The Producers (1967) Queer Film B+

DIRECTOR: Mel Brooks

Mel Brooks’s debut feature is a deliriously irreverent farce about greed, show business, and the spectacular unpredictability of audiences. It’s also one of the sharpest satires ever made about the entertainment industry’s willingness to exploit anything—even fascism—if it might turn a profit.

Max Bialystock (Zero Mostel) is a washed‑up Broadway producer who finances his flops by seducing elderly women for checks. When timid accountant Leo Bloom (Gene Wilder) reviews Max’s books, he makes an offhand discovery: a producer could actually make more money with a guaranteed flop than with a hit, by overselling shares in a show that will close immediately.

SPRINGTIME FOR HITLER AND GERMANY

WINTER FOR POLAND AND FRANCE

DON’T BE STUPID BE A SMARTY

COME AND JOIN THE NAZY PARTY

They choose SPRINGTIME FOR HITLER, a neo‑Nazi playwright’s musical valentine to Adolf Hitler—an idea so tasteless it seems foolproof. They then hire LSD (short for Lorenzo St. DuBois, played by Dick Shawn), a blissed‑out hippie, to play Hitler, Roger De Bris (Christopher Hewett), a flamboyant (gay) director who turns everything into a camp spectacle, and Ulla (Lee Meredith), a Swedish bombshell who becomes their “secretary”. Everything is engineered to fail. Until it doesn’t. The play becomes a comedic smash, leaving Max and Leo in the red.

Not nearly as shocking today as it was in 1967, The Producers remains wildly entertaining. A huge part of its staying power comes from Roger De Bris and his exquisitely mannered assistant Carmen Ghia (Andreas Voutsinas), who sweep into the film’s latter half and all but hijack it. Their entrance scene—Max and Bloom’s first visit to the townhouse—is pure comedic gold, a rapid‑fire cascade of quotable lines and perfectly calibrated camp that could give Carriea run for its money. It’s the moment the film shifts from outrageous to transcendent, carried entirely by Roger and Carmen’s unapologetic theatricality.

Please enjoy!

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