Trivia
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Director Trademark (4)
When President Skroob meets the Gallup twins, he tells them to "chew their gum." This is a reference to "Doublemint" commercials featuring twins.
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Colonel Harland Sanders is the founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken. Dark Helmet says "What's the matter, Colonel Sandurz? Chicken?"
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During the self-destruct sequence, when the "Cancel Self Destruct" door is opened, the "Authorized By" line at the bottom has the name ALBIEZ. Peter Albiez was one of the special effects staff.
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Mel Brooks sent the script to George Lucas and was concerned that he would be offended, but Lucas called Brooks and gave him his trust after seeing Blazing Saddles and Young Frankenstein.
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John Candy ad-libbed the line, "Oh, that's gonna leave a mark," after standing up without undoing his seat belt.
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The voice of the Self-Destruct Countdown is that of the film's script supervisor, Julie Pitkanen.
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George Lucas' Industrial Light and Magic constructed the puppet of the chest-burster for the film. The main effects unit for the film was Apogee, Inc. This was the company headed by John Dykstra that split off from ILM in 1978 when Lucasfilm moved to Marin County. Thus, Spaceballs marked the first time since Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope that the two units shared work on a single project.
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The scene in which Dark Helmet (Rick Moranis) is playing with his dolls was not in the script. Mel Brooks came up with the idea on the set one day, and told it to Moranis, who then improvised the entire scene, including the dialogue.
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The Barf costume was operated by three people. John Candy operated Barf's tail using a hidden control in his paw, while two assistants each controlled an ear. Candy's costume was powered by a 30-pound battery that he wore on his back.
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Of all the many jokes in this film, Mel Brooks says that the two he is most proud of are the running gag about merchandising ("Spaceballs: the Breakfast Cereal", "Spaceballs: The Tee-Shirt", etc.) and Col. Sandurz's renting Spaceballs before it was finished.
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The blasters used by the Spaceball stormtroopers are actually Calico M100 carbines with a scope attached.
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WILHELM SCREAM: When Barf holds up the curved tubes, deflecting the shots of four of the bad guys back at them, the fourth one screams a Wilhelm as he is shot in the rear.
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Spaceballs merchandise shown in the movie include: bed sheet, flame thrower, lunch box, cornflakes, towels, Yogurt figure, toilet paper, shaving cream, place mat, action figures. As part of the fair-use agreement between Mel Brooks and George Lucas, no legitimate Spaceballs merchandise ever existed in the real world. The lunch box and coloring book are simply The Transformers products with a Spaceballs logo stuck on them.
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In one scene, Lonestar says he was born "somewhere in the Ford Galaxy." This is a joke-reference to a model of car produced by the Ford company (the Ford Galaxie 500), as well as to Harrison Ford of Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope.
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Spaceballs: The Book, the novelization by R.L. Stine (aka Jovial Bob Stine) reveals the names of the Dinks to be: Rinky Dink, Blinky Dink, Stinky Dink, Pinky Dink, Finky Dink and Winky Dink.
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In the scene where Dark Helmet is dressed in safari clothes searching for Lone Starr and the others with binoculars, he is on top of a floating vehicle. In reality, the vehicle isn't floating or suspended on wires of any kind, but on top of a platform that was surrounded by mirrors that reflected the sand around it to give it the appearance of floating.
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In the DVD commentary, Mel Brooks talks about how difficult it was playing the Yogurt character. The gold-colored makeup gave him a terrible rash on his face and neck (necessitating the shooting of all of Yogurt's scenes out of sequence), also his knees were hurting constantly since he had to walk around on his knees even though he was wearing kneepads. Brooks also goes on to say that in spite of the difficulties, he enjoyed playing as Yogurt tremendously and that it was all worth it.
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Every time Dark Helmet has his face covered, his voice is lower and more basal, similar to James Earl Jones when he played Darth Vader. In the DVD commentary, Mel Brooks says that the idea of Dark Helmet's voice changing whenever his face was covered was actually Rick Moranis's idea.
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A full face mask resembling a wrinkled bulldog was originally constructed for the character of Barf, but Mel Brooks quipped that 'if they were going to hide John Candy behind a mask, he might as well hire someone else for half the price'. A nose and upper lip piece was tried next, which Candy approved but again Brooks did not. They finally settled on animatronic ears connected to a hairpiece, a small nose application and a patch over one eye just like the dog from the 'Our Gang' shorts.
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Six complete Dot Matrix suits were built for Lorene Yarnell Jansson to wear and all of them were used up due to breakage on set. For the interior scenes, the feet were outfitted with roller skates, but for the desert exteriors she was given flat-bottomed shoes. Dot's face was somewhat inspired by Joan Rivers who had already been contracted to provide the voice.
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Mel Brooks came up with the idea for this film when he discovered he had yet to spoof space movies, since he already destroyed the western films with Blazing Saddles, made fun of the horror genre with Young Frankenstein, and gave silent movies the ax with Silent Movie.
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The name Dot Matrix was taken from a type of computer printer which was very popular with personal computers in the 70s and 80s prior to the invention of Ink-Jet and Laser printers.
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In the DVD Commentary, Mel Brooks talks about the various Jewish-related jokes (i.e. "Druish Princess", etc.) and how he felt ashamed for putting those jokes in the movie in the first place, but also felt proud for leaving them in the movie.
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The castle on Druidia is King Ludwig II's Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria. It has been modified by matte painting with additional ramps. Neuschwanstein Castle has been featured in many motion pictures, and is the original inspiration for the castle at Disneyland.
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The scene where the Megamaid sucks the atmosphere off the Druidian mountain is a parody of the Paramount Studios logo.
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Princess Vespa's name is a joke in-and-of itself: Vespa is the Italian word for a wasp. In North American slang, the term WASP can connote a white vainglorious person of high breeding.
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During his scene, Michael Winslow did all the sound effects. In the commentary for the movie Mel Brooks jokes that they saved around a $1000 by letting him do this.
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Along with 1988's Caddyshack II, Big and Beetlejuice, notable for containing "the F word" in a film rated PG during the PG-13 era.
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One of the Dinks is played by Tony Cox, who also played an Ewok in Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi. The ape at the end (who says "There goes the planet!") is voiced by Michael York, who is the stepfather of Rick McCallum, producer of the Star Wars prequels.
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According to Mel Brooks, this is one of the most expensive movies he has ever made: $25 million, with Dracula: Dead and Loving It a close second at $22 million. By contrast, The Producers cost less than $1 million to produce.
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When initiating the metamorphosis of Spaceball-1 into the giant maid, Dark Helmet leans towards Col. Sandurz and asks "Ready, Kafka?" This is a reference to the novella "Die Verwandlung" by Austrian-Hungarian author Franz Kafka, a story about a man who finds himself slowly turning into an insect. The most common English translations of said piece are titled "Metamorphosis".
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After King Roland gives the combination to the air shield of planet Druidia, and the light goes out and on again, the doctor is seen making out with the nurse. Dark Helmet then tells him to go the golf course and "work on his putts". This is a pun, as "putz" in Hebrew/Yiddish is slang for penis.
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Director Trademark
Mel Brooks:
[cast]
Mel Brooks cast himself as President Skroob and Yogurt, and cast Dom DeLuise as the voice of Pizza the Hutt.
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Mel Brooks:
[phony sequel]
In many movies, Mel Brooks alludes to a sequel that ultimately never happens. In "Spaceballs", Yogurt mentions he hopes he and Lone Starr will see each other in "Spaceballs 2: The Search for More Money".
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