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Since the 40th anniversary (!!!) Blu-Ray version of Blazing Saddles has just been released, Esquire has an interview with Mel Brooks:
ESQUIRE.COM: Looking back, what are the memories that stick out most from making the movie?
MEL BROOKS: I always thought Richard Pryor was going to be the black sheriff. I just assumed it. Richard was one of the writers [on the film] and then Warner Brothers said, “No, he’s got a drug problem, he’s not well-known as an actor.” And I was just like, “Trust me, this guy’s the funniest guy who’s ever lived. He’s going to be a big movie star.” And you know, two years later he did Silver Streak.
ESQ: And you were so disappointed they wouldn’t give him the part that you quit the film.
MB: I walked out and then after three days Richard grabbed me and said, “Look, if you leave I don’t get my last payment as a writer.” So I came back and he was like, “C’mon, we’ll find somebody.” So Richard and I looked diligently and when Cleavon read one line we looked at each other and that was it. He was the handsomest guy we’d ever seen in our lives. And Richard was like, “He’s really black, he’s going to scare the shit out of these people.”…
ESQ: Going back to Blazing Saddles, is it true when you first showed it to the Warner Brothers executives, none of them laughed?
MB: It was about a dozen executives at a screening room at Warner Brothers and, no, there were two guys that laughed. Now, not so loud, they didn’t want to hurt the other people’s feelings. But the ten other guys in the room didn’t laugh and at the end Leo Greenfield, who was in charge of domestic distribution — nice guy, I got along with him — but he said, “I have to voice my feelings, I think we should bury the picture and eat the money and not release it. It’s disgusting and I don’t want the Warner Brothers logo on it.” And [John] Calley [who ran the film division] said, “Well, let’s have a screening,” and that was a big, big hit. Right from the opening credits — the WB logo burning through and Frankie Laine singing and the whip cracks — that was it, we were home free. The hell with executives, the hell with politically correct. The manager said he’d never heard laughter like that in that movie house….
Much more at the link.
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