Quote

Look at Jewish history. Unrelieved lamenting would be intolerable. So for every ten Jews beating their breasts, God designated one to be crazy and amuse the breast-beaters. By the time I was five I knew I was that one.

Mel Brooks

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Mel Brooks
Age: 98
Born: 1926
Born: June 28
Actor
Composer
Film Actor
Film Director
Film Producer
Journalist
Librettist
Lyricist
Screenwriter
Soldier
Songwriter
Stage Actor
Brooklyn
New York
Melvin Brooks
Melvin Kaminsky
Time
Crazy
Intolerable
Knew
Beating
Five
Breast
History
Breasts
Unrelieved
Look
Jews
Beaters
Looks
Jewish
Lamenting
Every
Jew
Designated
Would
Ten
Amuse

More quotes by Mel Brooks

Image
Judd Apatow is pretty good, both as a producer and as a director.
Mel Brooks
Image
You're always a little disappointing in person because you can't be the edited essence of yourself.
Mel Brooks
Image
All short women have a delayed fuse. Marry a taller woman: My wife was an inch or two taller than me it's a sign of security.
Mel Brooks
Image
Never retire! Do what you do and keep doing it. But don't do it on Friday. Take Friday off. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, go fishing...Then Monday to Thursday, do what you've been doing all your life. My point is: Live full and don't retreat.
Mel Brooks
Image
I'm still a horse that can run. I may not be able to win the Derby, but what do you do when you retire? People retire and they vegetate. They go away and they dry up.
Mel Brooks
Image
I've been taught ever since I was a kid that sex is filthy and forbidden, and that's the way I think it should be. The filthier and more forbidden it is, the more exciting it is.
Mel Brooks
Image
As far as songwriters, I've always been a fan of Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, and George Gershwin those guys mean a lot to me.
Mel Brooks
Image
Anybody can direct, but there are only eleven good writers.
Mel Brooks
Image
Not only should we laugh about Hitler. We must laugh about him. Especially in Berlin.
Mel Brooks
Image
I've been accused of vulgarity. I say that's bullshit.
Mel Brooks
Image
I'll accept bad taste in a minute, as long as there's some great comedy minds and performances.
Mel Brooks
Image
Look, I don't want to wax philosophic, but I will say that if you're alive you've got to flap your arms and legs, you've got to jump around a lot, for life is the very opposite of death, and therefore you must at very least think noisy and colorfully, or you're not alive.
Mel Brooks
Image
The thing is to be brave and move the audience with you, instead of cater to the lowest common denominator, you know, slipping on a banana peel and falling on your ass. You got to move the audience a little further ahead in terms of their appreciation of what is comedy. It's complicated.
Mel Brooks
Image
When I was a little boy, I thought when I grew up I would talk Yiddish. I thought little kids talked English, but when they became adults, they would talk Yiddish like the adults did. There would be no reason to talk English anymore, because we would have made it.
Mel Brooks
Image
I don't think in terms of results at all. I think: what next insanity can I shock the world with?
Mel Brooks
Image
I love gentiles. In fact, on of my favorite activities is Protestant spotting.
Mel Brooks
Image
Look, I had to take chances or it wasn't fun being funny.
Mel Brooks
Image
I usually start with the words. The rhythm of the words gives me the rhythm of the song, and then I look for the musical highlights in it to carry it.
Mel Brooks
Image
Woody Allen is a genius. His films are wonderful. He's poetic, but he's also a critic. He artfully steps back from a social setting and criticizes it without - I suspect - without letting himself be vulnerable to it.
Mel Brooks
Image
THE 2,000-YEAR-OLD MAN'S SECRETS OF LONGEVITY 1. Don't run for a bus - there'll always be another. 2. Never, ever touch fried food. 3. Stay out of a Ferrari or any other small Italian car. 4. Eat fruit - a nectarine - even a rotten plum is good.
Mel Brooks