When we started writing Airplane!, we didn’t even know how to write a script, but we did have this incredible movie. It was a black and white film noir movie from 1957 called Zero Hour! You can go on YouTube and punch in “Zero Hour Airplane,” and they will show scene-for-scene the comparison. Zero Hour! was a straight melodrama about a guy with PTSD who gets on a plane chasing his wife, there’s food poisoning, and this guy has to fly the plane down. We didn’t know what we were doing as far as the technicalities of film story structure and character arc, but we had Zero Hour!. That’s why Airplane! was so successful; it had all those great elements of drama as well as comedy. Plus, our idea was to cast serious actors, not comedians, in a comedy, which no one had ever tried before. Somehow Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg kind of shrugged and said, “Well, these guys did a successful movie called Kentucky Fried Movie in ‘77,” and they thought they’d roll the dice with us. A $3 million investment for the studio returned $160 million just on the original release. It was quite a story.
I had the pleasure of talking with David Zucker, the man who essentially invented the modern cinematic spoof. If you grew up laughing at Leslie Nielsen telling people not to call him Shirley, or watching Priscilla Presley bat her eyelashes in The Naked Gun, you were living in Zucker’s world. Along with his brother Jerry and their friend Jim Abrahams, the holy trinity known as ZAZ, Zucker redefined comedy by taking it seriously. Very seriously.
But talking to Zucker today isn’t just a nostalgia trip. At a time when Hollywood feels obsessed with safe bets and endless reboots, Zucker operates with the restless energy of an outsider who still remembers what it was like to have nothing to lose. He isn’t interested in the polished, corporate version of filmmaking. He’s interested in the hustle.
Zucker’s story doesn’t begin on a studio backlot, but in the Midwest. “I started in Milwaukee back in high school,” Zucker says, recalling a time when comedy wasn’t a career path, but a survival mechanism. “I was a class clown, as was my brother and our partner, Jim Abrahams.”
While their peers landed sensible jobs, the trio headed west with no safety net. “When we left Milwaukee for LA, everybody asked us, ‘You’re going to try to make it in Hollywood? What’s your plan B?’ We said, ‘We don’t have a plan B.’”
They set up shop on Pico Boulevard with the Kentucky Fried Theater, a makeshift operation that relied on raw nerve and guerrilla marketing. They ran listings in the LA Times for a show called “My Nose” just so the paper would read: “My Nose… Runs Continuously.” It was this spirit, “Mrs. Zabatzky’s Law,” as Zucker calls it, referring to a neighbor who told firemen how to do their job, that defined them. The law is simple: “Never assume you can’t do somebody else’s job better than they can.”
That audacity led to Airplane!, a film that almost didn’t happen. “Every studio in Hollywood turned it down except for Paramount,” Zucker notes. The genius of the film wasn’t just the jokes; it was the structure. They essentially remade a serious 1957 melodrama called Zero Hour!, scene for scene.
“We learned on the job,” Zucker explains. “One thing we learned was that we wanted to develop our own style; we didn’t want to copy anybody else.” That style involved a strict set of rules, the most important being that you never hire comedians to do the heavy lifting. You hire serious actors, like Robert Stack or Lloyd Bridges, and make them say insane things.
However, the industry that embraced ZAZ forty-five years ago has changed, and Zucker isn’t shy about pointing out the decay. He views the current studio system as risk-averse and often creatively bankrupt. “Studios don’t want to risk anything today,” he says flatly. “I don’t want to give a blanket statement, but most of it is hacks.”
Zucker’s frustration is palpable when discussing the fate of his beloved franchises. He mentions a script for a new Naked Gun film he wrote with partner Pat Proft, which was rejected in favor of a reboot he had no hand in. “They wanted to do the hack version of replacing Leslie Nielsen,” he says. “I thought that was a wrong idea, but they went ahead and did it anyway.”
He compares the industry’s short memory to the law of the jungle. “It’s like when a lion kills a wildebeest and all the other wildebeest scatter, and then after the carcass dries up, they drift back and have no memory of what happened.”
Despite the roadblocks, Zucker refuses to stagnate. “Being original is number one on my priority list. I don’t want to do the same thing that I did five or ten years ago.” He is currently shopping The Star of Malta, a film noir spoof set in 1949, and Counterintelligence, a spy thriller taking on Mission Impossible and Bourne Identity. He is raising independent money, bypassing the studio system that only wants “sequels, remakes, superhero movies, and Tom Cruise movies.” But he is quick to add, “But I do love Tom Cruise movies!”
When he isn’t fighting for the soul of comedy, Zucker is planting roots, literally. A dedicated environmentalist, he works with TreePeople to greenify Los Angeles. “Trees are the basic engine of the environment,” he says with the same conviction he applies to script structure. “The saying is ‘the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.’”
He’s also moved into mentorship, launching MasterCrash, an online comedy course where he teaches the “15 rules” of humor he evolved over decades. It’s his way of combating the “hackification” of the industry. “I find a lot of people who think, ‘Well, I’m funny at parties…’” he says. “I believe them, but they can’t translate that into a script.”
