Max Brooks
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Maximilian Michael Brooks (born May 22, 1972) is an American actor and author. He is the son of comedian
Mel Brooks Melvin James Brooks (né Kaminsky; born June 28, 1926) is an American actor, comedian, filmmaker, and songwriter. With a career spanning over seven decades, he is known as a writer and director of a variety of successful broad farces and parodie ...
and actress
Anne Bancroft Anne Bancroft (born Anna Maria Louisa Italiano; September 17, 1931 – June 6, 2005) was an American actress. Respected for her acting prowess and versatility, Bancroft received an Academy Award, three BAFTA Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, tw ...
. Much of Brooks's writing focuses on
zombie A zombie (Haitian French: ; ; Kikongo: ''zumbi'') is a mythological undead corporeal revenant created through the reanimation of a corpse. In modern popular culture, zombies appear in horror genre works. The term comes from Haitian folkl ...
stories. He was a senior fellow at the Modern War Institute at
West Point, New York West Point is the oldest continuously occupied military post in the United States. Located on the Hudson River in New York (state), New York, General George Washington stationed his headquarters in West Point in the summer and fall of 1779 durin ...
.


Early life

Brooks was born on May 22, 1972, in
Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...
,
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
. He is the son of actress
Anne Bancroft Anne Bancroft (born Anna Maria Louisa Italiano; September 17, 1931 – June 6, 2005) was an American actress. Respected for her acting prowess and versatility, Bancroft received an Academy Award, three BAFTA Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, tw ...
and actor, director, producer, and writer
Mel Brooks Melvin James Brooks (né Kaminsky; born June 28, 1926) is an American actor, comedian, filmmaker, and songwriter. With a career spanning over seven decades, he is known as a writer and director of a variety of successful broad farces and parodie ...
. His father is
Jew Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...
ish, while his mother was an Italian-American Catholic. Brooks is
dyslexic Dyslexia (), previously known as word blindness, is a learning disability that affects either reading or writing. Different people are affected to different degrees. Problems may include difficulties in spelling words, reading quickly, writ ...
, and recalled that during the time in which he was growing up: Brooks attended Crossroads School in
Santa Monica, California Santa Monica (; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Santa Mónica'') is a city in Los Angeles County, California, Los Angeles County, situated along Santa Monica Bay on California's South Coast (California), South Coast. Santa Monica's 2020 United Sta ...
. He studied at
Pitzer College Pitzer College is a private liberal arts college in Claremont, California. It was founded in 1963 as a women's college in the Claremont Colleges consortium and became coeducational in 1970. Pitzer enrolls approximately 1000 students. Pitzer off ...
in
Claremont, California Claremont () is a suburban city in eastern Los Angeles County, California, United States, east of Los Angeles. It lies in the Pomona Valley at the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. As of the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census it had ...
, where he earned a
bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Medieval Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six years ...
in history. He also attended graduate school, studying film at
American University The American University (AU or American) is a Private university, private University charter#Federal, federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C., United States. Its main campus spans 90-acres (36 ha) on Ward Circle, in the Spri ...
in Washington, D.C.


