'Blazing Saddles': The Things Producers Hid From Public

1974 brought one of the funniest films ever made by Warner Brothers. It hit the silver screen and made huge waves, which still carries an impact to this day. Here are hidden facts about Blazing Saddles! Around the time when Mel Brooks took on Blazing Saddles, his son Max was born. Brooks was short on cash, so he felt compelled to make the movie work. Though he didn't want to seem like a sell out, he said he felt like Charles Dickens in taking on a project just for the money.

Madeline Kahn had been booked for the film adaptation of Mame prior to the beginning of filming for Blazing Saddles. Mame was being adapted from the Broadway musical, and starred Lucille Ball alongside Bea Arthur. Just a day before her work on Blazing Saddles began, Madeline was fired from Mame. Ball claimed that Kahn had was aiming to get fired by giving a bad performance so she could focus on playing Lili von Shtupp.

Chief executive Ted Ashley was not pleased after Brooks screened the film for Warner Brothers. Ashley cornered Brooks and commanded, "You have to do the following: take out the bean scene, punching a horse, the Lili von Shtupp and the black sheriff 'you're sucking my arm,' or something. You've got to take it all out." Brooks replied, "Great! They're all out," only instead of doing as he was told, he threw out all the notes and walked away.

Film fanatics will remember the following scene very well: the brutish Mongo parked his horse in a no parking zone, and then was confronted by a fellow horse rider. Mongo then calmly walked over and clobbered the horse, and by doing so, he knocked them both to the ground. Apparently, Brooks did not simply make up this part out of thin air, but rather, it was inspired by a real-life story he once heard from his old boss, Sid Caesar.

Despite how hilarious Mongo's knockout punch scene was considered, some viewers saw it as inappropriate. Animal rights activists were enraged with the treatment of the horse, despite the fact that in reality, no horses were injured. Still, it was argued that a lesser violent scene could have been made, which would not have made others get any ideas as was suggested in the film. Fortunately, the filmmakers did not have to harm any animals to film the scene, as they had horses trained to fall on command.