There’s something about me you should know.
I get Mel Brooks, Mel Gibson, Mel Allen, Woody Allen, and Woody Harrelson confused.
All of them.
I get all five of them confused, and even when I’ve separated them out, I still have to look up who Mel Allen is.
So, when Woody Allen was in the news again last week, I thought of Mel Brooks (after first thinking of Woody Harrelson, then Mel Allen, then Mel Gibson).
I’ve never seen The Producers. I’ve heard great things, but I’ve never seen it. So, with how-far-to-push-the-bounds-of-acceptability-in-comedy on my mind, I finally went to YouTube last week to watch “Springtime for Hitler,” the hit musical number from the film. And in the process of finding it, I noticed something:
The movie came out in 1967.
22 years after World War II ended, America was evidently ready for Hitler jokes. A lot of Hitler jokes. Not a one-off Hitler joke, but a movie full of Hitler jokes.
What does this mean?
Are we two years away from comedic movies about the Taliban? Did the clock start with 9/11 or did it wait for Operation Neptune Spear? Or has the clock changed altogether? Has it slowed down? Has it sped up, but only for some?
Or maybe I just don’t know what the reaction to The Producers was. Maybe people were mad. Maybe some people were mad. Maybe in the absence of partisanized news media it didn’t become an uproar the way a movie with a garish Osama bin Laden might today.
Anyway, I think I’ll have an easier time remembering which one of those guys is Mel Brooks now. For at least a few weeks.
Counterpoint: the waiting time was only 5 years.
Evidence: Borat.
Quite an interesting question to ponder…seriously. I saw the stage version 62 years after WWII and laughed so hard I snorted. 😆 But would I be too self-conscious to laugh today? Would the audience watch in horror? Would it even be produced (no pun intended)?