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Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993) More at IMDbPro »

• The scene where the Sheriff (Roger Rees) falls through the roof of Latrine (Tracey Ullman) and she tries to get him to have sex with her was completely improvised by Rees and Ullman.
  
  
• Mel Brooks says "It's good to be the king" when King Richard kisses Maid Marian. This is a reference to a line Brooks spoke as King Louis XVI in his History of the World: Part I (1981).
  
  
• Throughout the movie, a mole on the face of Prince John (Richard Lewis) changes position: it starts on his left cheek, then over to his right cheek, then his chin, then his forehead. It then goes back to the original place. This lampoons the mole on Alan Rickman's face in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991). It's also a nod to the famous "I-gor's hump" gag from Young Frankenstein (1974).
  
  
• Patrick Stewart plays King Richard talking on a thick Scottish accent, a reference to Sean Connery's performance in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991). Some critics found Connery's accent inappropriate for the role, since King Richard was English and did not speak with a Scottish burr (thus providing comedic fodder for Mel Brooks). Of course, there are then some historians who insist that Richard - and even Robin Hood - spoke with French accents, since that period was preceded a century or so by the invasion in 1066 of William the Conqueror from Normandy, a region of France.
  
  
• The scene where Don Giovanni (Dom DeLuise) pulls cotton wads out of his mouth is a jab at Marlon Brando's performance as Don Vito Corleone in the classic Mafia film, The Godfather (1972). During his screen test for The Godfather (1972), Marlon Brando stuffed cotton wool in his mouth to make his appearance resemble that of a bulldog.
  
  
• The gag about Robin being able to speak with an English accent is a reference to Kevin Costner's performance in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991). Unfortunately viewers who saw both movies in a dubbed version couldn't get this gag. For the German dubbed version the gag was changed to: "because I - unlike some other Robin Hood - do not cost the producers 5 million". The German word "kosten" (cost) was also pronounced to sound a little bit like Costner. In the French (France) and Italian (Italy) dubbed versions, it is translated as, "Because unlike other Robin Hoods, I do not dance with the wolves", referring to another Kevin Costner movie Dances with Wolves (1990). In Quebec, the translation becomes "Because unlike other Robin Hoods, I accept to wear tights," which refers to the fact that Costner didn't wear tights in the 1991 movie.
  
  
• When Ahchoo begins to talk to the villagers he places on glasses. This action and his mannerisms are a reference to Denzel Washington's performance in Malcolm X (1992)
  
  
• There is a quick shot of the prince's guards coming out of a hallway. The camera angle and marching drums are almost exactly like the opening credits of the TV series "Hogan's Heroes" (1965).
  
  
• Matthew Porretta, who plays Will Scarlet O'Hara, went on to play Robin Hood in "The New Adventures of Robin Hood" (1997), on TNT.
  
  
• The hangman in this film is played by Robert Ridgely, who played the hangman in Blazing Saddles (1974), also directed by 'Mel Brooks (I)'. Ridgely was also the voice of "Thundarr the Barbarian" (1980).
  
  
• There is a rumor that the idea for this film came when a studio executive turned to his son and jokingly demanded "Give me an idea for a sure-fire hit, or else!" The boy replied "That's easy. Do a parody of Robin Hood."
  
  
• The music for "Men in Tights" is recycled from "Jews In Space" from History of the World: Part I (1981).
  
  
• Scene in trailers, but not in the film: Robin shoots an arrow that flies around tree, brakes, swerves, and eventually completely misses target on a tree, splitting the tree in half.
  
  
• While most of the film's Robin Hood parodies come from Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991), the banquet scene and a few other elements of the movie also parody Errol Flynn's film, The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), and the archery contest scene parodied Disney's animated Robin Hood (1973).
  
  
• The shot of the guards falling down in a row took weeks to prepare.
  
  
• When Ahchoo first appears, he and Robin fight Prince John's knights with a style Robin calls "Praying Mantis". Praying Mantis is an actual martial art - a style of Kung Fu emphasizing grabbing your opponent and bringing him to the ground - but it is nothing like the slapstick techniques that Robin and Ahchoo use.
  
  
• This wasn't the first Mel Brooks Robin Hood parody. His previous attempt was the short-lived TV series "When Things Were Rotten" (1975).
  
  
• Dick Van Patten, who plays the Abbot in this movie, played Friar Tuck in Mel Brooks' first Robin Hood parody "When Things Were Rotten" (1975).
  
  
• The character played by Joe Dimmick, "Dirty Ezio", was originally written as "Dirty Harry" (Dimmick being a Clint Eastwood look-alike). But on that shooting day, Ezio Greggio, the Italian director, was visiting on the set and Mel Brooks decided to change the killer's name as a joke-homage to his colleague.
  
  
• When Robin Hood first comes across Ahchoo, he is being beaten by a group of soldiers, and Ahchoo says, "I hope someone is getting a video of this thing." This is a reference to the Rodney King beating in the early 1990s, when a group of L.A.P.D. officers beat a black motorist and a bystander captured it on video. The acquittal of the officers sparked the L.A. riots.
  
  
• Dave Chappelle's screen debut.
  
  
• When the Sheriff is impaled on Robin's sword, Latrine offers to save his life with a "magic pill". The pill is, in fact, a Life Savers mint.
  
  
• When the Rabbi tells Robin Hood "Locksley and Bahgel, you can't miss." This is referring to a popular pairing in Jewish cuisine of Lox and Bagels.
  
  
• None of the actors actually sang their own parts. All of the singing was done by professional singers. Debbie James and Arthur Rubin did the singing for Amy Yasbeck and Cary Elwes.
  
  
• When attempting to motivate the villagers, the speech given by Robin Hood is a clear reference to two speeches given by Winston Churchill during WWII, specifically the "We shall fight them on the beaches" (given after the British withdrew from Dunkirk) and "Never was so much owed by so many to so few" (given after the Battle of Britain).
  
  
• The Sheriff of Rottingham's speech impediment is called a "Spoonerism".
  
  
• Don Giovanni was named for the title character in Mozart's opera "Don Giovanni".
  
  
• When the the crowd gives Robin the chop at the archery tournament, this references a tradition at the Florida State University sports matches. The chant is also sung when at FSU games. The chop was also, prior to this film, brought to more focus with the Atlanta Braves baseball fans adopting it to cheer on their team in the League Champion and World Series.
  
  
• Director Trademark: [Mel Brooks] [sequel] At the end of the film, in the lyrics to the reprisal of the "Sherwood Forest Rap", Ahchoo hopes the cast will come back for "Robin Hood 2".
  
  
• The lizard in Don Giovanni's lap is a reference to Marlon Brando's performance in The Freshman (1990), in which Brando plays a parody of his character in The Godfather (1972). The plot of that movie revolves around a contraband Komodo dragon.
  
  

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