All About Me! My Remarkable Life in Show Business by Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks (born Melvin Kaminsky in 1926) grew up in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn during what he recalls fondly as very good times. He had three older brothers. His father, Max, died of tuberculosis when Mel was two years old. Their mother, Katie, worked odd jobs and relied on the kindness of their relatives, who lived in the neighborhood, to help the family take care of their needs. Mel’s older brothers doted on him. One, Lenny, would give him 50 cents every Saturday. Mel could buy a salami sandwich and a soda, go to the movies, and still have enough left over for ice cream.
Mel’s father and his family migrated to the US from Poland and sold herring from push carts in Jewish neighborhoods all over New York. Mel’s mother was from Kiev, Ukraine. The push carts did pretty well. Williamsburg was a good place to grow up. The boys played stickball constantly, dodging cars as needed. Mel and his buddies made balsa wood airplanes and flew them in the local parks. The public schools were good and many graduates went on to become professionals or start their own businesses. During the summer, the poorer kids, including the Kaminsky brothers, went to a camp paid for by Eddie Cantor, a noted local entertainer, who knew Mel’s mother because they grew up in the same neighborhood.
The Kaminsky brothers worked hard. The oldest went to pharmacy school while working full time in the garment district. Mel could always count on his siblings to help him understand some homework that he didn't get. Many of the kids in Williamsburg who had no interest in college went to work in the garment district where you could make a pretty good living. Mel had no interest in that. He loved planes and thought about becoming a pilot. He really enjoyed getting people to laugh at his jokes and spent a lot of school time working on his comedy routines, often resulting in some punishment. He also loved to go to plays. There were some lower-level actors in his building and they got Mel into theaters to check out what was on stage. One of Mel’s friends was the brother of Buddy Rich, a fledgling drummer back then who hit the big time in the 1950s and 1960s. Mel liked to drum and Buddy taught him a thing or two.
Mel loved movies and went to several a week. He studied physical comedy on the big screen, which helped him understand how to use pratfalls and such to get laughs. He really enjoyed Charlie Chaplin, the Marx Brothers, Buster Keaton, and the Three Stooges. As a teenager, Mel was pretty good at doing impressions of movie stars and honed his physical comedy skills. He also was hired as a busboy at a resort in the Catskills, the vacation home to many Jewish people from New York City. Several times when an unknown comic couldn’t make the performance Mel would fill in. As a teenager he wasn’t very good, but failing to get laughs back then then helped him hone his craft to get laughs later.
In the early 1940s, every able-bodied man went into the service to fight WWII. Mel’s brothers joined up. Mel was 15 when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor but there was a program that placed high school seniors into Virginia Military Institute for their last semester and then sent them off to Europe to fight. Mel loved VMI and ended up doing transport during the war. Soon his commanding officer figured out that Mel was funny and had his act together, so PFC Kaminsky organized shows for the soldiers, occasionally doing his own stand-up routine. Mel saw a lot of Europe while he was there – building bridges, defusing landmines, and making friends with the locals. One of them was Petite Henri who was a young boy during the war. Mel ran into him thirty-five years later while he was on vacation. After the war ended, Mel stayed in Germany in Special Services where he put together shows for occupying troops. He met a lot of American stars then, which helped him later in his professional life. He also developed his skills as a song-and-dance man and he became a pretty good one.
Sid Caesar Back in NYC, Mel hunted for a show business job. He was hired by a local promoter, Benjamin Kutcher, who cozied up to rich old ladies to get them to finance his productions. Hence was born the idea for The Producers, a smash early movie hit for Mel Brooks who had changed his name after the war. After a year with Benjamin, Mel was ready to move on. A show biz buddy invited Mel to see a new act, Sid Caesar, at a nightclub. Mel was enthralled and got to go backstage to meet Sid, who asked for a critique of his performance. Mel actually did have some suggestions. They hit it off and Mel was paid a little bit of money to write some jokes. In the late 1940s he became a full-time writer for Sid, who starred in several early TV variety shows that included Your Show of Shows (1950-1954), which ran live on NBC on Saturday nights from 9 to 10:30. The program was the original Saturday Night Live.
