DAVID BIANCULLI, HOST:
This is FRESH AIR. I'm TV critic David Bianculli. Today, we're celebrating Mel Brooks, one of the few EGOTs in show business. EGOT is a clunky acronym that's shorthand for the four major popular arts awards - the Emmy for television, the Grammy for the recording industry, the Oscar for Motion Pictures and the Tony for the Broadway stage. Mel Brooks has won them all. For television, he won one Emmy as a writer for a Sid Caesar TV special and three others as a guest actor on the sitcom "Mad About You." He won Grammys for one of his "2000 Year Old Man" comedy records with Carl Reiner and for his original cast recording for Broadway's "The Producers." For the movies, he won an Oscar for his screenplay for his original 1967 version of "The Producers," and before that, another one for his work on the Oscar-winning 1963 animated short "The Critic." And finally, on Broadway, he won three personal Tonys for his musical version of "The Producers" - best musical, best original score and best book of a musical.
In 2021, at age 95, he finally wrote his very funny memoir, titled "All About Me," and featured prominently in a documentary about one of his many passions, "The Automat." Mel Brooks turned 99 years old on June 28. Half a year later, HBO is noting the occasion by presenting a new two-part four-hour documentary called "Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man! " Part 1 premiered last night. Part 2 premieres tonight. And both parts will stream afterward on HBO Max. Today on FRESH AIR, we'll note that occasion by listening back to two vintage interviews Terry Gross conducted with Mel Brooks, and we'll begin with my review of the new HBO biographical documentary.
"Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man! " is co-directed by Judd Apatow and Michael Bonfiglio, the team that also directed a similar biography about another pioneering comic mind, "George Carlin's American Dream." In the same documentary genre, Apatow also directed "The Zen Diaries Of Garry Shandling." As a young teenager, working for his high school radio station, Apatow recorded interviews with Steve Allen, Jerry Seinfeld, Martin Short and others, then went on to write and direct such classic comedies as "The Larry Sanders Show," "Freaks And Geeks," "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" and "This Is 40". And now, with this string of comedy-focused documentaries, he's exploring that early passion all over again.
When Apatow interviews Mel Brooks for this two-part HBO special, he asks some very frank questions. About Mel's late wife, Anne Bancroft. Apatow asks, what do you miss the most about Anne? And it isn't just the two of them talking. "The 99 Year Old Man! " rounds up lots of family members, as well as an absolute who's who of comedy, talking about the output and influence of Mel Brooks, Jerry Seinfeld, Dave Chappelle, Sarah Silverman, Ben Stiller, Jimmy Kimmel, Conan O'Brien and others. And in vintage interviews, we hear from people whose careers Mel Brooks affected enormously, from David Lynch to Gene Wilder.
Some of the stories we hear are familiar, but they're treated like greatest hits, little gems polished to perfection and edited together, performed on a variety of stages. Other stories are more fresh and surprising, as when Mel talks about going to Sid Caesar, star of the popular 1950s live TV comedy "Your Show Of Shows," begging Caesar to quit a few years into the show's run.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "MEL BROOKS: THE 99 YEAR OLD MAN! ")
JUDD APATOW: What was your vision for your career?
MEL BROOKS: Movies.
APATOW: I'm going to write movies?
BROOKS: I'm going to write movies.
APATOW: And you tried to get Sid to make movies with you?
BROOKS: Yeah. I said, Sid, you do a show on Saturday night, and by Monday, it's forgotten. You can't just do television 'cause television evaporates. And I pitched this idea. I quit, you quit. We don't do the third year of "The Show Of Shows." We do the first year of a picture starring Sid Caesar, a never-to-be-forgotten comedy by that incredible comedy writer, Mel Brooks. And I convinced him. A month goes by. He said, I got bad news. They offered me something I couldn't refuse, a million dollars at Caesar. I'm big, but I'm not that big that I can say no to that. He said, and I can get you a raise. I said I don't want to raise. I want movies.
