The only time Mel Brooks thinks his comedy went too far

As someone who has been at the forefront of American comedy for more than seven decades, Mel Brooks has written countless boundary-pushing jokes. His particular brand of humour has given life to sketch shows, musical theatre, television comedy, and big-screen spoofs, and he has won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony award in the process. Amazingly, though, Brooks believes he only pushed things too far with one gag in his whole career, and it came as part of a project he confessed was created in bad taste.

In 2021, Brooks was interviewed by Vanity Fair about his memoir All About Me. Incredibly, despite his age, the 95-year-old was as sharp and hilarious as ever, and his memories of his storied career were as clear as if they had happened yesterday. When journalist Donald Liebenson reminded Brooks that he’d suggested he write a memoir 25 years earlier, but Brooks told him he’d never do it, the comedy legend deadpanned, “Obviously, it was a very good suggestion because it came to pass.”

Brooks’ insight into his comedy philosophy was fascinating, as he admitted he had spent his entire career on a quest for the ultimate punchline. This pursuit meant that he often tried punchlines that didn’t quite work, or turned out to be offensive to certain people – but he didn’t care. He was adamant, “Nobody ever said, ‘You crossed the line,’ because I didn’t know where the lines were.”

The Young Frankenstein creator believes that comedy has become too sanitised in the last couple of decades, and he thinks it’s because we’ve lost sight of the role of comedy in the world. He likened the relationship between comedians and society to that of a court jester and a king. He mused, “It is our duty to whisper in the king’s ear what is going on. The king doesn’t want to hear bad things, so we make it funny. But we tell the truth.” Ideally, in this relationship, the comedian shouldn’t have to watch their step with what they say – they should simply bring things to society’s attention in a funny way.

Fascinatingly, though, even though Brooks claims he’s never been accused of crossing the line with a joke, and he believes it’s a comedian’s job to push things as far as they will go, that doesn’t mean he’s never self-censored a gag.

When Brooks put together a five-person writing team for Blazing Saddles, his classic postmodernist western parody from 1974, he posted a simple message on the wall for everyone to take their cues from: “First, we laugh”. To Brooks, this credo was essential to the project, and he admitted to telling his scribes, “We should write dangerously; that’s what this is all about”.

“Writing dangerously” on Blazing Saddles did lead Brooks into dicey territory, though, and he confessed, “It was the one time in my life that I said, ‘No, this is a bit much.’

The problematic gag came when Madeline Kahn’s seductress, Lily Von Shtupp, invited protagonist Bart, a black sheriff, into her quarters. As Brooks remembered, “She ad-libbed, ‘Make yourself comfortable, loosen your bullets,’ and then asked Bart if it’s true that black men are “gifted”. There followed a comically exaggerated slobbering sound, followed by Von Shtupp confirming, “It’s true, it’s true.”

Unfortunately for her, after a few moments, Bart delivered the punchline, “I hate to disillusion you, but you’re sucking on my arm.”

When Brooks viewed the explicit joke in the edit, even he needed to hold his hands up and say, “Okay, too far.” He cut it out of the movie, and to this day, it’s still the only time he felt he went too far.

In true Brooks fashion, though, when he addressed this very gag in a 2013 NPR interview, he mischievously said, “The whole movie’s in bad taste. But I like bad taste.“

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