One of the comic geniuses of the 70’s cinema was Mel Brooks. I don’t think I ever laughed louder or longer at a comedy than Blazing Saddles when I saw it at the Colony Theater on the Southwest side of Chicago.
He turns 86 years young today. I wish him 86 more. Eat a nectarine. Stay out of a Ferrari and any foreign cars.
This animated version of Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner’s famous skit The 2000 Year Old Man gets funnier every year. I taped this off of the television when it aired and listened to it hundreds of times. The lines still stick with me and I find myself quoting them without me knowing it.
Mel: I think there are ladies here.
Carl: You knew Joan of Arc
Mel: Know her, I went with her.
Carl: Did you know Shakespeare?
Mel: What a pussycat.
Mel: The greatest thing that mankind every devised is Saran wrap.
Carl: You acquaint that with man’s flight to the moon?
Mel: That was good.
It’s a half an hour long, but well worth revisiting…