Blazing Saddles


Blazing Saddles is a 1974 American satirical postmodernist Western comedy film directed by Mel Brooks, who co-wrote the screenplay with Andrew Bergman, Richard Pryor, Norman Steinberg and Alan Uger, based on a story treatment by Bergman. The film stars Cleavon Little and Gene Wilder. Brooks appears in two supporting roles: Governor William J. Le Petomane, and a Yiddish-speaking Native American chief; he also dubs lines for one of Lili Von Shtupp's backing troupe and a cranky moviegoer. The supporting cast includes Slim Pickens, Alex Karras and David Huddleston, as well as Brooks regulars Dom DeLuise, Madeline Kahn and Harvey Korman. Bandleader Count Basie has a cameo as himself, appearing with his orchestra.
The film is full of deliberate anachronisms, from the Count Basie Orchestra playing "April in Paris" in the Wild West, to Pickens' character mentioning the Wide World of Sports.
Blazing Saddles was released by Warner Bros. on February 7, 1974. The film received generally positive reviews from critics and audiences, was nominated for three Academy Awards and is today regarded as a comedy classic, while grossing $119.6 million against a $2.6 million budget. It is ranked number six on the American Film Institute's 100 Years...100 Laughs list, and was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry in 2006.

Plot

On the American frontier of 1874, a new railroad under construction will have to be rerouted through the town of Rock Ridge to avoid quicksand. Realizing this will make Rock Ridge worth millions, territorial attorney general Hedley Lamarr plans to force Rock Ridge's residents out of the town and sends a gang of thugs led by his henchman Taggart to shoot the sheriff and trash the town.
Not wanting to go with Reverend Johnson's suggestion to leave, the other prominent citizens named Johnson lead the other townspeople in demanding that Governor William J. Le Petomane appoint a new sheriff to protect them. Lamarr persuades dim-witted Le Petomane to appoint Bart, a black railroad worker about to be executed for assaulting Taggart. A black sheriff, Lamarr reasons, will offend the townspeople, create chaos and leave Rock Ridge at his mercy.
After an initial hostile reception in which he takes himself "hostage" to escape, Bart relies on his quick wits and the assistance of Jim, an alcoholic gunslinger known as the "Waco Kid", to overcome the townspeople's hostility. Bart subdues Mongo, an immensely strong and dim-witted, yet philosophical henchman sent to kill him, then outwits German seductress-for-hire Lili Von Shtupp at her own game, with Lili falling in love with him.
Upon release, Mongo vaguely informs Bart of Lamarr's connection to the railroad, so Bart and Jim visit the railroad worksite and discover from Bart's best friend Charlie that the railway is planned to go through Rock Ridge. Taggart and his men arrive to kill Bart, but Jim outshoots them and forces their retreat. Furious that his schemes have backfired, Lamarr has Taggart put out an ad for the enlistment of every criminal in the west. Answering the ad are a group of common criminals, motorcycle gangsters, Middle-eastern criminals on dromedaries, Nazi soldiers, and Ku Klux Klansmen.
East of Rock Ridge, Bart introduces the White townspeople to the Black, Chinese, and Irish railroad workers who have all agreed to help them in exchange for acceptance by the community, and explains his plan to defeat Lamarr's army. They labor all night to build a perfect copy of the town as a diversion. When Bart realizes it will not be enough to fool the villains, the townspeople construct copies of themselves.
Bart, Jim, and Mongo buy time by constructing a fake tollbooth in the raiders' path, forcing them to send for change to pay the toll. Once through the booth, the raiders attack the fake town and its population of dummies, which have been booby trapped with dynamite. After Jim detonates the explosives with his sharpshooting, launching the attackers skyward, the townspeople and workers attack the raiders as Lili sings with the Nazi soldiers.
The resulting brawl between townspeople, railroad workers, and Lamarr's thugs literally breaks the fourth wall and bursts onto a neighboring movie set where director Buddy Bizarre is filming a Busby Berkeley-style top-hat-and-tails musical number. The melee then extends into the studio commissary for a food fight and spills out of the Warner Bros. film lot onto the streets of Burbank, California.
Lamarr escapes the brawl and hails a taxi, instructing the cabbie, "Drive me off this picture!" He hides at Mann's Chinese Theatre, which is showing the premiere of Blazing Saddles. As he settles into his seat, he sees onscreen Bart arriving on horseback outside the theatre. Bart blocks Lamarr's escape and shoots him in the groin. Bart and Jim then enter the theater to watch the end of the film.
Back in the film, Bart announces to the townspeople that he is moving on because his work is done and he has grown bored with protecting them. Riding out of town, he finds Jim, still eating his popcorn, and invites him along to "nowhere special". The two friends briefly ride into the desert before dismounting and boarding a limousine which drives off into the sunset.

