God bless you Scott, for posting one of the best scenes of the film and for starting off my day on a hilarious note. When generating movie ideas with my writing partner, Mel Brooks is often a topic of conversation. Sometimes our ideas will veer off in a Brooksian direction and I'm quick to tug the reigns when they do, bc I think his comedy style would have been a hard sell had he not been directing the scripts himself. The tone of his movies, which are usually over the top, absurd, slapstick comedy, either work brilliantly or end up being terrible. And had he not oversaw the execution of the ideas, I think there's a good chance Mel Brooks wouldn't be the comedic genius we know and love today. What do you think?

Brian, glad you got your day off to a rousing and "hilarious" start with this clips. Re your question: It's a good one. Most of the scripts I've written have been comedies. One thing I've learned over the years is that the thing we call a "sense of humor" is hugely subjective. This is especially important when writing a script in Hollywood because one exec may love broad humor and another may loathe it. That's why it's CRITICAL to get everybody on board with the TONE you are going for on a project. Here I find using specific movie examples as a way of helping people involved in the project 'define' the tone: Softer like "Ferris Bueller" or harder like "The Hangover," that sort of thing. In terms of writing spec scripts, since you can never know which set of eyeballs will respond positively or negatively to your script anyhow, my default mode is write the tone YOU want to write. I'm facing this question right now with my next spec which is a comedy. It's going to cut against many supposed 'rules,' but I've decided I need to do that to write the story I see in my head. I would say this: Slapstick is tough. Apart from send-ups like the "Scary Movie" franchise, where do we even see this anymore? Why are there no Pink Panther or Blazing Saddles? I suppose you could say "Get Smart" was in that direction, but it was still grounded in a quasi-reality. "The Campaign" and "Identity Thief" are probably about as far as one would expect to see nowadays, each with some pretty broad moments, but definitely each servicing characters with actual interior lives and arcs, albeit small ones appropriate to the nature of the comedy. That's not to say a spec couldn't sell tomorrow that was REALLY broad, it could get produced, make a zillion dollars, and spawn a whole generation of slapstick movies. Indeed given the internationalization of the film market, where more visually based humor will travel better than dialogue-heavy comedies, that might be a trend in the waiting. Bottom line, you have to write what you think works, what you're good at writing, and what makes you laugh.

Amen brother. Agree 100% with all of the above. Something I'm usually selling to my writing partner in order to keep a more translatable comedic tone with our ideas. Because, as you said, outside the Scary Movie franchise (which haven't been funny since the second one), and the Airplane/Leslie Nielson films before them, you don't see a ton of absurd/slapstick comedies getting made.

Oh, and thanks for your detailed response! I just discovered your blog a few weeks ago and have been LOVING it. Like literally, loving it: I put the lights down low in my bedroom, light some candles, turn up the romantic music, and...okay just kidding. Sorry! Took that one too far :) But seriously, your blog is AWESOME.