BIANCULLI: "Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!," by covering everything from "Blazing Saddles" to "Spaceballs," is full of laughs. It would have to be. But it's also quite serious, and that's what I love about it the most, because behind all the antics and anarchy, Mel Brooks is serious, too. The documentary shows scenes from Seinfeld's "Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee," featuring Mel hanging out at the house of his best friend Carl Reiner, enjoying their nightly takeout dinner on TV trays while watching television. Then the subject shifts to Reiner's death in 2020. And that sequence begins with an interview with Carl's son, Rob Reiner, who spoke with Apatow before his own recent tragic death. What Rob Reiner says is sad, and it's made even sadder by Rob's subsequent murder.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "MEL BROOKS: THE 99 YEAR OLD MAN! ")
ROB REINER: Mel was there when my dad died. My dad was in the bathroom. And he just collapsed in the bathroom, and Mel came back and realized, uh-oh, something's wrong. And my dad died, like, right after that. For months, months, months, he would come to the house. After my father died, he would come to the house, sit there, watch television and have dinner. And he did that for months. And he told us, the family, he said, you know, let me know when you're going to sell the house. I mean, you know, at some point we're going to sell the house. And I said, yeah, yeah. And I said - and then I said, well, maybe better you just - you know, we'll stage the house with you in it, you know? Maybe it'll up the value.
BIANCULLI: Apatow even asks Mel Brooks how he keeps going after the deaths of Anne and Carl. And for once, unlike other TV interviews earlier in his career shown here, the comic genius doesn't deflect the question with a quick one-liner. But his joy of love and life and comedy are obvious touchstones. He says as much to his granddaughter Samantha in a wonderful and tender segment in Part 2. His overall life lesson and advice turns out to be the same as that of Kurt Vonnegut - be kind.
And at age 99, Mel Brooks still is working - on "Spaceballs 2" and on "Very Young Frankenstein." Happy belated birthday, Mel. And you're already halfway to another one.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
BIANCULLI: Now we're going to listen to portions of a couple of interviews Terry Gross did with Mel Brooks. In 1991, she asked him about his film "The Producers," starring Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder, which was later made into a hit Broadway musical and movie musical starring Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick. The original 1967 film, like the other versions, is about two Broadway producers who come up with a convoluted scheme to get rich quick by producing the worst musical ever made, "Springtime For Hitler." It included this song.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SPRINGTIME FOR HITLER")
UNIDENTIFIED CHORUS: (As characters, singing) Germany was having trouble. What a sad, sad story. Needed a new leader to restore its former glory. Where, oh, where was he? Where could that man be? We looked around, and then we found the man for you and me. And now it's...
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As Nazi officer, singing) Springtime for Hitler and Germany. Deutschland is happy and gay.
UNIDENTIFIED CHORUS: (As characters, singing) We're marching to a faster pace. Look out, here comes the master race. Springtime for Hitler and Germany.
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As Nazi officer, singing) Winter for Poland and France.
UNIDENTIFIED CHORUS: (As characters, singing) Springtime for Hitler and Germany. Come on, Germans. Go into your dance.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
TERRY GROSS: You know, some of my very favorite Mel Brooks moments are your big production numbers, your Broadway showstoppers with big choruses for grim and totally inappropriate subjects, like "Springtime For Hitler" in "The Producers" or "The Inquisition, What A Show" (ph) in "History Of The World, Part I." Did you want to be on Broadway for real when you were growing up? Or did you want to be a song-and-dance man?
BROOKS: To be perfectly frank, yes. The answer to all those questions is, yes. Yes...
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: I wanted more than anything - I wanted to sing and dance jump up and down on Broadway, and even more than that on the big silver screen. And my heroes when I was young were, of course, Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly. And I loved all those great old black-and-white musicals like "The Gay Divorcee" and "Top Hat" and the color movies with - that MGM made with Gene Kelly, you know? Fantastic. I loved "Singin' In The Rain." I mean, who doesn't love a great musical? And in all of my movies, whether it's proper or not, I squeeze in a number, you know? Like in...
GROSS: Even in "Life Stinks" you have one.
BROOKS: Yeah, even in "Life Stinks," which is a story of rich and poor, somehow we're doing this salute to the '40s, you know, with Gene Kelly, in a rag factory.
GROSS: So when you were growing up and you really wanted to be on Broadway or to be a song-and-dance man, how far did you get with that? Or how far did you think you could get singing and dancing? Did you have...