Your Show of Shows was so popular that attendance at movie theaters dramatically dropped off when it was on. The case included comic greats like Imogene Coca and Carl Reiner. Producing and presenting 90 minutes of live TV every week is challenging, especially back then when they didn't have recording equipment to check out rehearsals. The work was mentally challenging and Mel was in three years of therapy as a result. After Your Show of Shows was canceled, Sid starred in Caesar’s Hour which featured some of the same crew, including Mel, and lasted until 1957.
By 1960, Sid Caesar was out of the limelight and Mel Brook was out of a job. He and Carl Reiner came up with The 2000 Year Old Man, a funny bit that featured the world’s oldest guy (Mel) being interviewed about contemporary and historic events by straight man Carl. One skit had Mel criticizing Paul Revere for riding around spreading anti-Semitism by yelling, “The Yiddish are coming!” It was that kind of humor. The 2000 Year Old Man was a huge success that led to live performances and record albums and enough money to make everyone happy.
Anne Bancroft In 1961 Mel was writing, including doing the screenplay for the upcoming movie, Bye Bye Birdie. A colleague who was working on the Perry Como Show invited Me to go to the show’s rehearsal. Anne Bancroft sang during the rehearsal after which Mel shouted, “Anne Bancroft! I love you!” to which she replied, “Who the hell are you?” Mel introduced himself and Anne went nuts, praising The 2000 Year Old Man records that she loved. It was a magic moment - February 5, 1961.
Mel pursued (“stalked” today) Anne and they dated. He had a sketchy income but he did a few commercials based on The 2000 Year Old Man which bailed him out. He also wrote the dialogue for a short, humorous documentary which won the Academy Award that year. He had enough money to take Anne out.
By 1964, Mel had earned a reputation as a good comedy writer. He was asked to write a pilot script for a TV show that would merge the bumbling Inspector Clouseau with the smooth James Bond. Thus was hatched Get Smart, which starred Don Adams as Maxwell Smart, an inept US spy who was always wrong but always came out on top. Smart had a shoe phone which he had to take off to use. Brooks believes that this bit of whimsy inspired the cell phone.
Get Smart’s success meant that Mel finally had a steady paycheck so he and Anne could get married. They tied the knot on August 5, 1964, in New York City Hall with a justice of peace presiding. It was the second marriage for each of them, with Mel having three children from his first marriage. Mel forgot the ring, so Anne gave him one of her hoop earrings to use. Mel also forgot to get a witness so he borrowed one from the couple that got married just before them. Mel was nothing if not disorganized, but he was very funny.
Mel wanted to make a play inspired by his first boss, Benjamin Kutcher, who schmoozed and swindled old ladies to finance his productions which generally failed, but failure paid him well. Mel’s working title for the soon-to-tank play was Springtime for Hitler - A Gay Romp with Adolph and Eva at Berchtesgarden, which was sure to offend most of the known world.
Mel sent the script summary off to Broadway producers he knew and they all had the same reaction. It’s too complicated, with too many characters, for a play. It’s a movie.
Mel agreed and set off to find someone to write the lead song, Springtime for Hitler. He was frustrated until Anne told him that he should write the song, which he did. Mel played the piano and had a good voice, but this was the first song that he had ever written, and it worked.
Mel wrote the entire script and then had to find someone to produce it, which, in movie lingo means pay for it. He went to many producers and got the same response – a comedy about Adolph Hitler is just too controversial. He finally met with Joseph Levine of Embassy Pictures who liked it. Levine cut his Hollywood teeth on Grade B spaghetti westerns that were filmed in Italy. Later he produced some classics including The Lion in Winter. Mel announced that he’d be directing the film which was agreed to after some discussion. One thing had to change. The working title, Springtime for Hitler, had to go. Movie theaters would not put Hitler’s name up in lights on their marquees. Mel came up with The Producers, which worked.
From the beginning, Mel saw Zero Mostel, a larger-than-life performer, as Max Bialystock, the force behind the fraud. He had no clue who to cast as Leo Bloom, the mousy accountant. Mel and Anne had seen Gene Wilder in a play in New York. Mel immediately saw Gene as Leo. They met a few times. Gene loved the script and agreed to take the part.