Cast

Cast notes:

Development

The idea came from a story outline written by Andrew Bergman that he originally intended to develop and produce himself. "I wrote a first draft called Tex-X", he said. "Alan Arkin was hired to direct and James Earl Jones was going to play the sheriff. That fell apart, as things often do." Mel Brooks was taken with the story, which he described as "hip talk1974 talk and expressionshappening in 1874 in the Old West", and purchased the film rights from Bergman. Though he had not worked with a writing team since Your Show of Shows, he hired a group of writers to expand the outline, and posted a large sign: "Please do not write a polite script."
Brooks described the writing process as chaotic: Bergman remembers the room being just as chaotic, telling Creative Screenwriting,

Title

The original title, Tex X, was rejected to avoid it being mistaken for an X-rated film, as were Black Bart – a reference to Black Bart, a white highwayman of the 19th century – and Purple Sage. Brooks said he finally conceived Blazing Saddles one morning while taking a shower.

Casting

Richard Pryor was Brooks' original choice to play Sheriff Bart, It has been alleged that the studio, claiming his history of drug arrests made him uninsurable, refused to approve financing with Pryor as the star. However, by 2013, it was acknowledged that Brooks had in fact abandoned plans to have Pryor star in the film by early 1972, with the claim about Pryor being "uninsurable" because of a "drug arrest" only being spread by Brooks in the time after Pryor's death in 2005. According to Michael Schultz, who knew Pryor and also attended the film's theatrical exhibition, Brooks feared that Pryor would overshadow him. The role of Sheriff Bart went to Cleavon Little, and Pryor remained as a screenwriter instead. Brooks offered the other leading role, the Waco Kid, to John Wayne. He declined it, deeming the film "too blue" for his family-oriented image, but assured Brooks that "he would be the first one in line to see it." After that, Dan Dailey was Brooks' first choice for the role. Gig Young was cast, but he collapsed during his first scene from what was later determined to be alcohol withdrawal syndrome, and Gene Wilder was flown in to replace him.
Johnny Carson and Wilder both turned down the Hedley Lamarr role before Harvey Korman was cast. Madeline Kahn objected when Brooks asked to see her legs during her audition. "She said, 'So it's THAT kind of an audition? Brooks recalled. "I explained that I was a happily married man and that I needed someone who could straddle a chair with her legs like Marlene Dietrich in Destry Rides Again. So she lifted her skirt and said, 'No touching.

Filming

Principal photography began on March 6, 1973, and wrapped in early May 1973. Brooks had numerous conflicts over content with Warner Bros. executives, including frequent use of the word "nigger", Lili Von Shtupp 's seduction scene, the cacophony of flatulence around the campfire and Mongo punching out a horse. Brooks, whose contract gave him final cut, declined to make any substantive changes, with the exception of cutting Bart's final line during Lili's seduction: "I hate to disappoint you, ma'am, but you're sucking my arm." When asked later about the many "nigger" references, Brooks said he received consistent support from Pryor and Little. He added: "If they did a remake of Blazing Saddles today , they would leave out the N-word. And then, you've got no movie." Brooks said the use of the slur was to show how despised, hated, and loathed the black sheriff was. Brooks said he received many letters of complaint after the film's release.

Music

Brooks wrote the music and lyrics for three of Blazing Saddles songs: "The Ballad of Rock Ridge", "I'm Tired", and "The French Mistake". He also wrote the lyrics to the title song, with music by composer John Morris. To sing the title song, Brooks advertised in the trade papers for a "Frankie Laine–type" singer; to his surprise, Laine himself offered his services. "Frankie sang his heart out... and we didn't have the heart to tell him it was a spoof. He never heard the whip cracks; we put those in later. We got so lucky with his serious interpretation of the song." In an interview with Terry Gross, Laine said that he did not know at the time that Blazing Saddles was a comedy.
The choreographer for "I'm Tired" and "The French Mistake" was Alan Johnson. "I'm Tired" is a homage to and parody of Marlene Dietrich's performance of Cole Porter's song "I'm the Laziest Gal in Town" in Alfred Hitchcock's 1950 film Stage Fright, as well as "Falling in Love Again " from The Blue Angel.
The orchestrations were by Morris and Jonathan Tunick.