Career


Writing

From 2001 to 2003, Brooks was a member of the writing team at ''
Saturday Night Live ''Saturday Night Live'' (''SNL'') is an American Late night television in the United States, late-night live television, live sketch comedy variety show created by Lorne Michaels and developed by Michaels and Dick Ebersol that airs on NBC. The ...
''. In 2003, Brooks wrote his first book, '' The Zombie Survival Guide'', a fictional survival manual about
zombies A zombie (Haitian French: ; ; Kikongo: ''zumbi'') is a mythological undead corporeal revenant created through the reanimation of a corpse. In modern popular culture, zombies appear in horror genre works. The term comes from Haitian folklore ...
. In 2006, Brooks wrote the follow-up '' World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War'', a novel on the same subject, set in the ten years following a
zombie apocalypse Zombie apocalypse is a subgenre of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction in which society collapses due to overwhelming swarms of zombies. Usually, only a few individuals or small bands of human survivors are left living. There are many d ...
.
Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, is an American film production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount ...
acquired the rights for a film adaptation, and
Brad Pitt William Bradley Pitt (born December 18, 1963) is an American actor and film producer. In a Brad Pitt filmography, film career spanning more than thirty years, Pitt has received list of awards and nominations received by Brad Pitt, numerous a ...
's production company,
Plan B Entertainment Plan B Entertainment, Inc., more commonly known as Plan B, is an American production company founded in November 2001 by Brad Pitt, Brad Grey, Kristin Hahn and Jennifer Aniston. The company first signed with Warner Bros. as a replacement for ...
, produced the film. In the October 2006 issue of ''
Fangoria ''Fangoria'' is an internationally distributed American horror film fan magazine, in publication since 1979. It is published four times a year by Fangoria Publishing, LLC and is edited by Phil Nobile Jr. The magazine was originally released i ...
'', Brooks stated that he would not be writing the screenplay for the motion picture, as he felt he was not an accomplished enough screenwriter to "do it right".
J. Michael Straczynski Joseph Michael Straczynski, known as J. Michael Straczynski (; born July 17, 1954) is an American filmmaker and comic book writer. He is the founder of Synthetic Worlds Ltd. and Studio JMS and is known as the creator of the science fiction televi ...
wrote the first version of the screenplay. Brooks wrote the introduction for the hardcover collected edition of
Dynamite Entertainment Dynamite Entertainment is an American comic book publisher founded in 2004 by Nick Barrucci in Mount Laurel, New Jersey, known for publishing comic book adaptations of licensed feature film properties, such as ''Army of Darkness'', '' Terminator ...
's zombie miniseries ''Raise the Dead'', released in 2007. In 2010, Brooks wrote the IDW comic book mini-series ''G.I. Joe: Hearts & Minds''. In 2012, Brooks published ''Closure, Limited and Other Zombie Tales'', featuring the story of that name from '' The New Dead'', along with three other short stories set in the ''
World War Z ''World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War'' is a 2006 zombie apocalyptic horror novel written by American author Max Brooks. The novel is broken into eight chapters: “Warnings”, “Blame”, “The Great Panic”, “Turning the Tid ...
'' universe. In 2014,
Broadway Books Broadway Books is an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc.. It released its first list in Fall 1996. Broadway was founded in 1995 as a unit of Bantam Doubleday Dell, a unit of Bertelsmann. Bertelsmann acquire ...
published '' The Harlem Hellfighters'', a
graphic novel A graphic novel is a self-contained, book-length form of sequential art. The term ''graphic novel'' is often applied broadly, including fiction, non-fiction, and Anthology, anthologized work, though this practice is highly contested by comics sc ...
which portrays a fictionalized account of the
African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...
369th Infantry Regiment's experiences in
World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
, written by Brooks and illustrated by Caanan White.
Sony Pictures Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment studio conglomerate that produces, acquires, and distributes filmed entertainment (theatrical motion pictures, television programs, and rec ...
has purchased the rights to create a film of the novel, with Caleeb Pinkett and James Lassiter producing on behalf of Overbrook Entertainment. He wrote the story for the 2016 film '' The Great Wall'', starring
Matt Damon Matthew Paige Damon ( ; born October 8, 1970) is an American actor, film producer, and screenwriter. He was ranked among ''Forbes'' most bankable stars in 2007, and in 2010 was one of the highest-grossing actors of all time. He has received va ...
. In 2017 Brooks published a novel based on ''
Minecraft ''Minecraft'' is a 2011 sandbox game developed and published by the Swedish video game developer Mojang Studios. Originally created by Markus Persson, Markus "Notch" Persson using the Java (programming language), Java programming language, the ...
'', titled '' Minecraft: The Island'', and in 2021, he published the sequel, ''Minecraft: The Mountain''. In August 2019, Brooks announced a new book, entitled '' Devolution: A Firsthand Account of the Rainier Sasquatch Massacre'', about the cryptid
Bigfoot Bigfoot (), also commonly referred to as Sasquatch (), is a large, hairy Mythic humanoids, mythical creature said to inhabit forests in North America, particularly in the Pacific Northwest.Example definitions include: *"A large, hairy, manlike ...
. It was released on June 16, 2020.


