Live Life Team
I think I was in grade school when “Spaceballs” first came out on video. I remember watching it at a slumber party and thinking, “This is different.” I had no idea what terms like “satire” and “parody” meant. Although I had seen “Star Wars”, I wasn’t old enough to get the jokes. The same could be said for the westerns that inspired “Blazing Saddles”, the silent films for “Young Frankenstein”, or the old and new Robin Hood” flicks for “Robin Hood: Men in Tights”. Yet I still found the films hilarious on their own merit even when I hit adolescence and discovered the irony.
It was just a few months ago that Brooks was an honouree at the Lincoln Town Center. The montage of his films was moving, but not as moving as the musical number that followed: a medley made up mostly of songs from “The Producers”. There, on the stage that epitomizes elegance and class, a flamboyant Adolph Hitler sang, “Heil Myself,” while a chorus line of Nazis danced in the shape of a swastika. It was a scene made all the more amusing as the camera panned from the dancers to Brooks and then to the guests seated next to Brooks, Barack Obama, the first African-American president, and his wife.
This is what has always amused me about the brilliance of Mel Brooks. His films defy more than just political correctness. They seem to transcend everything. Each time I watch them, I’m older and smart enough to get jokes I’d yet to understand in the past.
