11 February 15 - 21, 2024 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents have called me the N-word,” he says. But Feerow likes Blazing Saddles. He com- pares it somewhat to Quentin Tarantino’s 2012 Django Unchained, which, depending on whom you ask, has either 110 or 150 uses of the N-word. Feerow, who’s a fan, points out that the movie is set during the slave-era South. What word do we think white people — the bad ones — used then? Context matters. As for Blazing Saddles, “the joke is not ‘that’s how Black people are.’… The joke is on these goofy white people.” Of course, the joke works properly only if people get it. Some white people (see the Waco Kid quote above) see humor involving the use of racial slurs as a free pass to let them use the words themselves. Those people probably use them anyway in private, Feerow says. Could a Blazing Saddles be made today? Feerow thinks it could, but it would be tricky, and not just because of the racially charged language. Tastes in comedy change. The way the jokes are presented would have to be restructured, and comedy is hard. That’s why Brooks is a genius. But not all white comedians pushing the enve- lope on race are, Feerow says. He has seen white comedians with little experience delivering loaded jokes. It didn’t work. “Maybe you’re not seasoned enough to tell that joke,” he says. (Feerow had a message to anyone ready to light him up online for being a comedy snob: Try getting on stage sometime.) The Last Round-Up I nitially, Brooks wanted Lyle to wear a mus- tache and emote a sinister vibe. Enter the trademark twang. “I wasn’t going to play him like that,” Gilliam says. “I made Lyle a lovable goofball.” For a six-week shoot in a California desert and a shoestring budget of $2.6 million, Blazing Saddles became a vintage flick that to this day has genera- tions reacting, if not always laughing. Today, critics on social media occasionally lambaste the movie’s frequent use of slurs, particularly the N-word. But maybe in their focus on particular words, they miss the point. The View host Whoopi Goldberg made that point when she defended the movie in 2022. Blazing Saddles had come under fire on Twitter (now X) after Mindy Kaling, a star on the sitcom The Office, observed that her show wouldn’t fly in today’s era of heightened sensitivity. “It deals with racism by coming at it right, straight, out front, making you think and laugh about it, because, lis- ten, it’s not just racism, it’s all the isms, he hits all the isms,” Goldberg said of Blazing Saddles, according to En- tertainment Weekly. “Blazing Saddles, because it’s a great comedy, would still go over today. There are a lot of come- dies that are not good, OK? We’re just going to say that. That’s not one of them. Blazing Saddles is one of the great- est because it hits everybody.” The fans Gilliam comes across tend to agree. “My favorite thing is when the grandmother and her grandson come up and ask to take a photo,” Gilliam said. “Before you know it, we’re all reciting lines and laughing.” Blazing Saddles generated $26.7 million during its initial showing, and a total of $119 million in revenue including re- releases in 1976 and ’79. It won the 1975 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress (Madeline Kahn), Best Song (“Blaz- ing Saddles”) and Film Editing. It also received two thumbs up from Siskel & Ebert, which in the 1970s was worth a gazillion Yelp reviews in today’s currency. In 2006, the movie was deemed “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” by the Library of Congress, and was selected for preservation by the National Film Registry. The world premiere 50 years ago took place at the Pickwick Drive-In Theater in Burbank, with co-stars Wilder and Cleavon Little watch- ing on horseback. In the movie’s zany climax (What’s the statute of limitations for a spoiler alert?), a pie fight at a modern-day Hollywood studio spills into the street, forcing Lamarr to take cover in an adjacent theater where he winds up watching the premiere of, you guessed it, Blazing Saddles. After winning the confrontation with La- marr and saving their town, Black sheriff “Bart” (Little) speaks to the people in the newly integrated town of Rock Ridge: “I’m go- ing where I’m needed … wherever outlaws rule the West,” Bart says. “Where innocent women and children are afraid to walk the streets. Where a man cannot live in simple dignity. Wherever a people cry out for justice ... ” “Bullshit!” the townsfolk yell. “All right, you caught me,” Bart admits. “Speaking the plain truth: It’s getting pretty damn dull around here.” And with that, he rides off into the sunset … in a limousine. Almost everyone from the all-star cast is gone. Korman died in 2008; Wilder, 2016; Kahn, 1999. For decades, Brooks and Gilliam called each other after the death of one of their colleagues to reminisce about the actor and their movie. There will be no more calls. Gilliam and the 97-year-old Brooks are the last two standing. “Between you and me,” Gilliam jokes, “I hope I’m the one that has nobody left to call, not Mel.” From the most humble and unlikely of beginnings, Gilliam parlayed his acting impulse into a career filled with more than 50 movies, 200 TV shows and countless commercials. Though he gets recognized regularly, won a Reel Cow- boys career achievement award in November in Los Ange- les and even gets invited to appear as “Lyle” at chili cook-offs (with beans), he sees Blazing Saddles’ journey as a sad sign of a society so busy being offended it’s forgotten how to laugh. How enduring and endearing is Blazing Sad- dles? Gilliam, who estimates he’s watched the movie 300 times, still receives royalty checks totaling $2,500 per year. “We wouldn’t release the movie as is today, no way,” Gil- liam says. “It’s been 50 years and we’ve evolved in the wrong direction. Stay on this same trajectory … in another 50 years we’ll all be afraid to talk to each other. A country of saints and mutes. No thanks.” Mike Brooks Gilliam’s Texas twang helped land him the role in the film.
