Mel Brooks, the 98-year-old comedy legend who has spent a lifetime making the world laugh, has finally revealed the six actors he says he hated working with, but the confession is wrapped in the kind of affection and humor that only he can deliver. In a stunning and deeply personal video released today, Brooks opened up about the most difficult relationships of his career, naming Dom DeLuise, Madeline Kahn, Gene Hackman, Cloris Leachman, Richard Pryor, and his late wife, Anne Bancroft, as the six people who drove him absolutely crazy behind the camera. But as Brooks made clear, his version of hate is not what anyone expects, it is a love letter to the chaos, brilliance, and unforgettable moments that only these towering talents could create.
The first name on the list is Dom DeLuise, and the reason might genuinely surprise you, it had nothing to do with ego or a bad attitude, but rather the man simply could not stop laughing. DeLuise, who worked with Brooks on films including Silent Movie, History of the World Part One, Spaceballs, and Robin Hood Men in Tights, would erupt into full gasping, face-covering, body-shaking laughter that would completely destroy a take before it even had a chance to get going. Brooks described a scene from History of the World Part One where DeLuise had just a single line to deliver, but the moment Madeline Kahn reacted to him, he collapsed into laughter for 45 straight minutes, forcing the entire crew to just stand there and wait.
Brooks tried everything to manage the situation, rearranging scenes so DeLuise would not have to face other actors directly and even keeping cameras off him as much as possible, but nothing really worked.
What made it even more remarkable was that DeLuise was not usually laughing at himself, he was laughing at everyone around him, and putting him next to Madeline Kahn or Harvey Korman was basically hopeless. One look between them was enough to set him off completely, and Brooks once said that directing him felt like trying to wrestle a cat in a rainstorm. But here is the thing, and this is what makes the story so good, when DeLuise finally held himself together long enough to deliver a take, it was almost always brilliant, his timing was perfect, his energy lit up the screen, and the performance was everything Brooks wanted and more.
Off camera, DeLuise was one of the warmest people on any set, bringing food for the crew, cooking pasta, and treating everyone like family, and Brooks never stopped joking about how impossible he was to direct, but it was always said with a big smile.
The second name is Madeline Kahn, and if Dom DeLuise was difficult because he laughed too much, Kahn was difficult for the exact opposite reason, she was too serious about the work, too meticulous, and too unwilling to just follow directions and move on. She appeared in some of Brooks most beloved films, including Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, High Anxiety, and History of the World Part One, and in every single one of them, her performances were jaw-dropping. But getting to those performances was never a simple or smooth process, Kahn did not just learn her lines and show up, she questioned everything, from the script to the costumes to the staging of every scene.
The crew would be ready to shoot, cameras in position, everyone waiting, and Kahn would walk in calm as anything, as if time was not a factor that applied to her, and Brooks found it endlessly frustrating.
Then she would step in front of the camera and deliver something so good that all the frustration just evaporated, her role as Lily von Shtupp in Blazing Saddles became one of the most quoted and celebrated performances in comedy history. But filming those scenes meant constant back and forth, she would change the delivery of a line, suggest adjustments for other actors, and ask for more takes and different camera angles. Brooks once said that directing her felt less like being in charge and more like trying to keep up with someone who was always three steps ahead of him, and she once told him very calmly that she had found a better way to deliver a line he had asked her to do in a specific manner.
The maddening part, as Brooks later admitted, was that she was usually right, and the same dynamic played out in Young Frankenstein, where she pushed for more takes, debated lighting choices, and made every scene take twice as long to shoot.
Third on the list is Gene Hackman, and this one is a little different from the others, their collaboration was brief, just a single scene in Young Frankenstein where Hackman played the blind hermit in what became one of the film most beloved moments. But even in that short time together, the clash was noticeable, not because of any personal conflict, but because the two men operated in completely different worlds when it came to how they approached their work. Hackman was already a decorated serious dramatic actor when he came onto the set, and he brought that same intensity to this small comedic role, preparing carefully and wanting structure and clarity.
Brooks thrived on looseness and unpredictability, believing that some of the best comedic moments came from actors discovering things in the moment, from the chaos of a set that was allowed to breathe and surprise itself.
So when Hackman wanted more rehearsals and more controlled takes, it slowed things down in a way that felt unnatural to Brooks, and while the rest of the cast was joking around between takes, Hackman stayed focused and quiet, completely in character even during the breaks. Brooks described it as trying to play jazz with someone reading from a textbook, the rhythms simply did not match, and every time a take got ruined because someone broke into laughter, Hackman would give a look that said without a single word that he did not understand why grown professionals were unable to stay focused. Despite all of that, the scene turned out beautifully, Hackman performance was warm, physical, and perfectly timed, and audiences loved it, but they never worked together again because their styles were simply too different.
