25 top comedies of all-time

24 The Producers (1968)
Dir Mel Brooks (Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder, Dick Shawn)

Quintessential quote: ‘I was born in Dusseldorf and that is why they call me Rolf.’

The beginning of the Mel Brooks empire, and arguably his funniest film, ‘The Producers’ combines old-school comedy, Broadway backstage hi-jinks and outright headline-grabbing bad taste to intoxicating effect. Brooks regular Gene Wilder steals the show as the accountant to Zero Mostel's portly, conniving stage producer. The con itself – an elaborate plan to run with the takings of a show so dreadful it closes overnight – keeps things ticking along at a brisk pace, but it’s that Busby Berkeley scene of actors dressed in Nazi regalia operatically singing the stage show’s tacky title track, ‘Springtime for Hitler’, that remains most vividly in the memory. BW