For the playwright, Mel wanted Dustin Hoffman, a rising star. Unfortunately – or fortunately as it turned out – Dustin was off to do the defining role of his early career in The Graduate so he wasn’t available. Ironically, Anne Bancroft, who was only a few years older than Hoffman, was his co-star as Mrs. Robinson, one of her most memorable roles. It’s funny how life works sometimes. Kenny Mars, a relative unknown, got the part of Franz Liebkind, the nutty, gay, playwright. That worked.
The film was produced on time and under budget. Since Mel had a contract that gave him the final say in the finished cut, they didn’t waste any time on post-production changes. Joseph Levine, the producer who got the film made, was having second thoughts but he gave it the green light. The Producers opened in early March of 1967 at the Fine Arts Theater in NYC.
There was a line around the block before the first show. Mel was surprised until he found out what had happened. Peter Sellers had seen an advance copy and loved it. He paid for a big ad in Variety, the entertainment newspaper, and gave the film a great review. Although Variety was a Hollywood newspaper, it found its way to NYC and people read it and showed up.
The movie got great reviews when it was released in 1967 and it won an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, which was written by Brooks. Gene Wilder was in the audience and was caught on camera in tears.
Blazing Saddles Mel made very little money from The Producers, despite its success. He was approached by David Begelman – if his name was spelled “Bagelman'' he could work at Goldilox. He had just started a new production company that had a script they wanted Mel to rewrite. Mel brought in a team of comedy writers, including Richard Pryor, and they went to work.
As we know, the running gag is that the new lawman they bring in to clean up the town, Sheriff Bart, is Black. The citizens, all named Johnson, are pretty racist and the dialogue and jokes reflected that. Racial prejudice is the engine that drives the film, albeit prejudice with lots of laughs. The whole film was deliberately off-kilter which is why it was called Blazing Saddles, which makes no sense as a name. Mel wanted Richard Pryor as the lead, but the studio rejected that because of his erratic behavior and serious drug problems. Mel had seen Cleavon Little in a Broadway play and saw him as the sheriff. Cleavon was a superb actor who got into the tone of the movie right away and needed little direction. For the Marlena Dietrich-type seductress Lili Von Shtupp, Mel cast Madeline Kahn who could sing and ham it up. She had toyed with the idea of being an opera singer. She had the pipes. Harvey Korman was a comic standout on the popular Carol Burnett TV show, so he fit right in as Hedley Lamarr, the corrupt district attorney.
Mel still needed to cast the Waco Kid, a reformed drunk who became Sheriff Bart’s sidekick. John Wayne read the script and loved it, but he said it was too dirty for him to do. It would hurt his image/brand. Mel approached Gig Young, who was an established actor who was good at light comedy. Mel hired him, but early on it became clear that, despite Gig’s agent assuring Mel that Gig’s drinking days were behind him, they weren’t. (Bob’s Note: In the summer of 1960, Gig Young visited his family who lived in Lake Junaluska, NC. The Gaudets lived two doors down from the Youngs. We never met the star but we did wave at him.)
Mel turned to the actor who he trusted the most in the world – Gene Wilder – and the rest is cinema history. Wilder could play it straight as well as deliver comic lines so it was a good fit. He read the script over the weekend and loved it. They began shooting the movie a few days later and wrapped it up in just ten weeks. Mel wrote all of the songs as well as being the director. He says that Blazing Saddles was the beginning of his complete disregard for reality. The cowboys and beans flatulence scene and the constant pushing the envelope on racist tropes, both broke new ground. Having crooner Frankie Laine singing the movie’s theme song and Count Basie leading his band as Sheriff Bart rides into town are classic. Having a black limousine pick up Bart and the Waco Kid as the movie ends is a great finale. All of these things were off the entertainment grid back in the mid-1970s. The head of Warner Brothers Pictures told Mel to drop many scenes, including the bean scene and Mongo punching a horse. The studio head also told Mel to not use the N word and to cut Lili’s sexy song. Mel nodded his head and left everything in.
