Watching ‘The Producers,’ Nearly 50 Years Later

Mel Brooks’ 1968 film evoked laughs in the face of the obscene. It still does today.

By Isabel Fattal for Tablet Magazine

When I sat down to watch The Producers last weekend, I was prepared for the humor to be somewhat obscene. Having already seen Spaceballs and History of the World Part I, I was familiar with Mel Brooks’ style. But The Producers reached an entirely new level. I love Brooks’ sense of humor, but still I wondered if it was OK to laugh—while wincing—when the female SS officers dance in a Swastika formation during the first performance of Springtime for Hitler. Still, my discomfort was short-lived, and I didn’t find it too difficult to decide to just laugh at and enjoy the film.

My proximity to the film’s subject matter perhaps helped make me feel more comfortable laughing along with The Producers. As a grandchild of Holocaust survivors, I felt like my personal connection somehow allowed me to be entertained rather than offended. After all, laughing at one’s own history and identity seems more appropriate than laughing at the plight of others. This seems to have been true for Brooks as well; watching the film, I wondered if another writer or director who didn’t share Brooks’ background as the descendant of German and Ukrainian Jews would have been able to take the film to its extreme levels of obscenity—the key to its success.

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