(Segel, Jason) The son of a lawyer, Jason Segel grew up in an affluent neighborhood in Los Angeles. He was raised Jewish, but he attended a Christian elementary school. As a teenager, Segel started making movies on his own and developed a passion for puppets. He discovered acting in his senior year of high school and was spotted by a film casting executive during a performance. Instead of going to college, Segel decided to pursue a career as an actor. He was only 18 years old when he auditioned for writer-director Judd Apatow. Apatow cast Segel in a new television series called Freaks and Geeks, a 1980s high school dramatic comedy, which developed a strong cult following. Segel would go on to star in the hit sitcom How I Met Your Mother, followed by numerous film projects in which he starred, wrote, and produced. Segel and novelist Kirsten Miller have collaborated on four books in the middle grade Nightmares! Series, the latest of which is Everything You Need to Know About NIGHTMARES! and How to Defeat Them (Delacorte). Segel and Miller have also partnered on Otherworld (Delacorte), a YA novel that introduces awkward gamer Simon, a teen who gets the chance to be the first to test the newest set of virtual reality goggles before they hit the market. But when his friend Katherine disappears, it is no longer a game; she has been kidnapped by someone or something inside the virtual world, and it’s up to Simon to save her.
