From what Mel Brooks has said, he had one heck of a temper as well. Brooks stated that the punching out of the horse scene in Blazing Saddles came from a Sid Caesar experience, as well as a few other examples he has given over the years.
Show of Shows was my favorite show growing up and I had the privilege of meeting and chatting with Mr Caesar 20 years ago.
Rest in Peace
In our initial meetings, they agreed -- telling us that what they were doing simply wasn't working.
The Ad Manager then told us how the commercials had come about. Their house agency had written some TV commercials casting Caesar as celebrity talent. They met with Caesar's agent and signed a contract...and sent the storyboards to Caesar for his review prior to filming.
Caesar showed up for the first day of production and told them, "I won't do these. They're not funny." Maybe they weren't, I don't know.
At any rate, heart attacks all around. A crew has been called, a studio engaged, all with the idea of shooting some commercials...and now the star talent won't perform.
Caesar then offered a solution: if they could figure out how to make the commercials funny, he'd stay and do them...and he had some ideas. "Gimme a menu", he demanded.
There was a menu on hand, so it was passed over to Sid. He scanned down the menu, then announced, "Here it is! Chicken-fried steak! Now, THAT'S funny!"
So, they did a commercial of Sid Caesar making fun of chicken-fried steak...impromptu. And that became the cafeteria's commercial.
Unfortunately, chicken-fried steak isn't something you make fun of...in Texas. But how would you expect Sid to know that...???
One of the giants. RIP.
Caesar falls... right after Temple.
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