A row of dancing stormtroopers in the infamous opening musical number from Springtime for Hitler.

A fictional play in Mel Brooks' The Producers, Springtime for Hitler: A Gay Romp With Eva and Adolph at Berchtesgaden is a musical about Adolf Hitler written by Nazi Franz Liebkind. Image File history File links Producer_spngtim_4. ... Image File history File links Producer_spngtim_4. ... A story within a story is a literary device or conceit in which one story is told during the action of another story. ... Mel Brooks (born Melvin Kaminsky on June 28, 1926) is an Academy Award-winning American actor, writer, director and producer best known as a creator of broad film farces and comedy parodies or, as he says, spoofs. // Born Melvin Kaminsky in Brooklyn, New York to Russian-Jewish parents Maximillian Kaminsky... The Producers is a 1968 feature-length comedy film set in New York City, in which two con men (Bialystock and Bloom) attempt to cheat theatre angels (investors) out of their investment money. ... Musical theater (or theatre) is a form of theatre combining music, songs, dance, and spoken dialogue. ... Hitler redirects here. ... The (German: Nazional- socialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP) [National Socialist German Workers Party]); generally known in English as the Nazi Party, was a political party in Germany between 1920 and 1945. ... Franz Liebkind is a fictional character in Mel Brooks film and musical, The Producers. ...

The play is chosen by the washed-up producer Max Bialystock and his neurotic accountant Leo Bloom in their fraud scheme to raise substantial funding by selling 25,000 percent of a play, cause it to fail, and keep all the remaining money for themselves. In order to ensure the play is a total failure, Max picks the worst director he can find, Roger DeBris, a stereotypical homosexual/transvestite caricature, and gives the part of Hitler to an uncontrollable hippie named Lorenzo St. DuBois, who calls himself LSD. Since its coinage, the word homosexuality has acquired multiple meanings. ... For a discussion of the history and current usage of the term transvestite, see transvestism. ... A common caricature of Charles Darwin focuses on his beard, eyebrows, and baldness, while often giving him the features of an ape or monkey. ... Singer at a modern Hippie movement in Russia Hippie or Hippy refers to a subgroup of the 1960s and early 1970s counterculture, that began in the United States and influenced Europe, becoming an established social group by 1965 before declining during the mid-1970s. ... Lysergic acid diethylamide, commonly called LSD, LSD-25, or acid. ...

Synopsis

L.S.D. (Dick Shawn) as Adolf Hitler confers with his advisors

The play starts with a musical number, Springtime for Hitler, which contains the memorable chorus "Springtime for Hitler and Germany / Deutschland is happy and gay/We're marching to a faster pace/Look out, here comes the Master Race/ Springtime for Hitler and Germany/ Winter for Poland and France / Springtime for Hitler and Germany/ Come on Germans, go into your dance." Image File history File links Producer_lsd_2. ... Image File history File links Producer_lsd_2. ... Richard Schulefand (December 1, 1924 – April 17, 1987), an American actor and comedian known professionally as Dick Shawn, was born in Buffalo, New York. ...

Accompanied by dancing stormtroopers who at one point form a Busby Berkeley-style swastika, the play immediately horrifies everyone in the audience except the author, an unbalanced ex-Nazi named Franz Liebkind, played by Kenneth Mars, and one lone viewer who breaks into applause—and is pummelled by other disgusted theatregoers. As the audience is storming out of the theater, the first scene starts, with LSD dressed up in full Nazi uniform and talking like a beatnik. The remaining audience starts to laugh, thinking that it is a satire, and the spectators return to the theater. The seal of SA The   or SA (German for Storm Division, usually translated as stormtroops or stormtroopers), functioned as a paramilitary organization of the NSDAP — the German Nazi party. ... Kaleidoscopic Choreography from Footlight Parade, 1933 Busby Berkeley (November 29, 1895 – March 14, 1976), born William Berkeley Enos in Los Angeles, California, was a highly influential Hollywood movie director and musical choreographer. ... A right-facing Swastika in a decorative Hindu form In the Western world, since World War II, the swastika is usually associated with the flag of Nazi Germany and the Nazi Party. ... Kenneth Mars (born April 14, 1936 in Chicago, Illinois) is a television, movie and voice actor, perhaps best known for his roles in several Mel Brooks films and for playing King Triton in Disneys The Little Mermaid. ... Beatnik cartoon The term beatnik was coined by Herb Caen in an article in the San Francisco Chronicle on April 2, 1958. ... 1867 edition of the satirical magazine Punch, a British satirical magazine, ground-breaking on popular literature satire. ...

