From that moment on, Carl never stopped besieging me with questions. He made me a Texan psychoanalyst, a cockney filmmaker, a best friend of Da Vinci, the boyfriend of Joan of Arc—he was relentless. But the character that always worked and became a real fountain of knowledge and humor was the 2000 Year Old Man. It never missed.
If you knew Carl you didn’t just like Carl, you loved Carl. There simply was no like. There was just love. To be clear: Carl Reiner isn’t the best friend I ever had—he’s the best friend anyone ever had.
Carl came to Your Show of Shows and thought I was really talented. He supported me at every turn. Carl was a little older and had been on Broadway, starring in a wonderful post-war musical about soldiers reentering civilian life by Harold Rome with a book by Arnold Auerbach called Call Me Mister. I was leaning on him for the first two years of Your Show of Shows until I felt I could hold my own and had my own sense of confidence.
If I said I was the best, he said, “You are.”
For the first portion of my life Carl was my rock. Christ said, “On this rock I will found my church.” On this Jew from the Bronx, Carl Reiner, I founded my church.
Carl was a natural comedian, impresario, and nurturer of talent. He would study any room he was in, stealthily case it like a creative cat burglar, mine it for ideas, talent, and potential laughter. He was going to figure out how to make you laugh, you just didn’t know it yet. And you weren’t just going to laugh—you were going to be an active participant in the party. His raison d’être was to bring out the best in you, whoever you were, especially if you were his partner. He did that with Sid Caesar, then me, Dick Van Dyke, Steve Martin, and many others.
If you don’t have anyone in your life like Carl Reiner, stop reading this right now and go find someone!
Carl was an immediate and intuitive foil and partner, feeding off my energy and adding to it. I once took Scotch tape and attached my nose to my cheek, my lower lip to my chin, and an eyebrow to my forehead. I looked cruelly disfigured.
I burst into the writers’ room, and Carl immediately nurtured the bit:
Carl: How did it happen? Who did that to you?
Mel: The Nazis! They did it to me. Threw me in a ditch and did it!
Carl: You mean they beat you? Disfigured you?
Mel: Oh no. They took Scotch tape and stuck it all over my face.
Carl broke up and hit the floor, clutching his belly and laughing like crazy. For me that was a home run. Anytime I could make Carl laugh, I knew I had a winner.
* * *
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But back to the 2000 Year Old Man, for the next few years, any time there was a lull in the writers’ room, a party, a dinner—absolutely anywhere, Carl began interviewing me. Not only about the biblical days, but under the premise that this man knew everybody and everything.
Carl: Did you know the Apostles?
Mel: I knew them well.
Carl: Can you tell us about them? Who they were?
Mel: There was Ben, Murray, Al, Richie, Sol, Abe…
Carl: No, no. That’s not the Apostles.
Mel: Wait. You’re right. That’s the William Morris Agency!
Like all classic comedy straight men, Carl would provide the framework and atmosphere and cautiously redirect and set me up with his questions and reactions. I would not only take the comedy bait, but also provide additional setups for Carl as straight man to use for more options. In every classic comedy duo, from Laurel and Hardy to Abbott and Costello to Martin and Lewis, in order for the exchange to work, the quality of the straight man had to be as dynamic as that of the funny guy. Carl was the best at this.
I could use a single question as a springboard to unplanned exposition and tangents that would be as much of a surprise to Carl as they were to the audience. Carl was a gifted partner: While he deferred the punch lines to me, he knew me well enough to follow along and cross paths enough to set me up for more opportunities. He also knew he could throw me a complete curveball and I’d swing for the fences. We were a great ad-libbed high-wire act, and like the best high-wire acts, ours was dependent upon complete trust and respect for each other.
Carl once said, “A brilliant mind in panic is a wonderful thing to behold.”
I was at my best when I was backed into a corner. Like a cornered rat I had to somehow jump out of it. I would never surrender. Carl knew he would never get the same answer twice, and I loved to surprise him.
Carl: Who is the favorite of all your girlfriends of all time?
Mel: Shirley.
Carl: What was so special about Shirley?
Mel: Her friend Leila.
Carl hit the floor.
A few years later, Broadway producer Joe Fields threw a party in Hollywood and every major star was invited to come hear us perform this bit. Without bragging (or maybe with bragging), we were sensational. The laughs were nonstop and came like cannon fire.
Edward G. Robinson came up to us afterward and said, “Make a play out of it. I want to play that thousand-year-old man!”
Then George Burns came over and asked, “Is there an album?” And when we said no, he said, “Well, you better put it on an album otherwise I’m gonna steal it.”
At that same party was Steve Allen, the first host of The Tonight Show. He said to us, “Fellas, you’ve got to put this on a record.”
And we said, “No, no. This is just for us, for our own amusement. Not for the public.”
And he said, “I’ll tell you what. I’ll get a studio. You go in, do your thing, and in the end if you don’t like it you can throw it in the garbage and get rid of it.”
Needless to say, we didn’t throw it in the garbage.
At first, we said no. I didn’t want to. This was for friends. I thought some of it may be too inside, and I was afraid some of the pieces might be offensive to Jews and Catholics and provide some stimulus for anti-Semitism. The material was never designed for a national audience. I thought it might be too hip, but Steve convinced us that the Sid Caesar shows had elevated the comedy consciousness of the country.
Steve didn’t want to be a partner; he just wanted to get it out there. He was the kind of guy who liked everybody to hear fun. He loved to present fun for people, laughter. He gave us free recording time at a studio that he co-owned, World Pacific. We recorded for over two hours. It was all ad-libbed. I didn’t know what Carl was going to ask.
In fact, when we made the album, I said to Carl: “Don’t tell me anything, nothing in advance, just hit me with questions and when I can’t come up with a good answer, cut it. When I come up with a great answer, keep it in.”
And that’s the way we did it. We cut that first album down to forty-seven minutes and it became 2000 Years with Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks, released in 1961.
Carl and me performing the 2000 Year Old Man sketch on The Andy Williams Show.