Blazing Saddles ran in theaters for four months in the summer and fall of 1974, much longer than expected. When it came out, it was the second-highest grossing western of all time after Butch Cassidy, not bad for a ten-week shoot.
Young Frankenstein Gene Wilder came up with the idea for this movie while he was working on Blazing Saddles. At lunch one day, he pitched Mel on the concept of a movie featuring Dr. Frankenstein’s grandson. Mel liked it and asked Wilder if he had any financial backing for the film. Gene said that he had $57 in his wallet which Brooks took as a down payment on what would become a classic comedy film.
Gene and Mel both had scared themselves to death by watching the classic 1930’s Frankenstein movies starring Boris Karloff. I remember watching those movies (as well as the Dracula flicks) on Saturday night’s Creature Feature in Richmond, VA, when I was babysitting my siblings so my parents could go out on the town. I was 12 years old and the movies terrified me.
Young Frankenstein would pay homage to those early horror movies. The tone would be dark and somber and the movie would be shot in black-and-white. James Whale had directed the Frankenstein movies so Brooks and Wilder carefully studied his techniques. They did a lot of the prep work for their upcoming film after shooting for Blazing Saddles had ended for the day.
Wilder was an obvious choice for the lead, but Mel was stumped on filling in the rest of the cast. He got a call from Wilder’s agent who was looking for work for Peter Boyle and Marty Feldman. Gene and Mel were delighted. They saw Peter as the monster and Marty as Igor, the hunchback-not-of-Notre-Dame.
Mel had enough work product to pitch the film to a studio. He went to Columbia, who was interested but pushed back on shooting it in black-and-white. To Brooks that was a deal killer so he moved on. Alan Ladd, Jr. (the son of Alan Ladd the actor) was part of the leadership team that had just taken over Twentieth Century Fox. Mel had a contact with Ladd so he sent the script over. Alan Jr. loved it. He also agreed to pay whatever it took to make the movie. Mel almost fainted but he accepted the offer.
Mel put the rest of the cast together. Kenny Mars, who had played the crazy playwright in The Producers, was cast as the crazy German policeman, Inspector Kemp. (I have seen the movie many times but I hadn’t realized that Kemp put his monocle on the eye that had the eye patch over it until I read this book. That was an obvious sight gag that I missed.) The role of Frau Blucher, the crazy housekeeper, went to Cloris Leachman, who had impressed Mel by winning Best Supporting Actress in 1971’s The Last Picture Show. (That is a superb movie. If you haven’t seen it, check it out.) Mel held an audition to find the attractive lab assistant, Inga. Terri Garr knocked it out of the park with her fake German accent and she was cute. Mel went to Madeline Kahn, the Teutonic Vamp in Blazing Saddles, to play Dr. Frankenstein’s socialite girlfriend, Elizabeth, who ultimately falls in love with the monster.
The cast was set except that it wasn’t. Gene Wilder played tennis with Gene Hackman every Saturday. Hackman asked what Wilder was up to. Once Wilder told him about Young Frankenstein, Hackman wanted in. There was an opening for a character, the blind man who would befriend the monster and end up dumping hot soup in his crotch. It was a minor role but Gene Hackman was delighted to do it at minimum pay scale, despite the fact that Hackman was an A-List actor.
The movie was filmed at Fox Studio 5, a famous one. Brooks and Wilder found out that the original sets and equipment from the 1930s Frankenstein pictures were in storage. They were used in the movie, which is really neat. The production crew went back to using tons of dry ice, a throw-back technique, for fog and creepiness. It took four hours a day to make Peter Boyle look like the monster. A lot of the gags are based on old vaudeville shtick such as when Igor the hunchback tells Dr. Frankenstein to “Walk this way.” The good doctor follows him at which point Igor says “No -– walk this way!” and goes into his comical hunchback shuffle.
