13. A Star Comedian Who Fought the Nazis
Brooklyn-born star comedian Mel Brooks is best known for directing hilarious comedies like Spaceballs, Blazing Saddles, The Producers, and Robin Hood: Men in Tights. He is not somebody most people would associate with life and death type of dangerous work. Yet, that is precisely what Mel Brooks did in WWII, when he fought the Nazis as a combat engineer who cleared minefields under enemy fire and was in the thick of the Battle of the Bulge. As he put it: “I was a combat engineer. Isn’t that ridiculous? The two things I hate most in the world are combat and engineering“.
He was born Melvin James Kaminsky in 1926, descended from German Jews on his father’s side and Ukrainian Jews on his mother’s. Brooks was raised in poverty after his father’s untimely death when the future comedian was only two years old. Understandably, growing up without a father was rough, and it left its mark on Brooks as a child and into his adulthood. As he put it decades later: “There’s an outrage there. I may be angry at God, or at the world for that. And I’m sure a lot of my comedy is based on anger and hostility“.
