Before I tell you why you should watch the new documentary about Mel Brooks, I will tell you that 25 years ago, he told me, “You may be right. I have done everything there is to do in show business. … Everything except to be tall. That’s the one thing I’ve never accomplished, being tall. But I’m looking forward to that.”

He was a relative youngster then, 74 years old, but at a very important point in his life. He was generally regarded as a comedic giant, and why not? He had spent his life making people laugh, first as a Catskills comic and then as part of a glittering writing team (along with Woody Allen and Neil Simon) for Sid Caesar’s pioneering TV programs “Your Show of Shows” and “Caesar’s Hour”; as the co-creator of “Get Smart”; as the 2000 Year Old Man on a series of best-selling comedy albums with pal Carl Reiner; as movie writer, director, producer and actor in such films as “The Producers,” “Young Frankenstein” and “Blazing Saddles.”

But he had not had a critical or box-office hit since his 1977 Hitchcock spoof “High Anxiety.” And there he sat on a cold December day in 2000 in New York, taking a big risk, for many believed that the success or failure of the musical version of “The Producers” he was overseeing would provide the final sentence to his career.

Well, we all know what happened. “The Producers” would open in Chicago, move to Broadway and win a record 12 Tony Awards. The career carried on, and now here is Brooks, as charming, smart and, of course, funny as ever, as the centerpiece of a thoughtfully thrilling documentary now airing on HBO Max. “Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!,” exclamation point more than justified.

It may be a bit long at almost four hours (in two episodes, now streaming), but it is impossible not to enjoy. Its length is forgivable since one can sense the excitement and affection of filmmaker Judd Apatow, who interviews Brooks at length. Apatow, along with co-director Michael Bonfiglio, has previously also captured in documentary form George Carlin and Garry Shandling.

Drawing on ample archival footage and candid interviews, he and Bonfiglio take us back to the beginning with Brooks (born Melvin Kaminsky), the youngest of four boys of a widowed mother in Brooklyn, all of them off to World War II, all safely returned, with Brooks telling Apatow, “War changed me. If you don’t get killed in the Army, you can learn a lot.”

Mel Brooks attends the Los Angeles premiere of the HBO film “Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!” on Jan. 20, 2026. (Rodin Eckenroth/Getty)

His career moves to the raucous Sid Caesar writers’ room and we do also hear, rather wistfully, from Brooks’ three children and his first wife, former Broadway dancer Florence Baum, before he was off to moviemaking in California in the early 1960s. His granddaughter Samantha is charming.

You will hear Brooks tell a terrific Cary Grant story (one he has told many times over the years on the various late-night talk shows where he has been a frequent guest) but, more tenderly, tales of his courtship and marriage to actress Anne Bancroft. Gene Wilder shares feelings that go far deeper than director and star. And we get details of Brooks’ long friendship with writer-director Reiner, from the early 1960s to their sharing dinners together as widowers every night watching “Jeopardy” on TV.

Bancroft died in 2005; their son, novelist Max, is tender in interviews. Reiner’s wife Estelle died in 2008 and Reiner in 2020. Hearing Reiner’s son, filmmaker Rob, talk about his father and Brooks gives one a chill, knowing this was one of the final conversations before he and his wife Michele Singer Reiner’s December murders.

The number of people with whom Brooks has shared his creative life will impress and perhaps surprise you. There’s Richard Pryor, who did a bit of writing for “Blazing Saddles,” who says, “He’s a loving man. It’s about love with him.”

The late director David Lynch credits Brooks with saving his career by hiring him to direct “The Elephant Man” after seeing Lynch’s “Eraserhead.” In addition to his own movies, Brooks produced such films, through his Brooksfilms, as “The Fly,” “My Favorite Year,” “Frances” and others, taking a rare low profile lest his name lead moviegoers to think they would be seeing comedies.

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Naturally, we hear from a large crowd of showbiz folks and all of them — Ben Stiller, Jerry Seinfeld, Dave Chappelle, Sarah Silverman, Conan O’Brien, Josh Gad, Robert Townsend, Matthew Broderick, Nathan Lane and others — are complimentary. There must be someone in that backbiting swamp that is Hollywood who isn’t a Brooks fan, but such a person is not to be found here.

Whatever your relationship with Brooks beforehand, this film will enrich it. Will you understand what makes him tick? I don’t know, and you won’t care. Just spending time with him is satisfying enough.

His famously quick wit has not lost a step. When Apatow asks, “You lost your father at an early age?” Brooks quickly replies, “No, no. My father died.”

His ability to recall names and places and laughs is, frankly, astonishing. He is not only able to remember but to enjoy, to savor. We should all be so lucky.

