Can you recommend any comedy westerns that have a lot of cheap gags, silly stereotyped characters, etc?

I'm cast in a stage version of Taming of the Shrew this summer that's being set in the Wild West. (This particular Shakespeare festival always does one "concept Shakespeare" every summer in addition to their more traditional stagings.) The plan is to make it a broad, slapsticky kind of western farce.

So: I'm on the lookout for cowboy/western stereotypes, cliches, sight gags and such. We can take Blazing Saddles for granted. I'm especially interested in older comedies that use lots of character actors.

I'm playing an old guy who I'll probably "type" after Walter Brennen, Chill Wills, Andy Devine, etc--but I'm asking in general for ideas for the whole show.

What are your favorite comedy westerns? Or: what films do you think I should watch for creating my own cowboy spoof material?

Is there more than one comedy Western? As someone who finds Mel Brook's "humor" um, abominable, I can't even recommend Blazing Saddles (which I turned off after 25 minutes of silence).

Back to the Future 3.

So spaghetti westerns are out of the question?

If not, check out the Trinity films as well as My name is Nobody

Nothing's out of the question; I'm just fishing for ideas. Problem is, I don't have a lot of time.

(I almost wish we were doing it specifically as a spaghetti western, since all the character and place names in Shrew are Italian! But I think the idea isn't that specific, just comedy western...)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089945/

http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0105932/

Search for keywords comedy + western on IMDB.

Silverado with kevins kline and costner is quite good - not sight gags as such, but just a touch of quirkiness, esp. john cleese in a supporting role as a sheriff who is a stickler for punctuality.

How about McLintock?

Lemonade Joe (farce muscal Western from Czechoslovakia)
Terror of Tiny Town (Musical Western with cast of little people)

The Villain

What about 3 Amigos. Not a "traditional" Western, per se.

Cat Ballou

The Dean Martin character in Rio Bravo has some good comic possibilities.

As a side note, good luck with the production. I've appeared in three versions of the play myself (once as Kate).

Destry Rides Again (1939)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0031225/

It is an essential comedy western.

Maverick

My favorite (a.k.a. the only comedy western I like) is Lust in the Dust.

Rob

I highly recommend the comedic genius of Don Knotts in 'The Shakiest Gun in the West.'

If nothing is out of the question, then you must check out "El Topo" and "Whity" (shockingly, both are available on fantastic R1 DVDs, the former one of the long great holdouts only recently brought to market by Anchor Bay after a seemingly endless rights feud between the director and the manager of The Beatles... it's a rather long story).

Anyway, while neither of these are knee-slappin' comedies, they're about as unusual a pair of putative Westerns as you'll ever see. And worth seeing just to see 'em.

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Both movies starred James Garner.

I'll have to second Back to the Future 3. The three old timers in the saloon are all hilarious, if I'm not mistaken, played by Harry Carey Jr., Pat Buttram, and Dub Taylor. All play the typical western oldtimer perfectly.

"Run fer fun?! What the hell kind of fun is that?"

Yeah, duh! That's the first one I thought of. It's ridiculous.

what about in The Searchers when Montgomery Clift kicks that Indian woman in the back down the hill? I don't think I've laughed so hard during a western.

That's Jeffrey Hunter. Man, I just caught the remastered version of The Searchers on the Hi Def channel this last weekend, and that movie looks SO incredible. Definitely in my top 2 or 3 favorite movies of all time.

But back on topic, there's also "Shanghai Noon".

Rustlers' Rhapsody immediately came to mind though I've never seen it.

I doubt many of the comedy-westerns I can think of (The Hallelujah Trail, Buffalo Bill & The Indians) would be very helpful.

Semi-related, I saw a modern retelling of the story on BBC America not long ago. Shirley Henderson was hilarious as the shrew.

"Bandidas" (Hayek/Cruz), along with it's worthy predecessors in the abundant cleavage department, Louis Malle's "Viva Maria" (1965), and especially Christian-Jaque's "Les Pétroleuses" (1971) with Brigitte Bardot and Claudia Cardinale.

Hurray for titillating boobalicious slapstick fun ......