For its initial screening, the film ran almost two-and-a-half hours, much too long for a comedy, especially in the 1970s. It took three months to cut the movie down to 95 minutes. Young Frankenstein was to open in December of 1974, up against The Towering Inferno and The Godfather, Part II, so Mel had to scramble to publicize the picture. He had the 5,600 square foot side of the Playboy building in LA painted as a billboard for the movie which required 86,000 gallons of paint. Mel was indeed nuts. The film was a huge hit. In February, Blazing Saddles was released. In December, Young Frankenstein opened. 1974 was a very good year for Mel Brooks.
More movies Mel Brooks made many more films than I described above. These include: The Twelve Steps, a take-off on a Russian fable; Silent Movie, literally a silent movie with no dialogue; Robin Hood: Men in Tights; To Be or Not to Be, a remake of the 1942 classic set in WWII; and a few others. High Anxiety, which featured goings-on in a psychiatric asylum, was a spoof on Alfred Hitchcock films. Hitchcock loved Blazing Saddles and was an advisor to Mel on High Anxiety in 1977. History of the World, Part I (1981) begins with Mel as Moses dropping the third tablet that had the commandments on them. That’s why we have ten commandments, not fifteen. Spaceballs (1987) was a parody of the Star Wars movies, but the film also featured riffs on Star Trek, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Alien.
Brook’s films all made money, although none were as successful as Blazing Saddles or Young Frankenstein, both of which are considered classics. The book goes into detail on the making of each one of his movies. It’s good reading but this piece would be twice as long if I summarized them, so – as my gift to you – I didn’t write about them.
Brooksfilms By the late 1970s, Mel had been both a successful director and producer. He was interested in making serious films, but he knew that audiences would have a tough time taking his films seriously if it was a Mel Brook’s production. Thus, was born Brooksfilms, an independent studio where writers and directors could be creative without having to worry about a producer's heavy hand. Mel would be the producer and he had developed a reputation for letting talent do its thing without being micromanaged. He pulled in some solid Hollywood talent to help him out, including Randy Auerbach, daughter of the Boston Celtics’ Red Auerbach. She was a talented director who had worked with Mel previously.
The studio produced some great movies including The Elephant Man (1980) starring the recently-deceased John Hurt. Mel volunteered his wife, Anne Bancroft, to be in the film, getting paid at the lowest union rate, which helped the bottom line. The film was a huge hit that credentialed Brooksfilms as a serious studio. Other productions included Frances, about Frances Farmer, a mentally ill actress that received two Oscar nominations and My Favorite Year with Peter O'Toole as a fading movie star who can’t quite make the transition to TV in the 1950s. It is a raucous comedy that is worth seeing if you haven’t.
The Producers on Broadway In the late 1990s, entertainment impresario David Geffen called up Mel Brooks with a proposition to do a play based on the 1967 movie, The Producers. This would be a musical and Mel Brooks would write all of the songs. They needed someone to write a script to frame the songs so Mel hired Tom Meehan who had worked with him on several movies. Since then, Tom had become a big deal on the Broadway theater scene. Mel and Tom would go to a nice French restaurant every day for lunch and write the songs and the script while enjoying fine food.
They hired the experienced Mike Ockrent as the director but he tragically died of cancer well before the show would open. Susan Stroman was Mike’s wife. She had just won a Tony for directing but was grief-stricken. After a decent interval, Mel asked her to do The Producers. She was still very upset by Mike’s death and at first refused. Mel convinced her that, after she stopped crying about Mike, she should join the crew. She came around and did a great job on the play.
There was still a lot of work to do, so Mel organized weekend bagel and coffee meetings at Susan’s penthouse. The production team fleshed out the play which was quite different from the movie.
Mel had to assemble the cast. He and Anne traveled to Paris to meet with Nathan Lane, who was vacationing there. They met him in the hotel pool and Nathan immediately accepted Zero Mostel’s role as Bialystock. Mel recruited a lot of seasoned actors for the other parts but he still hadn’t figured out who would play Leo Bloom, Gene Wilder’s role in the film. Nathan suggested Matthew Broderick for the part. Broderick had won a Tony for How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying so he knew his way around a stage. He was delighted to play Leo.
