Mel Brooks Quotes (38 Quotes)

Life literally abounds in comedy if you just look around you.

I kept leaning on him and I finally said, 'Mel, this isn't fair.' So I asked him to come on board as a co-writer with credit. And he was happy to do it.

Humor keeps the elderly rolling along, singing a song. When you laugh, its an involuntary explosion of the lungs. The lungs need to replenish themselves with oxygen. So you laugh, you breathe, the blood runs, and everything is circulating. If you dont laugh, youll die.

That's Tom Meehan. You wouldn't dream he'd come up with those home runs. You'd think 'Tom Meehan. Gentile, structure, taste. But you wouldn't think he'd come up with the jokes. But he's got it. He got it all.

I wouldn't have done this show without Nathan Lane, because he's God's gift to Broadway, ... And Matthew's a surprising find -- I didn't know he could sing and dance.

It's always been a love letter to Broadway, and now its time has come,

Critics can't even make music by rubbing their back legs together.

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.

I think people should buy 20 of them. Buy 20 and save a lot of them for Christmas presents. Who knows how many of these they make They might be gone.

As long as the world is turning and spinning, we're gonna be dizzy and we're gonna make mistakes.

Everything we do in life is based on fear, especially love.

You're always a little disappointing in person because you can't be the edited essence of yourself.

Every human being has hundreds of separate people living under his skin. The talent of a writer is his ability to give them their separate names, identities, personalities and have them relate to other characters living with him.

I don't believe in this business of being behind, better to be in front.

I've never been happier than when I was writing the musical score of The Producers. One song after another tumbled out of my head in what was the most soul-satisfying experience of my career. And in my less than humble opinion, I must say that it turned out to be surprisingly good.

When we did 'Young Frankenstein,' we knew we could get the college crowd. They loved the Mary Shelley novel. If you didn't get the references, you couldn't enjoy my movies.

If Shaw and Einstein couldn't beat death, what chance have I got? Practically none.

Brooks, who plays a doctor in the film, feels laughter is indeed the best medicine. If you don't laugh, you don't get that circulation and you die, ... So if you watch 'Dracula, Dead and Loving It,' you will live a long time, if you don't see it you will

Anybody can direct, but there are only eleven good writers.

I was going to do the book and the music and the lyrics,

We rest our case on the production numbers.

On directing movies anybody can direct. There are only 11 good write

He who hesitates is poor.

If presidents can't do it to their wives, they do it to their country.

It was with Your Show of Shows ... Everything I learned about comedy, I learned from Danny Simon.

Humor is just another defense against the universe.

We want to get people laughing; we don't want to offend anybody.

Hope for the best, expect the worst. Life is a play. We're unrehearsed.

There's no lightning. There's blood, sweat and tears. There's a good idea and there's 18 months of due diligence, hard work, day and night.

Anybody can direct. There are only 11 good writers.

Look, I really don't want to wax philosophic, but I will say that if you're alive, you got to flap your arms and legs, you got to jump around a lot, you got to make a lot of noise. . . , or at least your thoughts should be noisy and colorful and lively.

I only direct in self-defense.

If God wanted us to fly, He would have given us tickets.

Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die.

Rhetoric does not get you anywhere, because Hitler and Mussolini are just as good at rhetoric. But if you can bring these people down with comedy, they stand no chance.

These men both publicly and privately have done so much for me. Without Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick I would be living in a little motel just around the corner here, trying to make ends meet.

If you're quiet, you're not living. You've got to be noisy and colorful and lively.

Bad taste is simply saying the truth before it should be said.