Mel Brooks is clearly a man of many talents. He’s a comedian, an actor, a filmmaker, an Oscar-winning screenwriter, the voice of a toilet monster in that one movie and, briefly, a Frank Sinatra impersonator.
Now the 99-year-old Blazing Saddles director has a side gig as a personality quiz designer — not for Cosmopolitan, but for The New York Times.
The Times didn’t provide much context for how this came about beyond stating that “the comedy legend devised a personality test for us.” The test is fittingly known as “The Mel Brooks Questionnaire,” and has been handed out to two celebrity participants so far. The completed test is then published on the Times’ website for all to enjoy.
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The first item on the quiz, oddly, tells participants: “Describe Your Favorite Fragrance.” The next has a blank space for them to “Draw a still life of flowers in a vase that you’d like to receive on your birthday.” The first person that the paper asked to take the quiz, Rob Reiner, opted to draw a smirking stick man, with text explaining “The only thing I know how to draw.”
The New York Times
Then, people are asked to name which architect they would choose to design their “dream house.” Brooks then instructs test-takers to circle “your preferred fruits” and circle “acceptable forms of footwear” (options include “sandal,” “loafer,” “slipper” and “none”). Next, there’s a section to name a preferred neighborhood to dine in and a specific restaurant where one would make a dinner reservation, along with a space to provide both the hypothetical food and drink order.
There’s also a spot to rank “forms of transportation.” Maya Rudolph, the only person other than Reiner to take the quiz for the paper as of writing, put “car” first and “canoe” last (“donkey” was also an option).
The New York Times
Even more unusually, one spot asks participants to “draw the spaceship that would take you all the way to Mars.” Reiner, of course, just drew that same guy again.
The New York Times
Brooks also asks about “career ambitions” for ages 5, 15, 21 and 89. One entry is just labeled “Eggs!” with a number of options to circle (poached, scrambled, raw, etc.). Similarly, “Hats!” allows one to pick everything from “Sherlock Holmes’ deerstalker” to “Whistler’s mother’s bonnet.”
At the very end, the questionnaire allows participants to select their “favorite comedy film of all-time” with “no write-ins.” Naturally, the options are only The Producers, Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, High Anxiety or Spaceballs.
No, Dracula: Dead and Loving It is not an option.