The show made its out-of-town debut in Chicago on February 1, 2001, and was a smash success. Mel and the crew tweaked and shortened the play a bit and it opened on Broadway at the St. James Theater on April 19, 2001. (Three days earlier, I had run the Boston Marathon, but I digress.) The Producers got great reviews, and two months after it opened it won 12 Tony awards, a record that still stands to this day.
The Producers went on to enjoy worldwide success for many years. Anne Bancroft had been battling cancer during much of the run of the play. She died in 2005 which devastated Mel.
Mel went on to develop Young Frankenstein as a play. It was successful, but nothing like The Producers. He earned lots of awards - the Kennedy Center Honors in 2009, the American Film Institute Lifetime Achievement Award in 2013, and the National Institute of Arts Medal in 2015.
Mel ends the book with a nice out, as they say in show business “I started in 1938 as a street-corner comic in Brooklyn, and I’m still doing it… just on more well-known street corners. Comedy is a weird but very beautiful thing. Even though it seems foolish and silly and crazy, comedy has the most to say about the human condition. Because if you can laugh, you can get by. You can survive when things are bad if you have a sense of humor.”
Bob’s Take
All About Me is a classic American success story. Mel and his family lost their father very early. The boys were raised by their mother and their extended family, and they were raised well. They never had much money but they had each other and that made up for what they didn’t have.
He is a genius. He won two Oscars by his early 40’s. He did stand-up comedy in the Catskills and in the Army; he was a key writer for Sid Caesar’s many successful TV shows; he and Carl Reiner conceived and executed The 2,000 Year Old Man (while unemployed); he was the motive (great word) force behind The Producers film; he directed movies, wrote and sang songs, produced movies (got the money); and made The Producers one of the most successful Broadway shows of all time. He also gave us Blazing Saddles and Young Frankenstein, two remarkably entertaining films. Mel Brooks is one of the few people who has won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony.
He is a nut. Mel Brooks invented new envelopes to push during his career and everything worked. His bosses regularly rejected major elements in his films but he ignored them and he was right. Using the N word in Blazing Saddles may have been offensive to some people but it highlighted the racism of all of the Johnsons who lived in Rock Ridge. In Young Frankenstein, highlighting a hunchback's hunched back no doubt offended many people but it was really funny.
WWII was a big influence and a career booster for him. Like millions of American soldiers, Mel did his part to help us win the war. While in the service, he had an opportunity to sharpen his comedy chops as well as a chance to organize shows for the troops.
Anne Bancroft was the great love of his life. He was married to Frances Baum, a Broadway dancer, from 1953 until 1962 and they had three kids. Mel met Anne shortly after his first marriage ended, and they really hit it off. She literally inspired him to do things that he didn't think he could do and she stepped up to act in his movies when needed, always at the lowest union pay scale.
Serendipity has been very good to Mel Brooks. After reading the book, one is struck by the fact that Mel was very often in the right place at the right time to improve his life and advance his career.
- He grew up living in a building with a guy who worked in the theater, which literally opened the doors for young Mel to see many Broadway plays which led him to a show business career instead of working in the garment business or going to college.
- In WWII his commanding officer liked to entertain the troops, and he recognized that Mel could help him do that. Mel became very good at organizing shows, which is essentially producing and directing, skills which helped him be successful after he left the Army.
- Mel met an unknown comic, Sid Caesar, through a mutual friend who got Mel backstage to chat with Sid. They meshed and the rest is showbiz history.
- He was also lucky to have a friend who invited him to the Perry Como Show rehearsal where he met and was smitten by Anne Bancroft, his future wife.
- Peter Boyle and Marty Feldman fell into his lap for Young Frankenstein when Gene Wilder’s agent called Mel trying to get work for his two clients. The two actors were perfect in their roles and their contributions to the film were significant.
This is one of the most enjoyable books that I’ve read over the past two years. It bounces as it recounts dozens of the highlights of Mel Brooks’ career. There is barely a negative element in it. Mel probably felt some guilt about not being totally in the lives of the three children he had with his first wife, but the divorce did not stop him from being very involved in those children’s lives. Mel Brooks has indeed had a wonderful life.
