He said: “He was the pro and I was the rookie”. That (along with his Willy Wonka role) explains why Gene Wilder’s death hits so hard, and why there’s no one better than Brooks to help us celebrate his legacy.
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Mel Brooks stopped by The Tonight Show and talked about his dear friend with host Jimmy Fallon.
Brooks went on to recall his first film collaboration with Wilder, 1967 The Producers, a project Gene was convinced would never get funded.
Wilder, a two-time Oscar nominee, died Sunday of complications from Alzheimer’s disease at his home in Stamford, Conn.
Brooks recalled first meeting Wilder when the late comedian was working with Brooks’s future wife, Anne Bancroft, in “Mother Courage”.
In the aftermath of Wilder’s death, Brooks wrote on Twitter, “One of the truly great talents of our time”.
But he also knew how to keep it cool as the boozing gunslinger in “Blazing Saddles” or the charming candy man in the children’s favorite “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”. Wilder was cast as Rene Gallimard- a role that was later played by John Lithgow after Wilder withdrew from the production.
“We became very good friends, and I told him about Leo Bloom in the thing I was writing called The Producers”, he continued. “You’re going to get the money”. Brooks replied, “Look in the mirror, blame it on God”.
“But then I didn’t want to do the kind of junk that I was seeing”, Wilder said during the interview. When, “miracle of miracles”, he finally did get the money and told Wilder, the actor “burst into tears”.
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Watch Brooks’ tribute to Wilder below. “He cried, and I hugged him”. And even knowing that this friend wasn’t going to make it, didn’t lessen the shock at all for Mel. Brooks called it a “wonderful moment”.
