Blazing Saddles is such a popular and classic movie, but there’s no denying that it’s pretty controversial and contains some quite shocking scenes and language that it simply wouldn't get away with today.
Writer Andrew Bergman himself admitted, "You couldn't make this movie today. You can't say the N-word in a movie today, not even in a comic way," The Telegraph reported. He is probably right—but maybe that’s for the best!
We all know and love the catchy theme song to the movie sung by Frankie Laine. It’s so convincing and it sounds just like a real theme tune from an actual Western!
But did you know that this was thanks to creator Mel Brooks’ trickery—he actually didn't tell Lane that the movie was a spoof. He told him it was a real Western, to make sure he sang it seriously! It certainly worked!
After WB fired Young and replaced him with Gene Wilder, Young was pretty upset by the decision and he decided to sue the production company for breach of contract.
However, Mel Brooks put him in his place when he declared, "On the first day of shooting… we hung him upside down in the jail cell, and green stuff started spewing out of his mouth," as he recalled to Rolling Stone. Sounds like Young was the one breaching the contract!
One of the funniest parts of the movie is when the whole group runs out of the studio at the end. Especially when you see them running out of the WB gates, and there’s a random man just standing there looking at them!
But we bet you didn't know that this man was a real-life onlooker—they tried to get him to move out of the way, but he didn't understand their instructions. So Brooks just gave him a waiver and let him appear in the movie!
Lili Von Shtupp is of course one of the most beloved and hilarious characters in the classic movie, but did you know that she is actually based on a real-life person? That’s why it was so important to Brooks that Kahn had movie-star legs.
That’s right! Shtupp is actually a parody of Hollywood legend Marlene Dietrich. It wasn't just Westerns that Blazing Saddles made fun of, but actually, it was the entire movie industry.
Blazing Saddles is known for being totally hilarious and just quite crazy, both in the story and behind the scenes. So guests made the world premiere for the movie just as crazy to match, holding it at the now-demolished Pickwick Drive-In Theater in Burbank, California.
But instead of driving in, the guests rode in—on horseback! Talk about a memorable movie event, truly in keeping with the theme of the genre.
Another reason Western fans love watching this silly send up of the genre is it’s full of tiny hidden references to many of the beloved movies of the era.
For example, did notice the scene where Mongo wakes up in the Sheriff’s office, where Bart is hanging up wanted posters? Well, one of these posters can also be spotted in the 1959 movie Rio Bravo, starring legendary cowboy movie star John Wayne.
One of the major rules in movie making is never to break the fourth wall, ie don't look directly at the camera or speak to the audience. This makes the sense of reality completely disappear, and you remember it’s only a movie!
However, this wacky movie didn't care about those rules, and Bart not only gives himself a hug randomly, but he also turns straight to the camera and speaks to the audience. Absolutely hilarious.
Despite Kahn’s reservations during the audition process, she was actually super keen to take the role of Shtupp. In fact so much so that Lucille Ball accused her of deliberately giving a bad performance in her previous movie Mame, so that she would get fired!
She did indeed get fired and she started work the very next day on Blazing Saddles. Because she got fired rather than quit, she received the salary for both movies.
Even though it seemed that Mel Brooks didn't let anyone stop him from making his movie as controversial as he wanted, the truth is he didn't totally get his way with all of the production decisions.
One thing Brooks wanted but didn't get his way was with casting the actor Richard Pryor. Brooks wanted him for the part of Bart, but no one would finance him because he was so controversial! So instead he cast Cleavon Little and hired Pryor to help write the movie’s script.
