Melvin Kaminsky will celebrate his 95th birthday later this month. He is one of the greatest show business figures of the last century, one of a few people to win an Oscar, an Emmy, a Grammy and a Tony, and 12 years ago — in the first year of the Obama Administration — he was one of those celebrated in the Kennedy Center Honors.
He has been in the entertainment industry for more than 75 years ever since he started working in the Borscht Belt after World War II, and he has provided us with some of the most memorable moments in our popular culture.
You know him as Mel Brooks.
If there is something that seems almost impossible now, it’s that we think as well or better of Brooks than we ever have. He has proved to be more than worthy of any good thoughts we think of him.
So many people aren’t.
One of the first examples was silent movie comedy legend Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle. He was an incredible physical comic, whose career basically ended when he was accused of killing a young actress during a sex act at a 1921 party at a San Francisco hotel.
Think of all the big names from that era. Arbuckle mentored Charlie Chaplin and discovered Buster Keaton and Bob Hope.
He underwent three trials and was finally acquitted, but the public never really forgave him and he died at age 46.
If he isn’t completely forgotten, most people these days would have no idea who he was.
Of course, that was a hundred years ago, but there are so many more recent examples.
Remember Bill Cosby?
Of course you do. Beginning in the early 1960s, he was as successful a comedian as anyone, and in the mid ’80s, his television show was as beloved as anything on the air.
He amassed a fortune estimated at $400 million, but at age 83 he is in prison, three years into what could be a 10-year sentence for aggravated indecent assault.
His petition for early release has been denied, in part because he continues to maintain his innocence and refuses to participate in a program for violent sexual offenders.
We never hear his comedy anymore, and as for “The Cosby Show,” it seems all but forgotten.
Then there is O.J. Simpson, who will be 74 next month. He was a success on three levels — football, broadcasting and movies — and took great pride in being a black man who was popular with white people.
Not anymore.
Clearly there are others, Woody Allen pre-eminent among them. For all our talk about Christian forgiveness, we are no a very forgiving people. Of course, one thing Cosby, Simpson and Allen have in common is that they all profess their innocence. It might be ungracious to mention that of the three, two are black and one is Jewish. But it certainly might be at least a minor factor.
But there are people who finish strong and wind up beloved. Brooks, for example. After he was done with movies, he turned “The Producers” into a Broadway show that won an amazing 12 Tony Awards.
At 95, he’s probably done.
But unlike some of the others in this piece, he will be part of the pantheon — and live in our hearts — forever.