Could not have made Blazing Saddles today: Mel Brooks

The 91-year-old filmmaker discussed the culture of being politically correct and said that it is slowly leading to the death of comedy.

Legendary director Mel Brooks said Hollywood today cannot think of making a film like 1974’s Blazing Saddles as the people have become “stupidly politically correct”.

Blazing Saddles released in 1974.

The 91-year-old filmmaker discussed the culture of being politically correct and said that it is slowly leading to the death of comedy, reports Variety. “No, no, I mean maybe Young Frankenstein. Maybe a few. But never Blazing Saddles, because we have become stupidly politically correct, which is the death of comedy,” Brooks said in a recent BBC Radio 4 interview.

The director emphasised that comedy has to walk a fine line when trying to create laughter, without hurting the sentiments of people belonging to different ethnicities. Citing example of the Holocaust, he said, “I personally would never touch gas chambers or the death of children or Jews at the hands of the Nazis. Everything else is okay.”

Containing numerous racial slurs, Blazing Saddles was a Western spoof about an African-American sheriff in a racist town, starring Gene Wilder and Cleavon Little.