The NSFW Joke Mel Brooks Wishes He Didn't Cut From Blazing Saddles
Comedy king Mel Brooks has always pushed the envelope. He's been no stranger to controversy over the years, and a lot of his films have raised even more eyebrows in today's political climate than they did upon their release. But still, to this day, there isn't a single joke that Brooks would take back. In fact, he regrets not going even further.
Brooks' 1974 film "Blazing Saddles" examines race through a parody of classic Hollywood Westerns. Despite being a critique of racism, Brooks has argued that fear of political correctness would have censored the film if he had tried to make it today.
"We have become stupidly politically correct, which is the death of comedy," he explained to BBC Radio 4 (via Variety) back in 2017. "It's okay not to hurt feelings of various tribes and groups. However, it's not good for comedy. Comedy has to walk a thin line, take risks. Comedy is the lecherous little elf whispering into the king's ear, always telling the truth about human behavior."
When asked what lines he wouldn't cross, Brooks gave the same response my own Jewish grandfather would probably give. "I personally would never touch gas chambers or the death of children or Jews at the hands of the Nazis," he said to BBC. "Everything else is okay."
Some people argue that Brooks takes things too far, but the comedian doesn't regret a single joke he's ever told. "[There's] not one I would take back," he told Fresh Air last year. "As a matter of fact, I'm pretty upset about some jokes that I took back [...] that I thought, well, that's a little too risque. But there were plenty of jokes I should have just exploded with, and I said, 'Maybe that's a bit too much for the kids' or whatever."
Madeline Kahn bites Cleavon Little's arm
There was one gag in particular that Mel Brooks ended up cutting that he wishes he had kept in "Blazing Saddles." "It had to do with Madeline Kahn going into Cleavon Little's dressing room after the show," he recalled to Fresh Air host Terry Gross. "And then she says something like, 'Relax,' you know? And then she says, 'Oh [...] how are you built? Oh, you're — oh, how beautiful [...] the way you're built, your people are built,' you know? And it was too much. And she's — and he says, 'I'm sorry to disappoint you, Ms. Von Shtupp. You're biting my arm, you know?'
The scene was a satirical take on the way that white women objectify and fetishize Black men. It's a gag that's designed to make the audience uncomfortable with the way that Ms. Von Shtupp is treating Little's character, Bart, but this discomfort mixed with humor might have felt too complicated and sexually charged for Brooks' intended audience. The film still earned an R rating for its strong language, comic violence, and sexual and racist references (per BBFC).
Probably the biggest controversy in "Blazing Saddles" is the use of the N-word, but Brooks doesn't lament this choice either. "I use the N-word in 'Blazing Saddles," the director told Men's Journal in 2013. "But it was to show how despised, hated, and loathed this Black sheriff was. Without the N-word, you couldn't have the story. You got to tell the truth."
Brooks never regrets taking it too far
"Blazing Saddles" isn't the only film that has landed Mel Brooks in hot water over the years. "When I did Springtime for Hitler [in 'The Producers'], the war was not even cold," he also told Men's Journal. "People like rabbis and would write to me and say, 'This is execrable.' And I'd say, 'You can't bring folks like Hitler down by getting on a soapbox — they're better at it than we are. But if you can humiliate them, ridicule them, and have people laugh at them — you've won.'"
Brooks was never worried about offending people, even if they weren't ready for what he threw at them. "Oh, you have to risk it," the comedian insisted in the same Men's Journal interview. "To hell with them." He was confident that history would side with him eventually and added: "I knew 'Springtime for Hitler' was perfect, I knew it was right. I said to my friends, they may have to catch up with me. I may be a little ahead of the curve at this point and have to wait for some of the world to catch up with me."
What good is regret when every mistake was part of the journey? "Forget about correcting your past," Brooks proclaimed. "You learn from your past as you go along. You can't say, 'If I had ....' You say, 'Okay, all right. That was a mistake. I won't do that again.' That's how you learn."