The monarchy was a family-owned business. They owned France and they passed it from father to son. I played one of the last of these Louises, the sixteenth, who was a dull, dim-witted despot who led France to the edge of disaster. As Dickens says so brilliantly in his opening sentence of A Tale of Two Cities: “It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.”
But let’s face it, folks, it was mostly the worst of times.
To show the state of abject poverty I hired two wonderful comics: Jan Murray and Jack Carter. Jack is a rat vendor. He shouts about his wares: “Rats. Rats. Nice dead rats for sale. Perfect for rat stew, rat soup, rat pie, and the ever-popular ratatouille.”
He’s followed by Jan Murray, rolling an empty pushcart. Jan says, “Nothing. Nothing. I got absolutely nothing for sale. If you want nothing—we’ve got it right here.”
In addition to playing King Louis the Sixteenth I played his look-alike double, the Piss Boy. I carried a bucket at outdoor royal events and was at the disposal of the noblemen who summoned me when they needed to relieve themselves.
Playing one of the king’s courtiers was the brilliant and always dependable for a big laugh Harvey Korman. Harvey played the Count de Monet, and I as King Louis always called him “Count de Money.” When he corrected me, I always put him in his place by reminding him that I was the king—and the king is never wrong. Harvey, who prided himself on never spoiling a take by laughing, as he often did on The Carol Burnett Show, said to me, “I may laugh in a TV show, but I would never ever break up in a movie.”
I was secretly determined to prove him wrong.
So upon seeing my resemblance to the servant holding the bucket, Harvey’s character says, “Your Majesty, you look like the Piss Boy.”
I saw my chance and ad-libbed, shouting back, “And you look like a bucket of shit!”
That did it! He was gone. He laughed so hard he couldn’t catch his breath. It cost me some money to shoot the scene over again, but it was worth it.
Pamela Stephenson as Mademoiselle Rimbaud with me as the lascivious King Louis XVI.
Another dependable Mel Brooks team player was the always wonderful Cloris Leachman. She played the infamous revolutionary Madame Defarge. All this misfortune was not going by unnoticed. The populace was disgruntled and disgusted, but they were also disorganized. They had a cause but lacked a leader to rally behind. But from every little movement springs a leader all its own. The true leader of the French Revolution was not Danton, or Robespierre, but a wild-eyed commoner who lived in the gutter with the wretched masses and knew their torment. The Revolution was born when the infamous Madame Defarge stepped before the people of Paris and incited them to action:
Madame Defarge （Cloris Leachman）： Fellow wretches. I don’t have to tell you that poverty stalks the streets of Paris. Families don’t even have enough money for bread. We are down to almost nothing… We have no rights. We have no say. We have no dignity! We are so poor, we do not even have a language! Just this stupid accent!
Fellow Revolutionist: She’s right, she’s right! We all talk like Maurice Chevalier!
Madame Defarge: And now, let’s end this meeting on a high note.
She bursts into song, and everybody joins her in hitting a long high note.
More than any other, there is one line from History of the World, Part I that people will shout at me when they recognize me on the street: “It’s good to be the king.” For some reason that line really resonated with the audience. I don’t think any of the shouters were actually kings, but they loved the idea regardless.
It was so popular that together with the talented Pete Wingfield I created a rap song with that title as promotion for the film. It was actually a big hit in France!
Here are some of the lyrics:
Well while Paris was rioting we were doing it good
When we heard there was some trouble in the neighborhood
I wasn’t too worried, no big deal
You step out of line, Jack, you’re in the Bastille
The party kept swinging all day and all night
The champagne was flowing we were feeling all right
They were screaming for bread, things started to shake
But Marie-Antoinette said: Well let ’em eat cake!
Even though we had Albert Whitlock to paint most of our historical settings, we decided that for the French Revolution we would use Blenheim Palace in Oxford, England, to be the backdrop for the Palace of Versailles. While we were shooting at Blenheim Palace, which was the ancestral home of the Dukes of Marlborough, we were visited by the current Duke of Marlborough. When I addressed him as “Your Grace,” which I found out was the proper manner when addressing a duke, he said, “Please, please. Call me Sonny.” Which was the nickname that he asked most friends to call him. He asked me if I would have dinner with him at his club in London. Since he was kind enough to lend us Blenheim Palace, the least I could do to repay him was to have dinner with him.