The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will honor Mel Brooks

It all started on Henry Street in Brooklyn for Mel Brooks.

"I was a street-corner comic," he recalled, more than 60 years later. "I would comment on the goings-on in the neighborhood -- 'Here comes Mrs. Bloom. Duck.' "

Brooks honed his comedic chops as a young stand-up in New York's Catskills Mountains in the 1940s -- fertile ground for future funnymen, as Brooks told it in a recent interview.

"I was doing the Catskill jokes, which were like 'Let me tell you about this girl I took out last night. This was a slender girl. Skinny. We're talking about a very skinny girl. I took her to a restaurant and the waiter said, 'Check your umbrella.' "

Eventually, Brooks abandoned the one-liners for more "people jokes. I would do impressions that the band would laugh at. I never did normal James Cagney or Humphrey Bogart impressions. I would say, 'Ladies and gentlemen, Thomas Jefferson.' I would say, 'It's imperative that we form a union of equality. . . .' And I would go on and on. The band would be hysterical."

And it didn't ruffle his feathers when the audience wasn't impressed. He always had a zinger comeback.

"I would say to the audience, 'How do you know I'm wrong? Did anybody see him?' "

On Friday, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences pays tribute to arguably the world's funniest man (with Oscars, Tonys, Emmys and Grammys to prove it) at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater.

Besides clips from such classic Brooks comedies as "The Producers," "Blazing Saddles" and "Young Frankenstein," there'll be a discussion with Brooks and Carl Reiner, Richard Benjamin, Teri Garr, Tracey Ullman and Lesley Ann Warren. Film historian Leonard Maltin will be the host.

Reiner, who was a regular on Sid Caesar's seminal 1950-54 NBC comedy series, "Your Show of Shows," immediately became friends with Brooks, who was one of the writers.

"Whenever there was a lull in producer Max Liebman's office, Mel would get up and do a performance," said Reiner.

"The first time I saw him he turned into a Jewish pirate. I will never forget. I think the first words out of his mouth were complaining about the cost of sailcloth. He said, 'Do you know how much it costs to set sail?' And he told us how many dollars a yard it was for sailcloth. I will never forget it; he called his cutlass a cutlet. Those are the first two jokes of his I remember."