Albert Brooks and the Daffy Duck mug

A perennial topic on this board seems to be whether "fear" was an appropriate measure of worthiness.

There have been a lot of excellent answers, mostly but not exclusively on the "yes" side.

However, I think most of the responses ignore the actual creator of the film. Brooks seems to revel in portraying what may well be his own, actual fears and insecurities. This movie showed us his fear of "fear." "Lost in America" showed us his fear of too little fear, or rashness, perhaps.

Roger Ebert once described an incident where, after an interview, Brooks showed Ebert some Warner Bros. mugs he'd gotten and offered Ebert the Elmer Fudd mug. Ebert said he liked the Daffy Duck mug better, and, after a pause, Brooks forced the Daffy Duck mug onto him.

I'm paraphrasing, but Ebert wrote, "I realized what had happened. Albert Brooks didn't like Elmer Fudd either. He liked Daffy Duck. I had taken his favorite mug."

Ebert's point wasn't that he'd literally read Brooks' mind, but that Brooks had created such a complete film persona that it was impossible to imagine the actual person was any different.

Who's to say, after all, that Judgment City only looked and worked the way it did from Brooks' position? Maybe from Julia's viewpoint, it looked slightly different, and people were judged on traits more appropriate to Julia herself. Or not. Point being, the movie is funnier (to me anyway) if seen as Albert Brooks' own private vision of the afterlife; one that brings his insecurities into sharp relief and plays them out for others to see and judge.

Anyway, just wanted to recollect the Daffy Duck mug story.


EDIT: I found the actual article, http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19910407/PEO PLE/44010308