Mel Brooks is 100! See legendary EGOT winner’s life in photos

Brooks was born Melvin James Kaminsky on a tenement kitchen table on June 28, 1926 in Brownsville, Brooklyn, and grew up in Williamsburg, on South 3rd Street. His father Max Kaminsky died of tuberculosis at 34, when Brooks was two years old. After spending some time in the army during World War II, upon his return, he moved to the Catskills and worked as hotel entertainment.

Brooks broke out with the 2000 Year Old Man sketch, in which his best friend Reiner interviewed him as a 2,000-year-old-man on Your Show of Shows.

Brooks was married to Florence Baum, a dancer in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, from 1953 until 1962, and they welcomed three children together, Stefanie, born in 1956, Nicky, born in 1957, and Eddie, born in 1959. Brooks saw a sizable decrease in his salary upon the end of Your Show of Shows, and eventually moved to Los Angeles to find work. Florence filed for legal separation in 1961, and they divorced the following year.

Brooks met The Graduate actress Anne Bancroft at a rehearsal for the Perry Como Variety Show in 1961, and they married three years later, welcoming their son Max in 1972.

Brooks and Bancroft were married for 41 years, together until the latter’s death from uterine cancer in 2005, when she was 73 years old.

Brooks is a grandfather to at least two grandchildren, his and Bancroft’s son Max’s son Henry Michael, as well as his and Florence’s son Edward’s daughter Samantha.