All in all, I have many fond memories of making To Be or Not to Be, it was so much fun. Especially singing and dancing with my gorgeous and sensationally talented wife. Anne really understood me, or at least enough to tolerate me, especially when I was being myself. I truly believe that when you’re with the right person, they love you not in spite of your flaws, but because of them. Anne once told a reporter that after meeting me she told her shrink, “Let’s speed this process up. I’ve met the right man.”
During an interview with both of us on the Today show, Gene Shalit asked Anne whether she was content in her marriage. She stared at him, surprised at the question. Then she said, “I’m more than content! When I hear his key in the lock at night my heart starts to beat faster. I’m just so happy he’s coming home. We have so much fun.”
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In addition to being a wonderful wife and partner, Anne was a truly great mother. Max was diagnosed with dyslexia at a time when it was relatively unheard of. They didn’t even call it a learning disability back then. It was dismissed as just laziness, goofing off, or “you’re not trying hard enough.” So my Annie, one of the greatest, most successful actresses of her day, set aside her career to raise Max and become his educational advocate. She taught herself all about dyslexia and developed coping mechanisms for Max. She met with all of his teachers and made sure that they understood what he was going through. She found ways Max could learn in a nontraditional format. Every year she took all of his schoolbooks to the Braille Institute and had them all read onto audiocassettes so that Max could listen to all of his reading assignments. Had she not done that, it would have been difficult, if not impossible, for Max to have graduated from high school.
If that wasn’t enough, Annie was figuring out how technology could help Max. When he was in eighth grade, she forced him to take a typing class. He hated it. She said, “Technology and computers are the way of the future. You’re gonna be a writer. This is a writer’s tool. You are gonna learn how to type so you can be a writer. You will never have to dictate and you will never have to be dependent on anyone else.”
She knew Max’s gifts even before he did. He developed a wonderful narrative skill. His images are beautiful, and you always know just where you are and what’s happening. As I mentioned earlier in the book, Max grew up to be a brilliant and successful writer—in no small part thanks to the efforts of his wonderful mother.
Anne had amazing range as an actress. She was equally convincing as the first female prime minister of Israel, Golda Meir, or as a mother superior in Agnes of God. Anne made acting sound deceptively easy: “It’s getting up early and putting on wigs now and learning lines. And, you know, most of it is that very few moments in the day when you’re really expressing yourself. It’s kind of like giving birth. It’s fairly painful and hard work. And yet, isn’t it worth it?”
She could be the leading lady or an aide-de-camp, helping people, being quietly on their side pushing them, or she could just be onstage with the spotlight and star in something. She was equally comfortable and easily transitioned between theater, movies, and television. She had several TV specials, which all led to her signature performance as Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate, the woman who seduces her friend’s college graduate son, played by Dustin Hoffman （who was actually only a few years younger than she was at the time）。 After decades and many other brilliant performances, it is still the one she is most remembered for. She was a little dismayed that it overshadowed her other impressive work like The Miracle Worker. Mike Nichols, one of the great directors that she worked with, said, “Her combination of brains, humor, frankness, and sense were unlike any other artist. Her beauty was constantly uplifting with her roles and because she was a consummate actress, she changed radically for every part.”
Anne always pushed me. She has always been an inspiration. She always thought I was talented. She believed in me right from the beginning, as a songwriter as well as a screenplay writer or whatever it was I wanted to do.
Anne, who nicknamed me Mibby （a conflation of Mel and Brooks）， always said, “You can do it.” She was a gift from God.
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I know that my intention in writing this book was mainly to share my adventures in show business, and not to indulge in too many stories of my private life…but I’ve been thinking that every once in a while, I would like to share some of the fun that happened in my other life, the life I lived along the way.