In the film, he says, “Sometimes my comedy is just to celebrate the joy of being alive.” And as he has said many times in his many years, he has always used humor as “a defense against the universe.” Few, if any, have done it better.

rkogan@chicagotribune.com

By MARK KENNEDY, AP Entertainment Writer

NEW YORK (AP) — Some people see the glass as half full and some as half empty. Marc Shaiman is something else entirely.

“I’m not even happy with the glass,” he says with a laugh.

The award-winning Hollywood and Broadway composer and lyricist cheerfully likes to call himself an “Eeyore” and “a card-carrying pessimist” despite many of his biggest dreams coming true.

“Just as soon as something good happens, something bad’s going to happen,” he tells The Associated Press. “I am always waiting for that other shoe to drop, and it inevitably drops.”

His career and personal ups and downs are on full display this winter with Tuesday’s publication of his memoir, “Never Mind the Happy: Showbiz Stories from a Sore Winner,” which is filled with funny stories from a man who has helped fuel popular movies and musicals for decades.

“I’ve been lucky enough to do a lot and I’ve been lucky enough to have an outrageous longevity. I thought, ‘Let me write it down, finally,’” he says.

This cover image released by Regalo Press shows “Never Mind the Happy: Showbiz Stories from a Sore Winner,” a memoir by Marc Shaiman. (Regalo Press via AP)

Tales of Bette Midler, Stephen Sondheim and the ‘South Park’ guys

The memoir charts the New Jersey-born musical prodigy’s rise from Bette Midler’s musical director in his teens to scoring such films as “Sleepless in Seattle” and “Mary Poppins Returns” and Broadway shows like “Hairspray” and “Catch Me If You Can.”

He’s worked with Billy Crystal, Martin Short, Luther Vandross, Raquel Welch and Rob Reiner, sparred with producer Scott Rudin and had a spat with Nora Ephron (“I’m certain she’s in heaven, telling all the angels she doesn’t like harps,” he writes). He also played at the White House and was a force in the early days of “Saturday Night Live.”

There was the time in 1999 that he got legendary composer Stephen Sondheim so high on pot at a party in his apartment that the iconic composer collapsed three times. “I’ve killed Stephen Sondheim,” he thought to himself. (Sondheim asked him to tell the story only after he died.)

He tells the story of hearing Meryl Streep repeatedly working on a song for “Mary Poppins Returns.” Moved, he and his writing partner, Scott Williams, knocked on her door to say how impressed they were by her dedication to rehearse. “Well, guys, fear can be a powerful motivator,” she told them.

“I’m mostly just trying to show how human everyone is — even these bold-faced names,” Shaiman, a two-time Grammy winner and two-time Emmy winner, says in the interview.

Shaiman isn’t above mocking himself, as he does for becoming an inveterate pothead and cocaine user. “I should go into the Guinness Book of World Records for being the only person who put on weight while being a cocaine addict,” he writes.

There are stories about how a misunderstanding over an unpaid bill with Barbra Streisand left him shaken for days and the time he insulted Harry Connick Jr. (Both would later reconcile.)

Then there was the time he found himself dressed in an ostentatious powder-blue suit and feather boa alongside Matt Stone and Trey Parker on a red carpet for “South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut” — they were dressed as Gwyneth Paltrow and Jennifer Lopez.

One lesson from Shaiman: ‘Show up’

One lesson Shaiman hopes to teach aspiring artists is to go for it: “What you can do is show up. Show up to everything. Say yes to everything because I’m a good example of that.”

He tells the story of Midler organizing a world tour and offering his services but being told she was only hiring local Los Angeles people. So he withdrew all his money from the bank, hopped on a flight from New York and called her from a phone booth: “I’m in L.A. Where’s rehearsal?”

“Even if you don’t get the job, keep your spirit up because someone in that room is going to remember you for another thing. That’s the thing I think to really learn from the book,” he says.

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As a sign of Shaiman’s pull on Broadway, the audiobook will feature performances by Crystal, Short, Matthew Broderick, Megan Hilty, Nathan Lane, Katharine McPhee and Ben Whishaw, among others.

“I had included a lot of lyrics in the book and then I suddenly realized, ‘What, am I going to sing them all or speak them all?’ So I started calling friends, some who had sung those songs and some who had sung the demos,” he says.

Crystal met Shaiman at “Saturday Night Live” and quickly hit it off. In a separate interview, Crystal called his friend funny and quick to improvise, with an almost photographic memory of music.

“Look at his range: From ‘Misery’ to the beautiful score from ‘The American President.’ And I brought him in on ‘61(asterisk)’ and then the ‘Mr. Saturday Night’ score,” Crystal says. “He’s just so uniquely talented as an artist.”

Despite being a Tony Award winner in 2003 with “Hairspray” and earning two other nominations for “Catch Me If You Can” in 2011 and “Some Like It Hot” in 2023, Shaiman is flustered by Broadway.

His last two shows — “Smash” and “Some Like It Hot” — earned great reviews but closed early, a victim of high costs and fickle audiences.

