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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

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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
Five
Breast
History
Breasts
Unrelieved
Look
Jews
Beaters
Looks
Jewish
Lamenting
Every
Jew
Designated
Would
Ten
Amuse
Time
Crazy
Intolerable
Knew
Beating

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When we got to our hotel rooms, mosquitoes as big as George Foreman were waiting for us. They were sitting in armchairs with their legs crossed.
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Basically, I'm a writer. I'm the proprietor of the vision. I alone know what I eventually want to happen on the screen. So if you have a valuable idea, the only way to protect it is to direct it.
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The audience. They see the name Mel Brooks, they want something really funny. They don't want to be moved they don't want to be taught any lessons. [...] I get more letters for Twelve Chairs and Life Stinks than I get from any other movies, because people actually agree with the philosophy, or were moved, or they love the movie.
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I only direct in self-defense.
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Immortality is a by-product of good work. Masterpieces are not for artists, they're for critics. Critics can't even make music by rubbing their back legs together. My message to the world is 'Let's swing, sing, shout, make noise! Let's not mimic death before our time comes! Let's be wet and noisy!'
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Look, I had to take chances or it wasn't fun being funny.
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Hope for the Best. Expect the worst. Life is a play. We're unrehearsed.
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As long as the world is turning and spinning, we're gonna be dizzy and we're gonna make mistakes.
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I have always been a huge admirer of my own work. I'm one of the funniest and most entertaining writers I know.
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There's an army story in me, and I think there's a WWII Brooks film somewhere.
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Cat angels are the reason there are no mice angels.
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My favorite expression is: When you go up to the bell, ring it ? or don't go up to the bell.
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Being brave is being scared and worried and still doing it [what you do]. Because if you're just a wacko, a mashugana, a crazy guy, then you're not brave, your nuts!
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I don't think in terms of results at all. I think: what next insanity can I shock the world with?
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One day, God said 'Let there be prey.' And he created pigeons, rabbits, lambs and Gene Wilder.
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Judd Apatow is pretty good, both as a producer and as a director.
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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.
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Don’t be stupid, be a smarty / Come and join the Nazi Party!
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I like people with big talents and small neuroses - not always an easy combination to find. I've discovered that if the neurosis is too big, it diminishes the talent and you wind up working too hard for what you get.
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I have been lucky that some critics joined the mob in loving something I've done, or in appreciating it. I've been lucky. But most of the critics don't like what the people like. I think they have a very strange job, and they are meant to criticize.
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