R-rated comedy revival lord Apatow provided. He serves as producer on Wanderlust and the film stars one of his many muses Paul Rudd, yet the movie isn’t really part of his collective. Nope it comes from David Wain, the strange and hilarious little man who was responsible for a variety weirdo cult successes like The State, Stella, Wet Hot American Summer, and The Ten. The filmmaker with a taste for winking anti-comedy probably could have spent his career on the fringes if the R-rated comedy trend hadn’t given him a shot at mainstream viewers with the surprisingly successful and cripplingly funny Role Models.

Now, Wain’s back with Wanderlust. Co-written with longtime collaborator Ken Marino, the film returns Wain to mainstream mode for a comedy that’s conventional enough on the surface to please moll-trolling cinemagoers, but with enough eccentric asides and supporting performances to please his more demanding and deeply strange fanbase.  Hit the jump for our review of Wanderlust on Blu-ray.

The first trailer for stand-up comedian Mike Birbiglia’s Sleepwalk with Me has gone online.  Birbiglia both directed and starred in the piece which tells the tale of a struggling comedian who faces a career slump and a failing relationship, amidst increasingly dangerous bouts of sleepwalking.  Fans of Birbiglia will recognize some of his signature jokes from his stand-up act by the same name.  It’s at once a humorous and touching tale that features the comedians signature Birbiglian style.  Sleepwalk with Me, also starring Lauren Ambrose, Kristen Schaal, James Rebhorn, Carol Kane , Cristin Milioti, Aya Cash, Lucy DeVito and David Wain, opens August 24th.  Hit the jump to view the trailer.

Although he’s currently playing a big bad vampire on HBO’s True Blood, Christopher Meloni is now set to play a big, bad CEO in David Wain’s rom-com spoof, They Came Together. The picture reunites the Wet Hot American Summer director with stars Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler. Poehler’s character runs a small knick-knack shop that is about to go out of business thanks to Rudd’s company.  THR reports that Meloni will star as Rudd’s boss, the CEO of CorporateCo Coporation and Co, Inc.  Written by Wain and Michael Showalter, the picture plans to wrap up casting and shoot this July.  They Came Together also stars Ed Helms, Michael Ian Black, Jason Mantzoukas, Cobie Smulders and Noureen DeWulf.

Wet Hot American Summer director, David Wain, is adding some heat to his rom-com spoof They Came Together by way of Cobie Smulders (The Avengers) and Noureen DeWulf (Ocean’s Thirteen).  Michael Ian Black joins the reunion of Wain, Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler, as he too was part of 2001′s Wet Hot American Summer. The new film, which Wain calls “a spoof/homage/deconstruction/love letter to Romantic Comedies,” was also written by Wain and Michael Showalter, again pairing the former Wet Hot scribes.  Hit the jump to read more about They Came Together and less about Wet Hot American Summer.

Andy Bernard’s schedule book is pretty packed this summer. Ed Helms, one of the lead actors on The Office, will film two movies before returning to his desk at Dunder Mifflin this fall; he’ll join Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler in They Came Together before filming a cameo in We’re The Millers.  Both of these will finish before filming for The Office begins on July 30. Hit the jump for more on these two films.

Here are some recent casting additions at a glance:

• Edward James Olmos (Battlestar Galactica) has been confirmed as a cast member in Machete Kills, starring Danny Trejo.
• Rosie Huntington-Whiteley(Transformers: Dark of the Moon) is set to join the cast of Mad Max: Fury Road.
• Jason Mantzoukas (The Dictator) joins the David Wain-directed comedy, They Came Together, with Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler.

Hit the jump for more.

More casting news for you today.  Here it is at a glance:

• Richard Dreyfuss has joined the indie pic, Squatters, along with Lolita Davidovich, Nancy Travis, Evan Ross, Luke Grimes and Andrew Howard.
• Helena Bonham Carter and Kathy Bates have joined Amelie director, Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s The Young and Prodigious Spivet.
• Max Greenfield of Fox’s New Girl has joined the Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler comedy, They Came Together, directed by David Wain.

Hit the jump for more.

Back in 2001, director David Wain’s Wet Hot American Summer starred Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler in a satire of coming-of-age, last-day-of-summer ensemble comedy films.  Now, the three will reunite once again for the romantic comedy parody, They Came Together.  The delightfully meta-titled project will be financed through Lionsgate’s microbudget division.  Wain co-wrote the script with collaborator, Michael Showalter not long after completing Wet Hot American Summer, but the project never got off the ground.  Lionsgate is now aiming for a production start this summer.  Rudd and Poehler both participated in a table read of both the Wet Hot American Summer and They Came Together scripts at San Francisco’s Sketchfest earlier this year.  Hit the jump for more on the plot of They Came Together, which takes a clear shot at You’ve Got Mail and a number of other rom coms.

With Oscar weekend upon us, the aura of patting you and your peers on the back is as present as ever. In that spirit, I’m using this week’s opening paragraph to recognize the solid work that Matt, Adam, Dave and co. have done in covering the 84th Annual Academy Awards. To prep for Sunday’s show, I recommend you getting up to date on all of our Oscar coverage, culminating in Matt and Adam’s predictions.