“I wish the shows kind of stunk and I could go, ‘Oh, man, that really stunk. People are really not liking this,’” he says. “But when they’re enjoying it?”

Shaiman really has nothing else to prove and yet he laughs that his skin has gotten thinner — not thicker — over the years. He’d like to take it easy, but that’s not what Eeyores do.

“I don’t know how well I’ll actually do with retirement, but I’d like to give it a try.”

By Gretchen McKay, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Woe to the cookie, cake or waffle lover who discovers, often after years of stomach upset, fatigue and skin issues, that the culprit of their health issues is gluten, the protein found in grains like wheat, barley and rye.

Most everything you find in a bakery, grocery store cookie aisle or on the sweet side of a breakfast menu is made with flour. Which means that those with gluten sensitivities or allergies are often out of luck when it comes to sweet treats.

One of my sons has celiac disease so I’m always on the lookout for gluten-free products that don’t include hidden sources of gluten such as soy sauce or malt vinegar and actually taste good, or at least good enough to justify the high cost. (Gluten-free cereals, pasta and snacks can be up to 139% more expensive than their gluten-containing counterparts, according to the nonprofit Celiac Disease Foundation.)

Dilettoso, a gluten-free baking mix brand founded by Italian nutritionist Stefania Dilettoso in 2024, offers a tasty and super-convenient solution for the home cook.

Dilettoso baking mixes, which come in Vava Vanilla, Choc-o-Lotta and Bella Berry flavors, are an easy way to make a quick and easy gluten-free breakfast for your child. (Gretchen McKay/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette/TNS)

Made with a blend of finely ground organic whole oat and brown rice flours, organic tapioca starch and natural flavorings, its Amore mixes are low-fat, preservative-free and because no sugar is added, fairly low cal (a serving counts just 120 calories).

For many people, texture is just as important as taste in baked goods. Because these mixes are made with naturally absorbent oat flour, the batter retains its hydration and bakes up light and fluffy. When it comes to breakfast foods, that translates into pancakes and waffles that rise beautifully, with an airy, light interior.

They’re available in three kid-friendly flavors — Choco-Lotta, Bella Berry and Vava Vanilla — and can used to make pancakes and waffles with the addition of water or milk (and an egg, if you want the extra protein). They also can be used as a gluten-free base for cookies, brownies, cakes and muffins with the addition of other ingredients.

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One 10-ounce box of the Amore mixes — Italian for “love” — makes around 15 4-inch mini waffles or a half-dozen 7-inch regular waffles.

We tried the Vava Vanilla variety, which like the other mixes is leavened with baking soda and cream of tartar.

My toddler grandson gobbled them down just as quickly as the “regular” pancakes he gets to eat on weekends with my husband and me at Eat’n Park. But the real thumbs up came from my son, who said they were “pretty good” for a gluten-free product.

However, their price means they will probably be reserved for special occasions. They were $13.95 per box on Amazon (or $35 for a three-pack and $49.50 for a six-pack). That’s nearly $2 a waffle or 93 cents per mini waffle.

©2026 PG Publishing Co. Visit at post-gazette.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Edward Lotterman

You can take an applied economist away from their computer but you cannot stop their brain from recognizing economics as they travel our nation. Here are examples from rambling from St. Paul to Austin, Texas.

Overlooking the Missouri River in Atchison, Kan., just below Amelia Earhart’s childhood home, one sees why grain trucks from South Dakota and southwest Minnesota drive northeast to the Twin Cities before shipping grain toward New Orleans. This observation helps understand why we now are wasting billions deepening more seaports than we need.

Barge-loading docks on the Missouri River at Sioux City, Iowa, are only half as far by truck from South Dakota or southwest Minnesota as ones in the Twin Cities. Even those downriver in Omaha, Neb., are nearer than Savage or Shakopee. Driving south toward these Missouri river ports is more on the way to the Gulf of Mexico than the Twin Cities. Yet, despite spending billions improving navigability on the Missouri, grain shipments on it dwindle to near nothing. What gives?

Yes, topography disadvantages the Missouri. But we had already spent barge loads of dollars improving the Mississippi and Ohio rivers for transport. That engendered political demands for the same on the Missouri. That is hard for Congress to resist.

Start back two centuries. Steamboats on readily navigable interior rivers jump started a century of rapid economic development. New Orleans formed a natural seaport. From there, steamboats of diminishing sizes could make their way up the Mississippi, Ohio and Missouri rivers and smaller ones like the Tennessee, Arkansas and even the Wabash. Small steamboats made it to Mankato and to Fort Benton, Mont.

Cheap transportation facilitated selling farm, forest and mine outputs early on. Riverboats brought household supplies and raw materials for new industries.

