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Memorable moments
from a storied history91 Years of THR
THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 40 JANUARY 2020 AWARDS 1
AVCO^ EMBASSYPICTURES/
PH
OTOFES
The “Springtime for Hitler” musical sequence in 1967’s The Producers. Right: THR first wrote about the Mel Brooks film on Aug. 18, 1966. TIt’s been more than 50 years
since Mel Brooks’ The Producers
wrestled with the challenge of
courting Oscar for a film offering
a comic version of Adolf Hitler,
something Jojo Rabbit is fac-
ing this year. “There are many
to whom this brand of humor
is more an opening of wounds
that can never heal,” THR said in
its Dec. 28, 1967, review. “Those
who will not buy Grundig and
Volkswagen will probably pass
by The Producers as well.” (For
anyone under 50, the German
company Grundig was once the
largest radio manufacturer in
Europe; Volkswagen was founded
in 1937 by a Nazi labor union.)
But on the bright side, THR loved
the movie. “It is a hilarious film,
sparked by the sort of perfor-
mance in which star Zero Mostel
has no peer and marking an
impressive directorial debut by
Brooks,” said the review. But what
THR seemed most concerned
about was that Embassy Pictures
might have botched the film’s
chances for Oscar noms by open-
ing it in New York and not having
enough trade screenings. “Gene
Wilder’s supporting performance
would have been eligible and
perhaps likely to have earned an
Academy Awards nomination,”
said THR. (It turned out Wilder
was eligible and did receive a sup-
porting actor nod; Brooks, then
41, won the Oscar for original
screenplay.) THR had been fol-
lowing the film’s progress for atleast 17 months. In August 1966,
it announced that Brooks’ film,
then titled Springtime for Hitler,
would be made on a $1 million
budget. (The final cost for the
40-day shoot that began a year
after the THR announcement
was $941,000, or $7.25 million in
today’s dollars.) The title, though,
was an ongoing problem. Brooks
had been thinking about using
Springtime for Hitler in some-
thing since 1962. Universal’s Lew
Wasserman was interested in the
film but wanted it switched to
Springtime for Mussolini because
“Mussolini’s nicer.” It ended up
being changed to The Producers
because Embassy head Joseph
E. Levine said no Jewish theater
owner would “put Springtime forHitler on his marquee.” And then
The Producers grossed $1.6 mil-
lion in theaters, which meant
it barely broke even. But when
Brooks adapted it as a Broadway
musical in 2001 with Nathan Lane
and Matthew Broderick starring,
it ran for 2,502 performances and
won a record 12 Tony Awards.
— BILL HIGGINSIn ’67, Hitler Comedy The Producers Won an Oscar
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