Mel Brooks

Known for ActingBorn 1926-06-28 (age 99)Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA

Melvin James Brooks (né Kaminsky; June 28, 1926) is an American actor, comedian, filmmaker, and songwriter. 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 21 entertainers to win the EGOT (which includes an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony). 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. Brooks began his career as a comic and a writer for Sid Caesar's variety show Your Show of Shows(1950–1954). There, he worked with Neil Simon, Woody Allen, Larry Gelbart, and Carl Reiner. With Reiner, he co-created the comedy sketch The 2000 Year Old Man. He released several comedy albums, starting with 2000 Year Old Man in 1960. Brooks received five nominations for the Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album, finally winning in 1999. With Buck Henry, he created the hit satirical spy comedy series Get Smart (1965–1970) on NBC television. Brooks won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for The Producers (1967). He then rose to prominence by directing a string of successful comedy films such as The Twelve Chairs (1970), Blazing Saddles (1974), Young Frankenstein (1974), Silent Movie (1976), and High Anxiety (1977). Later, Brooks made History of the World, Part I (1981), Spaceballs (1987), Life Stinks (1991), Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993), and Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995). A musical adaptation of his first film, The Producers, ran on Broadway from 2001 to 2007 and earned Brooks three Tony Awards. The project was remade into a musical film in 2005. He wrote and produced the Hulu series History of the World, Part II (2023). Brooks was married to actress Anne Bancroft from 1964 until she died in 2005. 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!. 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.Read more

Movies & web series

Recording the Producers: A Musical Romp with Mel Brooks

Caesar's Writers

Mickey's 50

It's Alive: The True Story of Frankenstein

Only Murders in the Building

Free to Be... a Family

Mel Brooks: Make a Noise

The Grammys

Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!

John Candy: I Like Me

Broadway: The American Musical

Dick Van Dyke: 98 Years of Magic

Curb Your Enthusiasm

Mel Brooks and Dick Cavett Together Again

The Sid Caesar Collection: Inside the Writer's Room

The Simpsons

The Making of 'The Producers'

The Elephant Man

Sunset People

RTL Samstag Nacht

Frank Sinatra: The Voice of the Century

Toy Story 4

Frasier

Young Frankenstein

Get Smart

The Frank Skinner Show

Remembering Gene Wilder

The Wonderful World of Disney

The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius

The Great Buster: A Celebration

Ballerina

Somebody Feed Phil

Noel's House Party

The Fly

Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You

Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee

Pretty as a Picture: The Art of David Lynch

Primetime Glick

Richard Pryor: Omit the Logic

If You're Not in the Obit, Eat Breakfast

The Last Laugh

The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson

When Things Were Rotten

84 Charing Cross Road

Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story

Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation

Sid Caesar Collection: Buried Treasures - The Legend of Sid Caesar

The Electric Company