The Producers

Name: The Producers
Genre: Comedy, Classic
Released: 1967
Duration: 88 min
Cast: Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder, Dick Shawn, Kenneth Mars, Estelle Winwood

Mel Brooks19671h 28mComedy, Classic

Why we chose it

Mel Brooks’s debut as a director won an Oscar for its screenplay and a place on the list of America’s funniest films. Two Broadway hustlers work out that a flop pays better than a hit, so they go looking for the worst play ever written and find a jolly musical about Adolf Hitler.

Synopsis

Max Bialystock is finished on Broadway, where every show he puts on closes after one night, and he squeezes the money for the next one out of rich widows. Then an accountant, Leo Bloom, goes through the books and spots something: a producer can sell shares in a flop several times over and keep the surplus, because nobody comes asking for their cut of a failure. All they need now is a play that’s sure to bomb, and they settle on a sunny musical about Adolf Hitler.