It’s laborious to not love Mel Brooks, contemplating that he gave us basic motion pictures like The Producers, Younger Frankenstein and Spaceballs. And with the potential exception of the time he accused Monty Python of stealing a sketch concept that they got here up with greater than a decade earlier he did, the comedy legend looks like a genuinely good particular person.
So it’s greater than slightly disappointing that now, on the age of 99, Brooks has determined to publicly defend his previous co-worker, Woody Allen.
Brooks and Allen famously labored collectively, together with different future stars akin to Neil Simon and Carl Reiner, on the basic Sid Caesar-led selection program Your Present of Reveals. “Woody acquired into the swing of the writers’ room very simply proper from the beginning,” Brooks wrote in his memoir All About Me! “He didn’t simply write humorous jokes, he wrote characters, habits, humorous conditions.”
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Brooks additionally recalled that Allen would stroll him dwelling after robust days working for the severely alcoholic Caesar. “I don’t know whether or not it was only for the great discuss, or if he thought no less than he’d be there to name 911 if I collapsed,” Brooks joked. “I respect the reminiscence of his friendship and entertaining chatter on these lengthy walks dwelling.”
However Mel might have merely been diplomatic in his fond reminiscences of Allen. In keeping with The Unruly Lifetime of Woody Allen by Marion Meade, the 24-year-old Brooks used to seek advice from the 19-year-old Allen as “that rotten little child.” In a 1997 interview with Meade, Brooks mentioned that Allen “by no means communicated something memorable,” including that he should have been “really hiding his mild underneath a bushel.”
As identified in Humorous Man: Mel Brooks by Patrick McGilligan, starting within the ‘70s, quite a lot of movie critics framed the 2 writer-director-performers as rivals, since they have been “each Jewish New Yorkers” and “each graduates of the Sid Caesar school of comedy.” In 1980, Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert devoted an episode of their present to a debate over “who’s funnier, Mel Brooks or Woody Allen?”
However Brooks seemingly by no means weighed in on Allen’s many scandals, together with the allegations that he sexually abused his daughter Dylan Farrow when she was seven. Even lately, after renewed curiosity in Farrow’s accusation sparked a cultural reappraisal of the filmmaker, Brooks primarily caught to describing their earlier relationship, though he did say that they’d “ship one another letters” sometimes through the years throughout a 2021 interview with The Guardian.
Now, only a week after Scarlett Johansson defended her former collaborator, Brooks has equally publicly knocked Allen’s critics. In an interview with Jewish Information, Brooks mirrored on his lengthy profession, together with his time on Your Present of Reveals.
On the intense facet, Brooks recalled an amusing incident through which the Home Un-American Actions Committee questioned the present’s employees, solely to be trolled by Carl Reiner. “McCarthy’s individuals got here to query us,” Brooks defined. “Carl mentioned, ‘Are available! Have a espresso!’ They requested if we knew any communists. Carl mentioned, ‘Many – however I didn’t know they have been communists, they have been simply in showbusiness.’ He was good. I assumed, ‘May as properly make them chuckle – it’s our greatest protection.’”
However then Brooks addressed Allen. “The beauty of Woody,” he mentioned, “was that after engaged on Caesar’s present, he’d at all times stroll me dwelling, all the best way uptown, simply strolling and speaking. It’s a pity he’s being crucified now for no purpose.”
After all, it’s debatable that Allen, who continues to make movies and just lately printed a novel, is “being crucified,” and that the general public scrutiny towards him is not well-earned – even placing apart essentially the most heinous allegations, so lots of the uncontested details about Allen’s life are creepy as Hell.
Brooks randomly defending Allen is perhaps essentially the most miserable movie star interview of the week not involving Judi Dench and Harvey Weinstein.