Acting and voice-over work

Brooks has a number of other creative credits. As an actor, he has been seen in ''
Roseanne ''Roseanne'' is an American television sitcom created by Matt Williams (producer), Matt Williams that originally aired on American Broadcasting Company, ABC from October 18, 1988, to May 20, 1997, and briefly revived from March 27, 2018, to May ...
'', '' To Be or Not to Be'', '' Pacific Blue'', and '' 7th Heaven''. He also has a career voicing animation: his voice has been featured in the animated shows ''
Batman Beyond ''Batman Beyond'' (also known as ''Batman of the Future'' in Europe) is an American superhero animated television series based on the DC Comics superhero Batman, and serving as the sequel to both '' Batman: The Animated Series'' and '' The New Ba ...
'', ''
Buzz Lightyear of Star Command ''Buzz Lightyear of Star Command'' is an American animated science fiction comedy television series produced by Walt Disney Television Animation and co-produced by Pixar Animation Studios. It is a spin-off of Pixar's ''Toy Story'' franchise a ...
'', ''
Justice League The Justice League, or Justice League of America (JLA), is a group of superheroes appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. The team first appeared in ''The Brave and the Bold'' #28 (March 1960). Writer Gardner Fox conceived the ...
'', and '' All Dogs Go to Heaven: The Series''. During the start of the third season of '' Lost Tapes'', he was cast as himself in the zombie episode, telling the audience about how zombies come to be. He also appeared on the Spike TV series '' Deadliest Warrior'', in which he represented the zombie team in the "Vampires vs. Zombies" episode, as one of the zombie experts along with Matt Mogk, founder of the Zombie Research Society.


Personal life

Brooks has been married to playwright Michelle Kholos since 2003. They have one son and live in
Venice, California Venice is a neighborhood of the City of Los Angeles within the Westside region of Los Angeles County, California, United States. Venice was founded by Abbot Kinney in 1905 as a seaside resort town. It was an independent city until 1926, whe ...
. In October 2020, Brooks and his father appeared in a short video endorsing Joe Biden's presidential campaign.


Filmography


Bibliography


Prose

* '' The Zombie Survival Guide'' (2003) * ''
World War Z ''World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War'' is a 2006 zombie apocalyptic horror novel written by American author Max Brooks. The novel is broken into eight chapters: “Warnings”, “Blame”, “The Great Panic”, “Turning the Tid ...
'' (2006) * ''Closure, Limited and Other Zombie Tales'' (2011) * '' Minecraft: The Island'' (2017) * ''
Devolution Devolution is the statutory delegation of powers from the central government of a sovereign state to govern at a subnational level, such as a regional or local level. It is a form of administrative decentralization. Devolved territori ...
'' (2020) ''Nominated for Locus Award's Best Horror Novel in 2021.'' * ''Minecraft: The Mountain'' (2021) * ''Minecraft: The Village'' (2023) * ''Tiger Chair: A Short Story'' (2024)


Comics

* '' The Zombie Survival Guide: Recorded Attacks'' (2009) * ''G.I. Joe: Hearts and Minds'' (2010) * '' The Harlem Hellfighters'' (2014)Max Brooks discusses "The Harlem Hellfighters," World War I and his own life on the 7th Avenue Project radio show
/ref> * ''The Extinction Parade'' (2014) * ''A More Perfect Union'' (2016) * ''Germ Warfare: A Very Graphic History'' (2019)


References


External links

* * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Brooks, Max 1972 births Living people American comics writers American male television writers Television writers from California American writers of Italian descent People of Lucanian descent American people of Jewish descent American graphic novelists American satirists American satirical novelists American University alumni Crossroads School alumni Writers with dyslexia American writers with disabilities Pitzer College alumni Primetime Emmy Award winners Screenwriters from New York (state) Jewish American film people