In this week’s installment you’ll find a slew of materials from The Avengers including new movie and toy images, Wanderlust interviews with Jennifer Aniston, Paul Rudd and more, very cool fan-made trailers for The Dark Knight Rises and John Carter, the first clip from The Amazing Spider-Man, and the scoop on Spartacus: Blood and Sand star Jai Courney‘s new gig as John McClane’s son in A Good Day to Die Hard. A quick recap and link to each ensues after the jump.

In the hilarious new comedy Wanderlust, over-extended and over-stressed Manhattanites George (Paul Rudd) and Linda (Jennifer Aniston) leave their over-priced micro-loft in the West Village and stumble upon Elysium, an idyllic community populated by very colorful, sexually adventurous characters. While the couple embraces a refreshingly different way of looking at things, they begin to question how they should live the rest of their lives.

At the film’s press day, Collider spoke to director/producer/co-writer David Wain, in both a roundtable and a 1-on-1 interview, about how the idea for this film started, the collaborative process he has with Ken Marino, what made Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston the right pair for these roles, why he wanted Judd Apatow to produce the film, strategically placing the genitalia to make it most effective, how much the story changed from first draft to final draft, and “The Bizarro Cut” that you can expect on the DVD. He also talked about juggling multiple projects in various stages of development, working on a sequel for Wet Hot American Summer, and having just directed an episode of the Fox comedy series New Girl, starring Zooey Deschanel. Check out what he had to say after the jump:

If you gather most of the alumni of MTV’s The State and put them together in a movie, hilarity will follow.  Throw in Paul Rudd and you get something even better.  David Wain‘s Wet Hot American Summer and Role Models proved this, and his latest film, Wanderlust, proves it again.  It’s ad-libbed comedy at its finest where you get a strong set-up for good jokes, and then you can hear all the alternate takes that are going to be on the DVD.  Wain isn’t afraid to let scenes run a little long if one of his actors is getting into a strong rhythm, and the only time the director/co-writer falters is letting Jennifer Aniston get overshadowed by the rest of the cast, and when he lets the comedy veer from madcap to unsettling.  But these are minor stumbles in a movie filled with moments that you’ll be quoting for years to come.

In the hilarious new comedy Wanderlust, over-extended and over-stressed Manhattanites George (Paul Rudd) and Linda (Jennifer Aniston) leave their over-priced micro-loft in the West Village and stumble upon Elysium, an idyllic community populated by very colorful, sexually adventurous characters. While the couple embraces a refreshingly different way of looking at things, they begin to question how they should live the rest of their lives.

During a press conference at the film’s press day, co-stars Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston talked about how much fun they had teaming up again (having first worked together on The Object of My Affection), what they enjoyed about working with director David Wain, how nice it was to shoot somewhere that they could disappear without the ever-present paparazzi, how much they enjoyed getting to improvise on set, and how long they think they would last, if they ended up in a place like Elysium. Check out what they had to say after the jump.

We’ve just received six movie clips from director David Wain’s (Role Models) Wanderlust. Starring Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston, Wanderlust follows a stressed-out Manhattan couple looking for a slower pace of living.  Their search leads them to a free love commune populated by wacky characters played by Justin Theroux, Alan Alda, Malin Akerman, Joe Lo Truglio and more.  You can check out the red-band trailer here and another clip from the film here.  The comedy, written by Wain and Role Models co-writer Ken Marino, lands in theaters on February 24^th.  Hit the jump to check out the new clips.

Opening next Friday is David Wain’s (Role Models) new comedy Wanderlust, and Universal has released a last-minute red band trailer for the pic. My ticket was already sold simply because I’m a big fan of Wain, Paul Rudd, and everyone involved, but this red band trailer reaffirms that Wanderlust is poised to be an incredibly funny flick. If you’re worried about this trailer spoiling all the good jokes, rest assured that there are only a couple new bits sprinkled in with the material we’ve seen previously.

Hit the jump to watch the trailer. The film also stars Jennifer Aniston, Justin Theroux, Ken Marino, Joe Lo Truglio, Malin Akerman, Kathryn Hahn, and Alan Alda. Wanderlust opens in 2D on February 24th.

The trailer for David Wain‘s Wanderlust has gone online.  The movie focuses on Manhattan couple George and Linda (Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston) who are forced to move to Atlanta when George loses his job.  Moving to Atlanta is apparently a fate so terrible that it causes Aniston to scream at the heavens.  The two then move around to various locations until they land on a commune and start to feel renewed.  It looks like For Better or Worse or Did You Hear About the Morgans? if either of those movies were funny.  Wain delivered a great little gem with Role Models and it’s tough to go wrong when you throw in The State alum like Ken Marino and Joe Lo Truglio.  There’s a bunch of great jokes in the trailer, and it isn’t even a red-band version.  Color me excited for this flick.

Hit the jump to check out the trailer.  The great cast also includes Justin Theroux, Malin Akerman, Ray Liotta, Lauren Ambrose, Kathryn Hahn, and Alan Alda.  Wanderlust opens February 24, 2012. [We've updated the article with new images which you can check out after the jump.]