BROOKS: Oh, I did it, but I did it in the in the sour cream factories of the Borscht Belt, in the Catskills just outside of New York. There were these resort hotels. And you started by just tending the rowboats or being a busboy, and you prayed to end up on stage, you know, in a variety show on Saturday night. And I became a drummer. And that - and I got onto the stage because the comic got sick. So the boss, Pincus Cohen - redundant name. He didn't need both Pincus and Cohen. One would have been - would have covered - it would have been covered. Said - used to call me Melbmnnnn, M-E-L-B-M-N-N-N-N. He'd say, Melbmnnnn, the comic is sick, and we know you're cute and funny, so jump on the stage and amuse the guests. So that night, I went on the stage, and I never went back to the drums.
GROSS: What did you do that night?
BROOKS: Well, that night, I did a different - it's a good question, Terry. I like you, Terry Gross. This is going to be a great show because I like you and I like me. So when I listen to this, I'm going to be in heaven, you know?
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: What did I do? That night, I did a different kind of comedy because there was a maid who was locked in the closet that day. She had somehow locked herself in a broom closet, in a storeroom closet, and she couldn't get out. And she was pounding on the door and screaming in Yiddish, (speaking Yiddish) and screaming. And finally, somebody heard her, opened the door and let her out. So they let Sophie (ph) out, and she had a little attack of tears and nerves, and then went back to taking care of the rooms. So then everybody at the place knew it. It was like a scandal. Poor Sophie, ay-ay-ay (ph), so - when I - the first thing I did that night, I said, good evening, ladies and Jews. You know, I did my...
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: And I said, (speaking Yiddish). I just scream, and then - and the place went - was pandemonium, you know, because they knew about it. And I decided to do, like, real comedy, people's comedy, or comedy that everybody knew instead of making up, quote, "jokes." And I've been doing that kind of comedy ever since.
BIANCULLI: Mel Brooks speaking with Terry Gross in 1991. We'll hear more after a break. This is FRESH AIR.
This is FRESH AIR. Let's get back to Terry's 1991 interview with Mel Brooks. He's the subject of a new documentary by Judd Apatow and Michael Bonfiglio.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
GROSS: I want to get back to your big lavish production numbers like "Springtime For Hitler." What possessed you the first time you did one of those? Like, "Springtime For Hitler," for instance, it's such a wonderful and really funny number, and I'm sure a lot of people thought it was just in horrible taste.
BROOKS: It was in horrible taste. It was in execrable taste. I'm ashamed of it to this day. But I do like that juxtaposition of those two textures, you know? Let me tell you, the song itself composed - nobody knows I wrote the music as well as made up those words. So I wrote the words and the music to "Springtime For Hitler." The song is beautiful. People listen to it even today, and they don't know it's "Springtime For Hitler." They listen to the orchestration or they listen to the nonvocal version of it in many cities. I was just in Chicago. There is an elevator playing "Springtime For Hitler."
GROSS: (Laughter) Really?
BROOKS: And there are people going up and down, but it just goes (vocalizing). They don't know it's (singing) springtime for Hitler and Germany. They don't know that. They just hear the music and they sway till they get to the 22nd floor, you know.
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: And it's amazing. And so the melody is almost like a Richard Rodgers melody. And that's why, when you hear these crazy words against it, it all falls into place beautifully.
GROSS: What do you think your most misunderstood scene is in any of your movies?
BROOKS: I think it's - that's a good question, Terry Gross. That's a very good question. What is my most misunderstood or misinterpreted theme? Yeah, vulgarity or bad taste. I use it, therefore I'm painted with that brush. The critics and a lot of people don't understand that bad taste is a wonderful device for unearthing truth that is all around us and evoking laughter. So that is the bane of my existence, is that I'm continually accused - like the overhead shot of the swastika in "Springtime For Hitler." I mean, it was a very important point in a very important musical in a very important story. So I don't think - they just single out, you know, something that they feel is in horrible taste, but they don't know that it's used to illuminate something.
GROSS: What kind of roles do you think you would have gotten if you weren't writing your own?
BROOKS: Oh, the - my favorite role would be the king of Germany, the kaiser roll. That would be - no.
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: Two demerits for that. I can't help - look, when you work in the mountains, it never leaves you. You know, cheap jokes, cheap jokes.
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: I mean, I'm a purveyor of cheap jokes. Now, what kind of roles would I - say again, Terry?
GROSS: What kind of roles do you think you would have gotten in movies if you weren't writing your own?
BROOKS: Well, in the '30s, I probably would have been a bellboy in hotel movies.
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: You know? And then, I guess, in the '40s, I would have been, you know, like, you know, a good-natured soldier from Brooklyn. I know the roles they would have given me.
