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Jeffrey Gillespie: Wilder at heart Friday Sep 2, 2016 at 12:01 AM If I were to tell you that Bertolt Brecht, that scion of 20th century epic theater, was a significant contributor to some of the best of Borscht Belt-style slapstick comedy during the latter part of that century, you might be skeptical. But in 1963, a young actor named Gene Wilder was working alongside a certain Anne Bancroft during a Broadway production of "Mother Courage and her Children," in a rather minor role as the Chaplain. At the time, the flinty Ms. Bancroft had spent a couple of years in a relationship with a 30-something comedy writer named Mel Brooks. After a meeting of the minds in the form of an off-color joke regarding a pea-coat being worn by Brooks ("they tried to sell them as urine jackets, but nobody was buying"), the two men began a collaboration that spanned decades and included such legendary films as "The Producers," "Young Frankenstein" and the 1974 comedy classic "Blazing Saddles," considered by many critics to be among the funniest movies ever made. Wilder was directed numerously by Brooks, but also by Woody Allen, Robert Aldrich, Arthur Penn and Sidney Poitier, among others. But Wilder's life beyond comedy was an earnest one. Behind his limpid blue eyes lay the melancholic aspect of a man who had survived tragedy; his politics and his artistry were more complex than he often got credit for. For example, the conspicuous, broad comedy of his work with Brooks included the hilarious attempt of Wilder's character in "Young Frankenstein" to explain away his family heritage by insisting that his name was not pronounced as "Stein" but rather as "Steen" — a thinly veiled allusion to the anti-Semitic traditions in Hollywood at that time. Wilder had earlier WASPified his professional name from the far more conspicuous Jerome Silberman when he began working with the Actors Studio in Manhattan in the late 1950s. His various collaborations with comedy barnstormer Richard Pryor led, perhaps inadvertently, to interesting commentaries on race dynamics in 70s America — most controversially in "Silver Streak," where Wilder's character appears in blackface, in peculiar obeisance to Al Jolson — that ultimately made a sustained historical contribution to cinematic discussions of race and prejudice in America. Wilder married the equally brilliant and hilarious Gilda Radner, a Saturday Night Live alum and comedienne, in 1984. She died less than five years later of ovarian cancer. Her widower fought and beat Non-Hodgkin lymphoma between 1999 and 2005. Wilder always said that he was an artist and an actor, not a clown. He approached his career with the same sort of quiet earnestness with which he lived his life. In the end, while his comedic performances were hugely entertaining and eye-wateringly funny, it was clear that there were deeper creative impulses at work. In song, during his soulful, landmark performance as Willy Wonka in Mel Stuart's 1971 adaptation of Roald Dahl's "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," Wilder implored his audience to hold their breath, make a wish, and "come with me, and ... be in a world of pure imagination ..." reminding us that simple expressions of art and beauty still have a place in an ever more automated and cynical world. With his passing, such sentiments have lost another of their champions. Ashland resident Jeffrey Gillespie is a Tidings columnist and freelance writer. Email him at [email protected].