Number four is Cloris Leachman, and Brooks described her as one of the finest actors he had ever encountered in his life, genuinely brilliant, fearless, emotionally deep, and completely unwilling to do anything she did not fully believe in. They worked together on Young Frankenstein, High Anxiety, and History of the World Part One, and in every case, she was extraordinary on screen, but getting her there put Brooks through the ringer. Leachman did not take direction passively, she questioned it, wanting to understand the reasoning behind every choice, every movement, and every line reading, and when Brooks gave her a note, she would ask why.
Brooks once joked that working with her felt like every scene was a college debate, she needed to examine every feeling and every motivation, even the meaning behind a single glance across the room.
Her role as Frau Blücher in Young Frankenstein is one of the most memorable performances in any Brooks film, the stare, the voice, and the delivery of every line were all iconic, but Leachman had a very different vision for the character than Brooks did. She wanted it darker and more grounded, while he wanted it strange, funny, and a little absurd, and they argued about it constantly, not in explosions of temper, but in a steady, persistent friction that never quite went away. Brooks said she had a particular look, a long, silent, unwavering stare that she would hold until he either gave in or found a way to convince her, and sometimes he gave in, but almost always the scene that came out of that process was sharper and stronger.
He did not hate her, he hated how often she was right, and after a full day of working with her, he said he had nothing left, but he kept casting her because she never failed to deliver something remarkable.
Fifth is Richard Pryor, and this entry on the list is more complicated and more emotional than the others, Pryor was not just someone Brooks worked with, he was someone Brooks believed in completely. When Blazing Saddles was being developed, Pryor was Brooks first and only choice to play the lead role of Bart, the black sheriff who turns a racist town upside down with intelligence and humor, and Brooks did not just want Pryor for the role, he wrote the role with Pryor specifically in mind. Pryor also helped write the film, sitting in the writing room with Brooks and contributing some of the sharpest, most daring material in the script, and his perspective shaped the film boldest moments.
But the studio refused, pointing to Pryor reputation for unpredictability, his missed meetings, his inconsistent behavior, and his personal struggles, and they would not approve him for the role.
Brooks pushed back as hard as he could, arguing that Pryor genius outweighed the risk, but he lost, and Cleavon Little was cast instead, delivering a fantastic performance that made the role entirely his own. Brooks never said a negative word about Little, but he never stopped wondering what might have been because Pryor had something in him, a wild and electric and genuinely unpredictable energy that Brooks believed no one else could replicate. The truth was that Pryor really was difficult to rely on during the writing process, there were days when he arrived overflowing with ideas, sharper and funnier than anyone in the room, and there were days when he did not arrive at all.
Brooks once described working with him as waiting for lightning, you could not control it, but when it struck, it was completely unforgettable, and after the film, they remained friends.
The final name on the list is Anne Bancroft, and Brooks always said that the hardest actor he ever worked with was also the one he loved the most, his wife of more than 40 years. They came together as co-stars on the film To Be or Not to Be, a remake of the 1942 wartime comedy, and the experience of working together as professional collaborators turned out to be one of the most intense creative experiences of Brooks life. Bancroft did not treat Brooks differently because he was her husband, on set, he was the director and she was the actress, and she expected that relationship to earn her respect through clarity and intelligence.
If a line did not feel right to her, she said so directly, if a scene seemed off, she challenged it, and she never let anything slide.
Brooks once described a look she would give him when his direction was not clear enough, she would stop, raise an eyebrow, and ask what emotion he was going for, then stand with her arms crossed and wait for an actual answer. He admitted she intimidated him, not in a cruel way, but in the way of someone whose instincts are so sharp that you feel them cutting through everything you thought you knew, and their disagreements were frequent and intense. The crew learned to quietly step back when those moments happened and let them find their way through it, and they always did because underneath the friction was a deep trust and a shared commitment to making the film the best it could possibly be.
Off set, they left it all behind, he would make her tea and she would ask about his day, but the moment they stepped back on set, the whole dynamic returned.
Brooks said she was the most difficult actress he had ever directed, but he also said she was the most brilliant and the only person who could undo him completely with a single sentence. She did not challenge him to be difficult, she challenged him because she genuinely wanted the film to be great, and so did he, and that shared purpose was worth every argument they ever had. When Brooks says he hated working with these six people, he is being honest in his own particular way, it is not real hate, it is the specific frustration that comes from spending years alongside people so talented and so passionate that they push you past every comfortable limit.
Dom DeLuise made him lose takes, Madeline Kahn made him lose arguments, Cloris Leachman made him lose sleep, Gene Hackman made him lose his spontaneity, Richard Pryor made him lose a role he had written for him, and Anne Bancroft made him lose every single debate they ever had on set. But what he gained from each of them was something that cannot be manufactured or faked, great comedy, lasting performances, and films that people are still watching and quoting and loving decades later, and that in the end is the highest compliment a filmmaker can pay to anyone who ever stood in front of his camera.
