The popular Oscar-nominated actress muses about movies, men, motherhood, and MS in a book that is both Hollywood hilarious and personally moving...
"I was originally up for the principal female role in Young Frankenstein. Mel Brooks was directing. He had just finished Blazing Saddles, and was at the top of the comedy world.
Mel had picked me out of five hundred girls, but admitted that he was still trying to convince Madeline Kahn to take the lead role. After I auditioned three times, Madeline finally did decide to take the part of the fiancie.
I was crushed. I d never come so close to getting a major part in a major movie. But then Mel told me that if I came back the next day with a German accent I could read for the part of Inga, Gene Wilder s buxom lab assistant.
A German accent in twenty-four hours?"