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: I would - they would have called me Brooklyn. Hey, Brooklyn, you know? And then in the '50s, I would have been the band boy with the rock 'n' roll group, you know, touring the - I know. That's why I wrote these movies, you know, or else I would have been stuck with all these parts. I would have been called Blinky (ph) and Winky (ph) and Nod.
GROSS: (Laughter) Before you started writing for "The Sid Caesar Show," did you have any outwardly Jewish people to see yourself in, outside of the Catskill comics, but people who were not only Jewish in show business but were doing sketches about being Jewish or who were writing stories about being Jewish or, you know, who were Jewish in any outward way?
BROOKS: Good question. No. The only role models had gone away, and that was Yiddish theater. You know...
GROSS: Right.
BROOKS: The Yiddish theater of Second Avenue in New York. And that was long gone by the time I had made my way into show business. I had only seen one play. And the second act of the Yiddish theater was an incredible device. It was great. It was the most emotional point in the play. This is the second act curtain I'm talking about, before you went into the third act. This is to hold the audience so they would sit for the third act. And the daughter would come home to them. She was missing, and she would come home. And she would enter stage left, and the mother was stage right looking at her. And she would open her coat, and she would show this big belly, and the mother would scream in Yiddish, (speaking Yiddish). Then she'd faint, and the curtain would come down. And that - as the mother would say, she's pregnant, you know.
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: So - and they always had - or a soldier would come home, and the mother would say, (speaking Yiddish). He's blind. And then the curtain would go. I mean, they always had this - they had these tragically emotional moments. And I learned that somehow at the end of the second act - and I do that in all my movies - you've got to hook the people so they're excited about at least the denouement, I mean, the rush to the end, you know?
GROSS: Your parents were Eastern European immigrants. Was mostly Yiddish spoken in your house?
BROOKS: No, no. My grandmother did. My mother, as a matter of fact, said erl (ph) and berl (ph). She was a New Yorker. You know, she had a - she came here when she was 3 years old. She learned English from - as most immigrants did when they came here as little kids, they learned English from Irish teachers, Irish teachers in New York. And they were the - the Irish got all the jobs. So therefore, all the teachers were Irish, and everybody was talking like this in Jewish households. (Impersonating Irish accent) Hey. Hey, Murshy (ph). Would you pass the kasha? Thank you very much, Mursh. I mean, of course, I'm overdoing it. But my mother did say - actually did say turlet (ph). She never said toilet. She said turlet.
BIANCULLI: Mel Brooks spoke to Terry Gross in 1991. We'll hear more after a break, and Justin Chang reviews a new film from Germany, "Sound Of Falling." I'm David Bianculli, and this is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SWEET GEORGIA BROWN")
MEL BROOKS AND ANNE BANCROFT: (As Frederick Bronski and Anna Bronski, singing in Polish).
BROOKS: (As Frederick Bronski, singing in Polish).
ANNE BANCROFT: (As Anna Bronski, singing in Polish).
BROOKS: (As Frederick Bronski, singing in Polish).
BROOKS AND BANCROFT: (As Frederick Bronski and Anna Bronski) OK.
BIANCULLI: This is FRESH AIR. I'm David Bianculli. "Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!" is the name and subject of a new two-part HBO documentary, concluding tonight and streaming on HBO Max. It's codirected by Judd Apatow and Michael Bonfiglio. And today, to note this wonderful new work, we're listening back to portions of some of our interviews with Mel Brooks. Let's continue with Terry's 1991 interview with him.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
GROSS: Can I hear about what your bar mitzvah was like?
BROOKS: It was fast and short. In those days, they were not - today, I just went to a bar mitzvah, and it could have fed all of Kyiv, where my mother came from. It's an amazing difference. My bar mitzvah took 15 minutes. And the kids threw hard candy, and a couple of them hit me with it, and it was all over. And, of course, I'll never forget the breath of my rebbe. I mean, rebbe breath is famous.
I mean, they eat garlics and onions, and then they tried to teach you Hebrew. And they would breathe in your face and say, no, (speaking Hebrew). And it was quite an experience. And ask any little Jewish kid who was bar mitzvahed about rebbe breath.
GROSS: A lot of your movies are parodies of genre films. When did you fall in love with movies? Did you go a lot when you were young?