Franz, disgusted, goes behind the stage, unties the cable holding up the curtain and rushes out on stage explaining that this is not how it should go. One of the actors hits him with a pipe through the curtain, and he falls over. The play continues, and the audience thinks that his performance was part of the act.

Differences Compared To The Musical

In the musical stage version of The Producers and the 2005 movie musical, the part of LSD was not included and Hitler was played by the gay director, Roger DeBris, who sang a flamboyant solo Heil Myself. Franz was originally chosen by Max to play Hitler, but due to an unfortunate accident after the Good Luck song when he broke his leg (the irony here is that the term 'break a leg' is used to mean 'good luck' in the theatre), Max asked Roger to play Hitler. The swastika choreography at the end is maintained through a large mirror that is raised to show the swastika to the audience. In the musical version, Franz does not interrupt the play, but waits until after the play to confront the producers and attempts to kill them, but fails. He breaks his other leg running away from the police. The 1968 film The Producers was adapted as a critically acclaimed Broadway musical by Mel Brooks in 2001. ... The Producers is a 2005 film based on the 2001 Broadway musical of the same name, which is in turn based on the 1968 movie starring Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder and Andréas Voutsinas. ... Break a leg is a well-known saying in theatre which means good luck. It is typically said to actors before they go out onto stage to perform. ...

Quotes

• "Springtime for Hitler and Germany / Deutschland is happy and gay / We're marching to a faster pace / Look out, here comes the master race!"—Lead Tenor Stormtrooper in beginning of song
• "Springtime for Hitler and Germany / Winter for Poland and France / Springtime for Hitler and Germany / Come on, Germans, go into your dance!"—The opening number
• "Springtime for Hitler and Germany / Goosestep's the new step today / Bombs falling from the skies again / Deutschland is on the rise again! / Springtime for Hitler and Germany / U-boats are sailing once more / Springtime for Hitler and Germany / Means that soon we'll be going / We've got to be going / You know we'll be going to WAR!"—Sung while the actors are in a large Swastika formation
• "You're German. We're all Germans. That means...we cannot attack Germany."—LSD in a briefing room scene
• "Vat is zis 'baby, baby'? Ze Führer has never said this 'baby'"—Franz, grieving about LSD's way of talking (60's Beatnik slang)
• "You are the victims of a hoax!"—Franz to the audience after letting down the curtain
• "Don't be stupid, be a smarty / Come and join the Nazi Party!"—line from the opening number sung in a vocal only cameo appearance by writer/director Mel Brooks. (Brooks also re-recorded the line for the musical and the film based on the musical.)
• "I am the author! You are the audience! I outrank you!"—Franz to an audience member in the film.
• "You will please be unconscious"
• "Heil myself / Watch my show / I'm the German Ethel Merman, don'cha know?"—Roger as Hitler
• "Heil myself / Heil to me / I'm the kraut who's out to change our history / Heil myself / Raise your hand / There's no greater dictator in the land!" - Roger as Hitler
• "I vos born in Dusseldorf / und zat is vhy zey call me Rolf!—Springtime for Hitler

U-boat is also a nickname for some diesel locomotives built by GE; see List of GE locomotives October 1939. ...   (Fuehrer when an umlaut is not used) is a proper noun meaning leader or guide in the German language. ... Beatnik cartoon The term beatnik was coined by Herb Caen in an article in the San Francisco Chronicle on April 2, 1958. ... Mel Brooks (born Melvin Kaminsky on June 28, 1926) is an Academy Award-winning American actor, writer, director and producer best known as a creator of broad film farces and comedy parodies or, as he says, spoofs. // Born Melvin Kaminsky in Brooklyn, New York to Russian-Jewish parents Maximillian Kaminsky... Ethel Merman (January 16, 1908 – February 15, 1984) was a Tony Award winning star of stage and film musicals, well known for her powerful voice and vocal range. ...

External link

• Broadway show lyrics for number