Mel Brooks Remembers Gene Wilder on Fallon

at
Share This Post

mel

Tuesday, on the Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon, Mel Brooks was a guest to promote his upcoming book release, “Young Frankenstein: A Mel Brooks Book: The Story of the Making of the Film”. Mel’s appearance came nearly 54 years after he was a guest on Johnny Carson’s first episode as host of the Tonight Show. On a much much sadder note, Mel’s appearance also came one day after losing his great friend, Gene Wilder who Mel Brooks described as “such a wonderful part of my life”.

Mel was one of a very select few people that was privy to the knowledge that Gene Wilder was ill. And even knowing that this friend wasn’t going to make it, didn’t lessen the shock at all for Mel. One of the hardest parts of losing Gene for Mel is that he can no longer pick up the phone and talk to his buddy.

The two originally met when Gene was doing a play with Mel’s late wife Anne Bancroft. That’s when Mel offered the part of Leo Bloom to Gene Wilder for a movie he was working on which of course turned out to be “The Producers”. The script sounded so outlandish to Gene Wilder at the time that he doubted that Mel would be able to come up with the backing needed to produce the movie. Mel Brooks goes on to talk about the emotional reaction Gene had when he found out “The Producers” was a go.

From there, Mel told Jimmy Fallon and the Tonight Show audience how during a break on set, he noticed Gene Wilder writing down notes for a script idea on a pad. It was the two words at the top of the page that caught Mel’s eye in particular, “Young Frankenstein”.

And the rest is comedy history.

 

Watch more late night tv comedy clips.

Ernie Tripper
Ernie Tripper