Mel Brooks names the greatest comedy actor of all time: “The funniest man ever”
As a comedy legend who conquered stage, film, and television with consummate ease and plenty of hilarity, Mel Brooks knows what it takes to make a career out of being funny. Many would point to him as one of Hollywood’s all-time comedy greats, but there’s only one name he’d call the best ever.
It’s not Gene Wilder, though, despite the magic those two repeatedly made together. Arguably Brooks’ most famous creative collaborator, the duo brought the best out of each other and made magic multiple times through The Producers, Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, and more.
Brooks’ comedy credentials and the constant acclaim and awards recognition that came with it saw him become just the eighth person in history to secure the coveted EGOT when he completed the quartet of an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony in 2001, which also made him the first performer known primarily for making audiences laugh to do it.
He’ll always be remembered as one of the industry’s greatest-ever comedians, but would he consider himself worthy of such a lauded position? Well, he probably would because Brooks is also smart enough to recognise the importance of pushing the boundaries of the medium on the silver screen after repeatedly butting heads with interfering studio executives who kept telling him his best jokes wouldn’t work.
Obviously, history always remembers the victors and Brooks’ insistence that Blazing Saddles stood to benefit more with the first audible farts in cinema history than without was the right call. Still, for his money, one of his foremost inspirations will never be beaten when it comes to reaching the top of the comedy mountain.
“As far as I’m concerned, Harry Ritz was the funniest man ever,” he told Esquire. “His craziness and his freedom were unmatched. There was no intellectualising with him. You just hoped there were no pointy objects in the room when he was working because you were down on the floor, spitting, out of control, and laughing your brains out. Harry Ritz always put me away. Always.”
Like Brooks, Ritz began his career on Broadway before segueing into cinema. A veteran of the stage long before making the jump into movies, alongside his siblings Al and Jimmy, the collective known as the Ritz Brothers began making waves in Hollywood in the late 1930s when they became contract players at 20th Century Fox before eventually setting up shop at Universal at the beginning of the following decade.
He may not be as well known as many others who frequent the conversation whenever it turns to Tinseltown’s leading comedy lights, Brooks included, but the filmmaker made sure to pay tribute to his hero when he drafted Ritz in for a cameo appearance in 1976’s Silent Movie.
