The Producers (1967 film) Glazier budgeted the film at $1 million, and sought financiers. Half the money came from philanthropist Louis Wolfson, who liked the idea of laughing at a dictator, and the remainder, along with the distribution, was arranged by Joseph E. Levine of Embassy Pictures. Levine's only condition was to change the title, as he felt many distributors would not carry a picture named "Springtime for Hitler." Brooks renamed it "The Producers," considering it ironic as "these guys are anything but producers." As Brooks "couldn't think of anybody to direct it," eventually he decided to take the task for himself, even though
The Producers (1967 film) more, as a Broadway musical ("The Producers," 2001) and a film based on the musical ("The Producers," 2005). He did not direct the latter. This film has spawned several home media releases on VHS, Laserdisc, CED, and VCD from companies such as Magnetic Video, Embassy Home Entertainment, PolyGram Video, Speedy, and Lumiere Video. A 1997 letterbox edition Laserdisc was released by PolyGram Video, which served as the basis for the extremely rare 1998 PolyGram DVD release. MGM (which owns most U.S rights to the Embassy Pictures library on behalf of StudioCanal) released "The Producers" on DVD (R1) in 2002 and