BROOKS: I went a lot and I didn't have a lot of money. So the way I used to get into movies was when the audience who had just - when the movie would break and the audience would walk out, I would join them. And I would walk backwards until I was in the theater.
GROSS: Oh, so it looked like you were exiting.
BROOKS: And I would hide in the back row.
GROSS: Yeah.
BROOKS: And then when the new audience came in, I mean, I would watch the movie. And that was the only way I could get to see movies because I couldn't afford the - whatever it was, the 15 cents to get in to see them. And I - my mother used to search for me in the movies 'cause I would see the same movie. You know, if it was "Top Hat" or "The Gay Divorcee," forget about it. I'd see it 16 times. I knew every step. I knew every nuance, every lilt, every note, every fill. I mean, I just - I was addicted. I was addicted to movies.
GROSS: I want to get back to something we were talking about before. You know how you were saying if you weren't writing your own roles, you'd be, like, the bellboy in the movie or whatever? When you realized that, as much as you loved song and dance and Broadway shows and musical comedy movies - when you realized that you probably weren't going to be a leading man, you weren't going to be cast as a leading man, well, eventually you started casting yourself as a leading man in parodies of those kinds of movies. But were you ever really heartbroken knowing that you wouldn't be in the serious versions of those movies?
BROOKS: That's a good question. Yeah, in my heart of hearts, I always wanted to be Errol Flynn. Yeah, I was heartbroken. And I always wanted the most beautiful, long-waisted, long-legged women in the world to fall on their knees and pray to me. But as life and God would have it, it was the other way around. Every time I see a tall, beautiful woman, I just crashed to my knees and I prayed to her. I'd say, please, just give me a slap in the face, something. Show me that you know I'm alive, too.
I made myself a leading man in "High Anxiety" because I always wanted to imitate Frank Sinatra. So here was a chance to write a song called (singing) "High Anxiety" and sing it at a bar, which was a dream of mine. And I made myself - I guess I made myself a leading man because in real life, I knew I could never be a leading man.
GROSS: I'm going to play some of "High Anxiety."
BROOKS: Oh, thanks, Terry.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HIGH ANXIETY")
BROOKS: (Singing) High anxiety whenever you're near. High anxiety. It's you that I fear. My heart's afraid to fly. It's crashed before. But then you take my hand. My heart starts to soar once more. High anxiety, it's always the same. Anxiety. It's you that I blame. It's very clear to me I've got to give in. High anxiety, you win.
GROSS: Mel Brooks, I want to get to a different side of what you do, and that's the movies that you produce, because, you know, Brooksfilms has done movies like "The Elephant Man." And you had David Lynch direct that. And "The Fly," David Cronenberg directed that. What I'm interested in here is that it seems to me you produce these serious, moody films that are so different from the kinds of films you direct and write and star in. It seems like it's another part of you, but it's one that I guess you feel more comfortable in the position of producer rather than writer, director or star.
BROOKS: True. Because I have not been allowed to do, quote, "serious things" - you know, allowed by my image. You do something and then the public - and the critics, too - want you to do it until you're dead. And they won't allow you to change your shape or form or express yourself in a different manner because, you know, hey, pal, you know, we're paying for vanilla. You know, don't give us chocolate. And so I formed this kind of sub-rosa, under-the-table, in-the-closet company called Brooksfilms. And I kept my name, the Mel - keep the Mel away, I said.
GROSS: But are these films that you would like to be making yourself, in a way?
BROOKS: Well, in a way, I've kind of put it together in "Life Stinks." And it's kind of the first time I've stepped out of the closet. So here I am, Mel Brooks and Brooksfilms, all in one movie. And I'm very happy with it, you know, I'm very happy I was allowed to do it. And it was a great experience. But I've never been allowed to fuse those, the quiet, dark, serious elements in me and the happy-go-lucky, silly comic.
GROSS: So many of your movies seem to be about, isn't it an absurd - isn't it absurd that I would be in this position here? Or isn't it absurd that a Jew like me would be in this position here? I'm wondering about the circumstances in your life where you felt like the Jew. Were there instances where you felt that way? Or did you grow up in a neighborhood where just about everybody was Jewish and came from families and background like you did?
BROOKS: Yes. I felt - actually, I felt - I had great compassion and pity for the few Catholic people that were living in our ghetto because...
GROSS: (Laugher).