Railroads were the eventual alternatives for extending shipments far from navigable rivers. Over time, steamboat service shrank back. But then, diesel-powered towboats pushing covered barges supplanted Mark Twain-era sternwheelers and deck cargos multiplied the payoff of low-cost water transport.

Congress funded initial construction for a series of locks and dams on the Upper Mississippi, above St. Louis, in June 1930, before the Depression really hit. But public works spending always has political support. Its employment-boosting potential attracted both presidents Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt. By 1940, the system was complete from Alton, Ill., to coal and petroleum docks below the Washington Avenue Bridge in Minneapolis.

Similar work was done on the Ohio and Tennessee rivers. The Arkansas was being made navigable to Tulsa, Okla. A large hydroelectric and flood control dam was built at Fort Peck in northeastern Montana. Destructive floods in 1943 prompted funding of five more “main stem” dams in the Dakotas, completed by 1960.

Thus, making the Missouri as navigable as the Mississippi and the Ohio seemed sensible. Measured in 2026 dollars, billions were spent. But the Missouri was always a wild river twitching its bed from side to side across its flood plain. Six large dams upstream did make flows more regular. Yet floods in 1951, 1952, 1984 and 1993 still shifted the main channel enough to push Nebraska farm runoff into Kansas and vice versa. Ongoing dredging cost tens of millions.

Topography is the culprit. From the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri near St. Louis, the Mississippi rises only 330 feet in elevation to reach St. Paul. The Missouri rises nearly 700 feet to reach Omaha and then Sioux City. Mileages are similar, but the Missouri is steeper and its current faster.

That would be true even without 26 locks and dams on the Mississippi. The cumulative lift of these locks roughly equals the difference in elevation between St. Louis and St. Paul. The Corps of Engineers essentially built a stair-step of flat lakes joined by locks. Water moves south, so there is a current, but it is a mile or two per hour versus four to six on the Missouri. Anyone who has tried to paddle a canoe upstream knows what that means.

Why not build the same on the Missouri? The flat topography over most stretches make that impossible just as it would for the Mississippi itself south of St. Louis. The next best alternative is building structures that anchor the main channel in place and deepen it enough for barges. The most common measure is “wing dams.” These look like jetties or breakwaters jutting into the river from the bank that one wants to preserve. The dams are constructed of pilings driven into the riverbed with rock piled on either side.

Such wing dams are visible from the house in Atchison in which aviator Amelia Earhart was born. Every quarter of a mile in the river below is a wing dam projecting out and downstream from the bank on the Missouri side. Each is 300 or 400 feet long. Drive the river road or look at Google Earth and they go on for miles.

So there is a channel usually deep enough for barges needing nine feet. But few travel it, at least not carrying grain downriver or fertilizer up. The confined river is deep enough for barges, but often very narrow compared to the Mississippi. Sharp bends are numerous. Towboats must fight the current going upstream and fight to maintain control coming down when the river is high and fast. Instead of the nine 1,500-ton barge tows usual on the upper Mississippi, your see two or four on the Missouri. But crew numbers for each towboat are the same.

The result is that Missouri River barge cargo is dominated by sand and gravel carried short distances for local use, just as barges from Grey Cloud Island used to come to concrete plants in northeast Minneapolis. The most recent year’s stats for Sioux City list about 160 barges loaded for movement to St Louis or beyond. Numbers from the Twin Cities vary from 3,300 to over 5,000 in recent years.

So the dreams — or delusions — of past officials proved false. The U.S. Treasury laid out billions with little payback. Didn’t anyone foresee this?

Yes, there were skeptics. But Congress naturally errs on the side of funding too many projects. If you guarantee a nine-foot channel on two or three major rivers it is hard to deny it to one more.

We face the same situation right now with harbors. The original 1914 Panama Canal locks accommodated vessels up to 40 feet in draft. That largely was to accommodate warships. Most cargo vessels drew 25 to 30 feet at most. U.S. Harbors were dredged accordingly.

Those lock dimensions defined a “Panamax” ship. But many new tankers, bulk carriers and container ships are built to “post-Panamax” dimensions that need 50 feet of water. In virtually all harbors, deepening to 40 to 50 feet instead costs hundreds of millions of dollars. The bigger the ships, the fewer there are. We really don’t need every port to accommodate them. But if you fund the dredging of Mobile, Ala., and Miami, it is hard to consign Savanna, Ga., or Galveston, Texas, to secondary status. Thus we are dredging out at least 15 ports to a depth of 50 feet or more. Little of the additional capacity will be used.

The same phenomenon occurs with cities that want their airports to be “international” ones. That means the federal government has to supply U.S. Immigration, Customs and USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service personnel and facilities to handle incoming flights, even if only package-tour charters returning from Belize or St. Lucia. But politics are such that these local requests are hard to refuse.

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St. Paul economist and writer Edward Lotterman can be reached at stpaul@edlotterman.com.