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Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks · Angela George at https://www.flickr.com/photos/sharongraphics/, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons
Person

Mel Brooks

b. 1926

American comedian, filmmaker, and actor (born 1926)

Born
28 Jun 1926 · Brownsville

Life timeline

Their life from birth to death. On the timeline, world events of the time are shown faintly.

Showing 115 years
  1. 28 Jun 1926BornBorn in Brownsville
  2. 1939 – 1945WarWorld War II
  3. 1967AwardPrimetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series
  4. 1969AwardAcademy Award for Best Writing, Original Screenplay
  5. 1969AwardWriters Guild of America Award for Best Original Screenplay
  6. 1975AwardHugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation
  7. 1975AwardNebula Award for Best Script
  8. 1976AwardSaturn Award for Best Director
  9. 1997AwardPrimetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series
  10. 1998AwardGrammy Award for Best Comedy Album
  11. 1998AwardGrammy Hall of Fame
  12. 1998AwardPrimetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series
  13. 1999AwardPrimetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series

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Meanwhile in the world

Major world events during their lifetime (1926 – today).

  1. 1933 – 1945The Holocaust
  2. 19341934 FIFA World Cup
  3. 19361936 Summer Olympics
  4. 1937 – 1945Second Sino-Japanese War
  5. 19381938 FIFA World Cup
  6. 1938Munich Agreement
  7. 1939 – 1940Winter War
  8. 1940 – 1945Auschwitz concentration camp
  9. 1941Attack on Pearl Harbor
  10. 1941 – 1945Eastern Front
  11. 1941Operation Barbarossa
  12. 1942 – 1943Battle of Stalingrad
  13. 1945Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
  14. 1945 – 1946Nuremberg trials
  15. 19501950 FIFA World Cup
  16. 1950 – 1953Korean War
  17. 1953 – 1959Cuban Revolution
  18. 19541954 FIFA World Cup
  19. 1955 – 1975Vietnam War
  20. 1956Hungarian Revolution of 1956
  21. 1956Suez Crisis
  22. 19581958 FIFA World Cup
  23. 1959Antarctic Treaty System
  24. 19621962 FIFA World Cup
  25. 1962Cuban Missile Crisis
  26. 19661966 FIFA World Cup
  27. 1966 – 1976Cultural Revolution
  28. 1968Prague Spring
  29. 1969Apollo 11 Moon landing
  30. 19721972 Summer Olympics
  31. 19741974 FIFA World Cup
  32. 19781978 FIFA World Cup
  33. 1978 – 1979Iranian Revolution
  34. 1979 – 1989Soviet–Afghan War
  35. 1980 – 1988Iran–Iraq War
  36. 19841984 Summer Olympics
  37. 1985Schengen Agreement
  38. 19891989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre
  39. 1989Fall of the Berlin Wall
  40. 19901990 FIFA World Cup

Biography

Melvin James Brooks (né Kaminsky; born June 28, 1926) is an American actor, comedian, filmmaker, songwriter and playwright. With a career spanning nine decades, he is known for a variety of successful farces and parodies. A recipient of numerous accolades, he is one of the few people to win the EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony) awards. 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 and a BAFTA Fellowship in 2017.

Brooks began his career as a writer for Sid Caesar's Your Show of Shows, where he worked with Mel Tolkin, Neil Simon and Carl Reiner. Reiner and Brooks co-created the comedy sketch The 2000 Year Old Man and shared the Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album for The 2000 Year Old Man in the Year 2000. With Buck Henry, he created the spy spoof Get Smart.

Brooks won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for The Producers (1967). After The Twelve Chairs (1970), he made a string of successful comedies: Blazing Saddles and Young Frankenstein (both 1974), Silent Movie (1976), High Anxiety (1977), History of the World, Part I (1981) and Spaceballs (1987). His musical adaptation of The Producers ran on Broadway from 2001 to 2007 and won 12 Tony Awards. It was adapted as a film in 2005. Through his company, Brooksfilms, he produced David Lynch's The Elephant Man (1980), David Cronenberg's The Fly (1986) and David Jones's 84 Charing Cross Road (1987). With Anne Bancroft, he starred in To Be or Not To Be (1983), a remake of Ernst Lubitsch's 1942 film.

Brooks and Bancroft were married from 1964 until her death in 2005; their son Max Brooks is an actor and author. Brooks wrote a memoir, All About Me! (2021). His career was covered in Judd Apatow's documentary Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man! (2026). The American Film Institute included Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein and The Producers on its AFI's 100 Years...100 Laughs list. In 2026, to celebrate his centenary, it moved Blazing Saddles to first place.

Text from the Wikipedia article Mel Brooks, CC BY-SA 4.0

About this information

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