Life update: A cry for HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Gene Wilder and Zero Mostel in The Producers.
There's a moment, early in Mel Brooks' The Producers (1967), when meek accountant Leo Bloom (Gene Wilder) finds a serious discrepancy while auditing the books of failing Broadway producer Max Bialystock (Zero Mostel). Max raised $60,000 from his backers for his last flop but only spent $58,000 on the show; the other $2,000 he kept for himself. This is fraud, Leo reminds Max, and could send the producer to prison. Max responds with a soliloquy:

Bloom, look at me. (more forcefully) LOOK AT ME, BLOOM! Bloom, I'm drowning. Other men sail through life. Bialystock has struck a reef. Bloom, I'm going under. I'm being sunk by a society that demands success when all I can offer is failure. Bloom, I'm reaching out to you. Don't send me to prison. (getting very close to Leo's ear) HEEEEEEEEELP!!!!!!!!

I've reached a stage in my life when I can relate to both men in this scene. Like Leo, I go to a dull, unrewarding office job every day. It's how I'm able to pay my rent and my bills and have medical insurance. At night and on the weekends, I pursue various creative enterprises. Unfortunately, like Max, I have largely met with failure. Despite producing a great deal of work over the course of several decades, nothing I have done has reached beyond a very small audience. Sometimes, the only audience is myself.
var infolinks_pid = 3415273; var infolinks_wsid = 0;