BROOKS: ...In Williamsburg in Brooklyn, because I felt, these poor people, these Christians. I mean, they're in the minority. We should help them.
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: We should be kind to them, you know? I never thought that we - you know? And then I was drafted, and I was in the Army. And I said, wait a minute, wait a minute. I mean, there are 10,000 guys here and I'm the only Jew. What's happened, you know? I began to realize that maybe we weren't the majority and - you know? Anyway, I think that I learned a lot. I learned a lot because there were people who hated me in the Army just because they found out I was a Jew.
And then I made sure that they got to know me and not just what, you know, they thought I was. And usually, I could make sense to them about who I was and what I was, you know? It was really interesting. I mean, the Army was a very interesting experience. Of course, war is very loud. And it's, you know, people are trying to kill you. I mean, they don't even know your last name and they're shooting at you, you know?
So it's very, very disturbing. I mean, it's not, you know, it's not what I want to do for the rest of my life. I knew that. After my first combat where these Germans were trying to kill me, I said, I'm going to get into show business. I knew that that's what I wanted to do. Singing and dancing was going to be a lot better than this. War is heck.
GROSS: Well, Mel Brooks, I want to thank you a lot for talking with us.
BROOKS: OK. Terry Gross, keep in touch. Don't be strange. And keep up the great work. I love your stuff. Say hello to Philadelphia for me. Bye, bye.
BIANCULLI: Mel Brooks talking with Terry Gross in 1991. We'll hear a portion of their later conversation from 2001 after a break. This is FRESH AIR.
This is FRESH AIR. We're listening to Terry's 2001 interview with Mel Brooks. He's the subject of a new HBO documentary by Judd Apatow and Michael Bonfiglio. Terry spoke with Mel Brooks on the occasion of the hit Broadway musical version of his 1967 film, "The Producers." That production won 12 Tony Awards, which still holds the record as the most wins ever by a Broadway musical.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
GROSS: Let's start at the beginning. When you were first coming up with the movie "The Producers," how did you come up with the scam that's at the center of the movie and the show, which is that a producer can make more money with a flop than a hit?
BROOKS: A hundred years ago, I was working for a producer in New York who was right around here - right around. We're broadcasting from Carnegie Hall, actually in the building. He wore an alpaca coat winter, summer, fall and spring. He wore a black producer's hat with the brim down on both sides. He wore a cape. He made love to little old ladies, and for that, they invested in his shows. And his leather couch in his office always had a little old lady in it, on it, around it, about it. He never stopped making love to these little old ladies. They never stopped giving him checks. And they would often - the dialogue was often like this. What's the name of the play? And he would say, cash. And they'd say, gee, that's a funny name for a play. And the quid pro quo was terrific for both of them. The little old ladies were happy because once again, they were adored and kissed and held passionately in a man's arms. And he got his little green, blue and yellow checks, you know, so he could put on his flops.
GROSS: But did he have a scam like that, of thinking...
BROOKS: No. He...
GROSS: ...He'd make more money from a...
BROOKS: No.
GROSS: ...Flop than a hit?
BROOKS: Everything he touched was doomed.
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: He never knew. You know, he always hoped for a hit. He was my model for Bialystock. But once I wrote it, I thought - I added that, that Leo Bloom, the accountant, would come up with this simple little scheme that if you raised more money than you needed, you could - and you're sure - sure - that you had a flop, then you could keep the money because no one would be asking you for money because they knew it was a flop. And so their investment went down the tubes.
GROSS: Now, when you came up with the idea of "Springtime For Hitler," did that idea precede your concept that you had to come up with the worst show ever written, or did you know you had to come up with the worst show ever written and that's how you came up with "Springtime For Hitler"? Which came first?
BROOKS: Oh, I knew they had to have a flop.
GROSS: Right.
BROOKS: And then I searched for six months. I was writing morning, noon and night. I couldn't find the right flop. Just like they read.
GROSS: Right. It...
BROOKS: Just like Bialystock and Bloom have - you know, read in a - their - that little office filled with scripts. Yeah.
GROSS: Yeah. They're searching for the worst play ever written.
BROOKS: Right.
GROSS: But you had to create the worst play ever written.
BROOKS: I had to create the worst play. I couldn't find the worst play ever written, so I created it.
GROSS: Now when...
BROOKS: And...
