When it came to Madeline playing Lili, I only had one caveat. Like I said before, Lili Von Shtupp is a satiric version of Marlene Dietrich in Destry Rides Again. She straddles a chair onstage and sings “See What the Boys in the Back Room Will Have” in that husky, sultry, slightly off-key Dietrich voice. I knew that Madeline could do a perfect replica of Marlene Dietrich’s distinctive voice, so the only question mark was Dietrich’s famous black-stocking-clad legs.
When Madeline came to audition for the part, I asked her to raise her skirt a little so I could see her legs. She said, “Oh, it’s gonna be one of those auditions, eh?”
“No, no!” I said. “You got me all wrong! I need an impression of Marlene Dietrich in Destry Rides Again. Remember she sings while straddling a chair and displaying those world-famous legs?”
“Ahhh,” she said. “I get it.”
So she grabbed a chair and straddled it—showing off her perfectly Dietrich-esque gams.
Without hesitation I yelled, “Madeline, you got the part!”
Madeline Kahn as Lili Von Shtupp, doing her great Marlene Dietrich impression—right down to those famous legs.
When Madeline sang the song “I’m Tired,” she was so amazing that she even hummed off-key, which is very hard to do. When you’re a good singer you’re glued to the middle of the note and it is very difficult to sing just slightly off-key. I learned that Madeline could do anything.
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So far things on the casting side were going well. Now, I needed the bad guy. A slick-talking evil schemer who would manipulate a brainless booby of a governor, played brilliantly by yours truly. I found my Hedley Lamarr on The Carol Burnett Show. He was the ever popular and talented laugh maker Harvey Korman. He had a kind of classy Shakespearean tone added to his delivery which really worked for the character.
Here’s an example:
Hedley Lamarr: Men, you are about to embark on a great crusade…to stamp out runaway decency in the West. Now you will only be risking your lives…whilst I will be risking an almost certain Academy Award nomination…for Best Supporting Actor.
I have to give myself an extra pat on the back for casting Harvey; he was just a brilliant choice to play Hedley Lamarr. I loved his perfect imitation of Laurence Olivier as Henry the Fifth sending his troops off to do battle when he sends his horde of bad guys off to destroy Rock Ridge proclaiming in an Olivier-esque vocal crescendo, “Now go do that voodoo that you do so welllll!”
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As Hedley Lamarr’s big dumb stupid foreman, Taggart, I got one of the best Western comedy actors that ever lived, the immortal Slim Pickens—the guy who rides Stanley Kubrick’s atom bomb down to earth in Dr. Strangelove. He was a staple of Westerns for decades and he brought so much history to the role.
I remember one day when we were out shooting on location, I said to him, “Slim, you’ve made a thousand movies. I’ve only made two. Give me some advice.”
He said, “Well, Mel, whenever you get a chance—sit down. Directing takes a lot out of you and you’re too busy to notice how tired you are.”
He was absolutely right.
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For the part of Mongo we needed a big scary brute. No one in Hollywood fit the part, so we looked to professional football, and we were lucky to get Alex Karras, who had played for the Detroit Lions. He wasn’t really an actor, but he fit the part like a glove. （A big glove.） He has one of the funniest lines in the movie: “Mongo only pawn…in game of life.”
Like I said before, everyone in Rock Ridge was named Johnson. And for the Johnsons we got an assortment of wonderfully talented actors. David Huddleston played Olsen Johnson, John Hillerman played Howard Johnson, George Furth played Van Johnson, Richard Collier played Dr. Sam Johnson, and Jack Starrett played Gabby Johnson, who by the way did a terrific impression of Gabby Hayes, a well-known frizzle-bearded nonsense-spewing Western character actor. And we took advantage of that when after Gabby spews his incomprehensible words of wisdom in church, David Huddleston stands up and says:
Olsen Johnson: Now who can argue with that? I think we’re all indebted to Gabby Johnson for clearly stating what needed to be said. I’m particularly glad that these lovely children were here today to hear that speech. Not only was it authentic frontier gibberish, it expressed a courage little seen in this day and age.
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Our schoolmarm, Harriett Johnson, was played by Carol Arthur, who in real life happened to be Dom DeLuise’s lovely wife. Dom himself does a cameo in the film as Buddy Bizarre, the famous Hollywood dance director who hilariously presides over our big production song-and-dance number, “The French Mistake.”