There’s little questioning thatAlbert Brooksmight be one of the most influential (albeit still underrated) comedy stars going back to his tenure onSaturday Night Live, providing the type of shorts that have become a mainstay on that show. Recently,Seth RogenandEvan Goldberg, the masterminds behind the Apple TV+ seriesThe Studio,were invited into theCriterion Closetto dig around their collection. Rogen pulled out Brooks' 1991 comedyDefending Your Life, stating, “Me and Evan explicitly ripped off the ending for this movie when we were making our movie,This Is the End,We did some work to change it, but it is essentially the same ending.”
This is the Endwas Rogen and Goldberg’s 2013 directorial debut, in which Rogen (playing a fictionalized version of himself) and his Canadian friendJay Baruchelattenda housewarming rager atJames Franco’s house, just as everything in L.A. almost literally goes to hell. Rogen and Goldberg called upon just about every actor and friend they’d ever worked with or knew, includingJonah Hill,Michael CeraandChristopher MintzfromSuperbad,Danny McBride, andCraig RobinsonfromPineapple Express,Jason Segel, andKevin Hart, among others, as well as some surprises likeRihannaandEmma Watson. Spoiler: Most of them die in gruesome ways in what ended up being an insane horror-comedy with tons of action, even more gore, and CG demons that made for an impressive directing debut by the duo.
How Does ‘Defending Your Life’ Connect to ‘This is the End’?
Following his stint making shorts forSaturday Night Live, Brooks became a bona fide filmmaker in 1979 withReal Life.After making two more well-regarded comedies in the ’80s, Brooks made his most personal film withDefending Your Lifein 1991. In the movie, Brooks plays Daniel Miller, an advertising exec who dies in a car crash, putting him in a purgatory called Judgment City, where, as the title suggests, he has to defend his questionable life decisions to two judges. Heeventually meetsMeryl Streep’s Julia, and they hit it off, but Daniel declines to spend the night with her, proving that much of his life had been driven by cowardice.
FilmmakerJudd Apatowwas so influenced by Brooks' work that he cast Brooks asPaul Rudd’s father inThis Is 40.In turn, Apatow played a huge part in boosting the careers of other comic actors and filmmakers, including Rogen and Goldberg, whose screenplay forSuperbadcaught Apatow’s eye. Brooks clearly had a similar impact on Rogen, to the point that when Brooksmentioned in 2014that he wrote a scrapped comedy about North Korea, Rogen suggested his forthcoming movie with Goldberg,The Interview, probably wasn’t as good.From there, the love affair between Rogen and Brooks was open and out in public.
Albert Brooks’ Directorial Debut Explored Reality TV Years Before It Existed
The comedy icon saw into the future with this reality television satire.
Ultimately, ‘This is the End’ Is a Very Different Film from ‘Defending Your Life’
Despite Rogen and Goldberg claiming that Brooks’Defending Your Lifeinspired the end ofThis is the End, the two films are nothing alike.This Is the Endis an ensemble movie with a massive group of actors sharing the burden of delivering laughs with Rogen and Baruchel. Brooks' movie is hyper-focused on his own character, reevaluating his life within a courtroom setting, and there are none of the genre aspects that permeate Rogen and Goldberg’s horror-comedy.Brooks deliberately tried to avoid any religious connotations with his version of the afterlife, whileThis Is the Endoften dives headfirst intoThe Exorcistand evenRosemary’s Babyterritory as it explores things like the Apocalypse and the Rapture.
Few of the feel-good aspects of Brooks' film work are evident inThis is the End, which is more of a mélange of the R-rated penis and pot-smoking jokes that were the central focus of much of Rogen and Goldberg’s oeuvre at the time.They’ve clearly matured withThe Studio.This is the Endis a horror-comedy full of demonic entities and gory deaths at every turn, and it’s hard to imagine anyone mentioning it in the same breath asDefending Your Life. That said, in the last ten minutes,This is the Endshows quite clearly what a Rogen and Goldberg version of heaven might look like, complete with pot smoking (of course), and a bizarre performance by the Backstreet Boys.
Rogen may have been a little too hard on himself when suggesting he and Goldberg “ripped off"Defending Your Life,even with their depiction of heaven. Three years after the release ofThis is the End, thesitcomThe Good Placedebuted on NBC, and that was far more liberal and obvious in its “borrowing” from Brooks' film. Either way,This is the Endmight not appeal to the same audience that cherishesDefending Your Life, though it will always be fun to see how different comedians share what their vision of heaven might look like.
This is the End
