Raising Hope also had the glorious pun about a doll that realistically sneezed. When it was found in a Christmas creche, someone shouted out, “It’s the baby sneezes!”
I doubt my friend or Fields had ever heard of it. It was pretty obscure until long after the movie was shot and long after we saw it.
Pretty odd coincidence. (I’m not saying it wasn’t a coincidence – it would also have been a bit of a grim reference for a WC Fields flick, given the deaths involved – but pretty weird.)
That’s where I first learned about it!
Mel talked about that little joke both times I’ve seen him. Luckily for all of us Blazing Saddles was early enough that he didn’t feel the need to telegraph, explain or beat the joke to death like he did so many others in later movies.
More than that. He also dressed as Balzac for a Halloween party one year.
Only now, almost 50 years after having seen the movie for the first time, have I learned it actually was a joke! I had never heard of the relevant gentleman until a few minutes ago, when I Googled the phrase used in the film.
Nice to finally know something that went completely over my head as a teenager. Now I’ll be really smart when I’m dead! 
You guys are pretty slow today. I’ve been expecting somebody to post this for three hours now:
I guess you must all be in church, eh? 
For that matter, how many kids today watching The Producers know what a Karmann Ghia is?
Heck, I’m 54 and, until I looked it up just now, I didn’t know who Mongo Santamaria was.
I did know about Karmann Ghia. I used to know a guy who drove one.
Relatively few people knew who he was when the movie came out.
Mrs J. and I saw it in the theater, and we were the only two audience members who laughed at the “Mongo! Santamaria!” line.
Along the same line as the Mongo Santamaria clip. In an episode of The Sopranos, FBI agents were attempting to enter a mobster’s home to plant a bug. One agent said “It’s locked” whereupon his boss said “Pick it Wilson”. If it doesn’t sound familiar here’s a clue : [spoiler] Wilson pickett. Funky Broadway. - YouTube
I was the only one who laughed at “Badges? We don’ need no steenkin’ badges!” (I watched a lot of old movies on TV every weekend afternoon.)
In Casablanca’s Paris flashback scene where Ilse has just finished teaching Rick geometry, Rick pours two glasses of champagne to celebrate a successful lesson, raises his glass and says, ‘Here’s looking at Euclid’.
His comment is especially prescient in view of the later love triangle involving Victor Laszlo.
That’s one of the Police Squad movies (forget which one)
2 1/2
How many people today encountering The Hitch Hiker’s Guide To The Galaxy for the first time know what a Ford Prefect was? Or Hotblack Desiato?
I didn’t know what a Ford Prefect was in 1982 (and I don’t know who Hotblack Desiato is (other than the character in the book), now).
Another one from Mel Brooks: in History of the World, Part I, when Marcus Vindictus calls in the erotic dancer, he shouts “Caladonia! Let’s make their big heads so hard!” It’s a reference to an old Louis Jordan song: “Caldonia, what makes your big head so hard?”
I recognize that reference.
In Young Frankenstein, our hero asks the shoeshine boy “Pardon me boy, is this the. Transylvanic station?” “Ya, track 29 - and can I give you a shine?” which likely goes over the younger folks’ heads these days.