“Joe Levine, after seeing one week of dailies, said, ‘I’ll give you another $50,000 to find an actor who’s better looking. In fact, Brooks was so nervous that on the first day of shooting, he yelled cut instead of action. You can’t go wrong with me.” Trial by FireĪlthough Brooks got the directing gig, it was a far cry from stage managing Sid Caesar’s “Your Show of Shows” on TV. I see ‘Springtime for Hitler,’ I see the burlesque show, the beer, and the pretzels. “I’m the writer, I see it, I see every scene, I see a half-moon coming out of the office window, I see little old ladies and what they look like on the couch being thrilled, being loved by Bialystock. “When Joe Levine said we needed a director, I said I can be the director,” added Brooks. “As writers, we can only use ourselves,” he said, before explaining how he came to direct such a memorable ensemble cast that included Kenneth Mars (as playwright Franz Liebkind), Dick Shawn (as hippie L.S.D., who plays Hitler), and Christopher Hewett (as cross-dressing director Roger De Bris). The first time he saw him perform at New York’s Village Vanguard, the comedian got on the floor and impersonated a coffee percolator. For Brooks, his co-stars represented the two sides of his own legendary personality. And Brooks always had Mostel (the Broadway star of “Fiddler on the Roof”) in mind to play the overbearing Bialystock.