GROSS: ...Did you come up with the idea that a musical about Hitler with dancing and singing Hitlers and dancing and singing Nazis would be just the thing that would be the worst play ever written?
BROOKS: Well, in those days, it was pretty dangerous.
GROSS: Yeah.
BROOKS: You know? Because, I mean, the war was only over for - what? - about 19 or 20 years, you know? And here we were taking - you know, making Hitler - taking Hitler to task in a funny way, you know? And Hitler wasn't - to a lot of people, I mean, Holocaust victims and - you know, and World War II horrors and - you know, this was not such a funny subject. You know, it was a pretty - you know? But I was always a tasteless fool, and I always felt that being politically correct would only be - would be the death of comedy, that comedy had to explore every vein that should be explored, that there should be no boundaries. You go where you have to go, and you do what you have to do in comedy. And if they hate you, they hate you, but, you know, that's what you got to do. So for me, Hitler was fine.
A lot of people who saw the movie were very much like the people in the movie who were gobsmacked and aghast at seeing a swastika on stage, you know? I had one incident, by the way, here - right here in New York. Only one. Thousands of people have already seen the show on Broadway. But there was one person, and my heart went out to him, and he - I was angry at the time, of course. He found me. I was sitting in the back of the theater during previews. And he said - he came screaming, how dare you? There was a holocaust. Hitler was a terror. You - you're making fun with Hitler.
And he's screaming at me at the back of the house. It was during the bows. People were applauding, so they really didn't hear him, but he was shouting in my face. He was red-faced. And he was a guy about 84, 85 years old. So screaming at me, and he said, I was in World War II. Well, I was angry, very angry at him. I shouldn't have been, but I was at the moment. And I - so I said, I was in World War II, also. I, too, was in World War II. Where the hell were you? I didn't see you anywhere. I said, I was in the combat engineers. Where were you? You know? And I was screaming back at him. And anyway. But I could see that he didn't get it.
Now, why he didn't walk out in the first act when the plot revealed that we were going to do "Springtime For Hitler", when we met Franz Liebkind, when - you know, I don't know why he didn't. He was the only one. And in the end, you know, I felt - you know, I apologized because he just didn't get it, you know, and - just like the people in the movie that didn't get it. They were outraged, you know? But by now, everybody is - you know, knows that we're using the Hitler thing to make it the worst play in the world, so they get it. Yeah.
GROSS: And I really think that it's because you feel so strongly about what Hitler did that you're able to make something this funny. Do you know what I mean? It's because - because it matters to you so much, you're able to really do something that - that's funny, that...
BROOKS: Well, I've always said...
GROSS: ...That's that funny. Yeah.
BROOKS: Yeah. True. I've always said that, you know, these guys are brilliant orators. They are. All despots have the gift of persuasive speech. And if you get on a soapbox and try to argue with them, you're finished. These guys will win. But if you can somehow ridicule them and make them laughable, then you'll always succeed, and their legacy will not triumph. So my job - one of my jobs - has always been to make fun of Hitler and the Third Reich. And I - you know, and I've done a very good job at it. You know, I made them, you know, pretty ridiculous guys. Yeah.
GROSS: Now, did you ever say to yourself, maybe I'm going too far?
BROOKS: Never. I've always said to myself, have I gone far enough?
GROSS: Right. Push it more.
BROOKS: Yeah.
GROSS: (Laughter).
BROOKS: I mean, that's my - you know, that's my mantra. That's my flag. My flag is, you can never go too far.
BIANCULLI: Mel Brooks spoke with Terry Gross in 2001. "Mel Brooks: The 99-Year-Old Man!" concludes tonight on HBO and will stream in its entirety on HBO Max.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HABEN SIE GEHORT DAS DEUTSCHE BAND?")
BRAD OSCAR: (As Franz, singing in German).
(As Franz, singing) Russian folk songs and French ooh-la-la can't compare with a German oom-pah-pah. We're saying...
(As Franz, singing in German).
(As Franz, singing) Polish polkas - they're stupid and they're rotten. It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that...
(As Franz, singing in German).
(As Franz) Key change.
(As Franz, singing) We're saying...
(As Franz, singing in German).
(As Franz, singing) It's the only kind of music that we Huns and our honeys love to sing.
NATHAN LANE: (As Max) That's our Hitler.
BIANCULLI: Coming up, Justin Chang reviews the new German film "Sound Of Falling." This is FRESH AIR. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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