Mel Brooks

Three of his films are included on the American Film Institute's list of the top 100 comedy films of the past 100 years (1900–2000), all of which were ranked in the top 15: Blazing Saddles at number 6, The Producers at number 11, and Young Frankenstein at number 13.

Melvin James Brooks (born June 28, 1926) is an American actor, comedian, filmmaker, songwriter, and playwright.

With a career spanning over seven decades, he is known as a writer and director of a variety of successful broad farces and parodies.

A recipient of numerous accolades, he is one of 19 entertainers to win the EGOT, which includes an Emmy Award, a Grammy Award, an Academy Award, and a Tony Award.

Brooks was born on a tenement kitchen table, on June 28, 1926, in Brownsville, Brooklyn, to Kate (née Brookman) and Max Kaminsky, and grew up in Williamsburg.

His father's family were German Jews from Danzig (Gdańsk, Poland); his mother was from Kyiv, in the Pale of Settlement of the Russian Empire (present-day Ukraine).

He had three older brothers: Irving, Lenny, and Bernie.

His father died of tuberculosis of the kidney at 34 when Brooks was two years old.

He has said of his father's death, "There's an outrage there. I may be angry at God, or at the world, for that. And I'm sure a lot of my comedy is based on anger and hostility. Growing up in Williamsburg, I learned to clothe it in comedy to spare myself problems—like a punch in the face."

Brooks was a small, sickly boy who often was bullied and teased by his classmates because of his size.

He grew up in tenement housing.

At age nine, Brooks went to a Broadway show with his maternal uncle Joe—a taxi driver who drove the Broadway doormen back to Brooklyn for free and was given the tickets in gratitude—and saw Anything Goes with William Gaxton, Ethel Merman and Victor Moore at the Alvin Theater.

After the show, he told his uncle that he was not going to work in the garment district like everyone else but was absolutely going into show business.

When Brooks was 14 he gained employment as a pool-side tummler (entertainer) at the Butler Lodge, a second-rate Borscht Belt hotel, where he met 18-year-old Sid Caesar.

Brooks kept his guests amused with his crazy antics.

In a Playboy interview, he explained that one day he stood at the edge of a diving board wearing a derby and a large alpaca overcoat with two suitcases full of rocks, and then announced: "Business is terrible! I can't go on!"

before jumping, fully clothed into the pool.

He was taught by Buddy Rich (who had also grown up in Williamsburg) how to play the drums, and started to earn money as a musician when he was 14.

During his time as a drummer, he was given his first opportunity as a comedian at the age of 16, filling in for an ill MC.

During his teens, he changed his name to Melvin Brooks, influenced by his mother's maiden name Brookman, after being confused with trumpeter Max Kaminsky.

Brooks graduated from Eastern District High School in Williamsburg in January 1944 and intended to follow his older brother and enroll in Brooklyn College to study psychology.

In early 1944, in his senior year in high school, Brooks was recruited to take the Army General Classification Test, a Stanford–Binet-type IQ test.

After scoring highly, Brooks was sent to the Army Specialized Training Program at the Virginia Military Institute to be taught electrical engineering, horse riding, and saber fighting.

In 1944, Brooks was drafted into the Army.

Twelve weeks later, when he turned 18, he officially joined the United States Army at the Fort Dix, New Jersey, induction center, and was sent to the Field Artillery Replacement Training Center at Fort Sill, Oklahoma for basic training and radio operator training.

Brooks was then sent back to Fort Dix for overseas assignment.

A reporter for the United States Department of Defense writes that Brooks arrived in France in November 1944, and later to Belgium, serving with the 78th Infantry Division as a forward artillery observer.

Brooks says he boarded the SS Sea Owl at the Brooklyn Navy Yard around February 15, 1945.

In February 1945, a short while later, Brooks was transferred to the 1104th Engineer Combat Battalion as a combat engineer, participating in the Battle of the Bulge.

Brooks began his career as a comic and a writer for Sid Caesar's variety show Your Show of Shows from 1950 to 1954.

Brooks was married to actress Anne Bancroft from 1964 until her death in 2005.

With Buck Henry, he created the hit television comedy series Get Smart, which starred Don Adams and ran from 1965 to 1970.

His films include The Producers (1967), The Twelve Chairs (1970), Blazing Saddles (1974), Young Frankenstein (1974), Silent Movie (1976), High Anxiety (1977), History of the World, Part I (1981), Spaceballs (1987), and Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993).

Brooks rose to prominence becoming one of the most successful film directors of the 1970s.

With Carl Reiner, he created the comedy sketch The 2000 Year Old Man, and together, they released several comedy albums, starting with 2000 Year Old Man in 1960.

A musical adaptation of his first film, The Producers, ran on Broadway from 2001 to 2007 and was itself remade into a musical film in 2005.

He wrote and produced the Hulu series History of the World, Part II (2023).

Their son Max Brooks is an actor and author, known for his novel World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War (2006).

In 2021, Mel Brooks published his memoir titled All About Me!.

He received a Kennedy Center Honor in 2009, a Hollywood Walk of Fame star in 2010, the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2013, a British Film Institute Fellowship in 2015, a National Medal of Arts in 2016, a BAFTA Fellowship in 2017, and the Honorary Academy Award in 2024.