For a man who has seen the highest highs of box office success, Zucker remains grounded in the philosophy that got him there: blind faith in one’s own voice. When asked what advice he gives to young people wanting to break into the business, he offers a line that is pure Zucker, cynical, funny, and secretly hopeful.
“I say, ‘Quit now. You’ll never make it,’” he jokes. “But if you can ignore that advice, you’ll be halfway there.”
Diane: I want to start discussing your journey. You’ve built a legacy around comedy and filmmaking with films like Airplane! and The Naked Gun. What first inspired you to pursue this path, and how did those early opportunities shape who you are even as an entrepreneur and a creative leader?
David: Well, I always had the entrepreneurial gene because my dad owned his own business, my grandfather owned his own business, and his father before him. We’ve never worked for anybody. I have done some work for hire, like the Scary Movie films. I was the director and ran the show, but I still had to answer to Bob Weinstein. That was a cool experience, but because I was hired, Bob had a very strong opinion about what should go on screen. We managed to compromise a lot. I started in Milwaukee back in high school. I was a class clown, as was my brother and our partner, Jim Abrahams. We were funny guys, but there were other funny guys in our school. There was something in the water in Milwaukee at the time. However, all those other guys who were probably funnier than we were got jobs after they graduated. Jerry, Jim, and I just wanted to pursue comedy. We learned on the job. One thing we learned was that we wanted to develop our own style; we didn’t want to copy anybody else. Being original is number one on my priority list. I don’t want to do the same thing that I did five or ten years ago. I always want to innovate and lead the way.
It’s the only thing that interests me. I have a couple of scripts now which are not doing the same thing. With my writing partners Pat Proft and Mike Mcmanus, I wrote a script for a new Naked Gun which Paramount rejected because they wanted to do the hack version, just replacing Leslie Nielsen in the old LA cop station. I thought that was a wrong idea, but they went ahead and did it anyway, and it effectively ended the franchise. I have repurposed my script, which is an international spy thriller spoof, James Bond, Bourne Identity, and Mission Impossible. Then I have another script which I also wrote with Proft and McManus, which is a film noir comedy set in 1949. We’re going to produce it just like it would have been shot in 1949. That’s a new idea, and new ideas are always risky. Studios don’t want to risk anything today. I’m looking for independent money, and we have half of the money raised. It’s only a $12 million budget, but the studios just want to do sequels, remakes, superhero movies, and Tom Cruise movies. I love Tom Cruise movies, don’t get me wrong. Occasionally, studios are right twice a day like broken clocks, and somehow they did Top Gun: Maverick, which was a wonderful movie. I don’t want to give a blanket statement, but most of it is hacks. They are hacks who turn out movies like Naked Gun 4, and, curiously, I was excluded from it. So what can you do? I just keep trying to do my own stuff.
Diane: Was there a specific moment early in your career that crystallized your credibility in the industry? A turning point that set you apart as an authority?
Diane: I think Airplane! certainly did. We did something that was so fresh and original but it also made it hard to get financing. Every studio in Hollywood turned it down except for Paramount, which was at that time run by Michael Eisner, who is some kind of genius. We found ourselves at Paramount, and they actually made the script better. It was totally insane that a big studio… but this was 45 years ago. It’s not the studios of today. I can’t say enough good things about Michael Eisner, Jeff Katzenberg, Barry Diller, Dawn Steel, and Frank Mancuso; all these people went on to run their own studios. At the time we brought Airplane! to Paramount, they somehow let us direct and cast it the way we wanted. It was such an amazing experience that Jerry, Jim, and I wrote a book about it called Surely You Can’t Be Serious: The True Story of Airplane! It truly is incredible when I think about it. I think that would make a good movie, but of course, probably no studio would make it because they have their heads up a place where the sun don’t shine.
Diane: It sounds like something that they do at Hulu, which is the behind-the-scenes and the making-of.
David: Right. Maybe Hulu would be a good place for it. I think it would make a good documentary based on the book, but I think it would make a good drama. For that, you need a main character who has a character arc, and we have all that. It’s not me and my brother; it’s our partner, Jim Abrahams, who really had an incredible transformation. He was a private investigator for a law firm, and then we coaxed him into the entertainment biz. We started a small theater called Kentucky Fried Theater, and we had a show on Pico Boulevard in LA. We had no advertising budget, and we needed people. We called the show “My Nose” so that our weekly listing in the LA Times calendar section read: “My Nose… Runs Continuously.” We would do all these crazy jokes. At that time, we were allowed to be crazy, and the business hadn’t become “hackified.” I think I just invented a word.
Diane: Well, I love that. As a creative myself, I would love to dive in and know more. My question is regarding the process when the three of you were sitting around and writing. I want to know that process and really dive into that.
David: When we started writing Airplane!, we didn’t even know how to write a script, but we did have this incredible movie. It was a black and white film noir movie from 1957 called Zero Hour! You can go on YouTube and punch in “Zero Hour Airplane,” and they will show scene-for-scene the comparison. Zero Hour! was a straight melodrama about a guy with PTSD who gets on a plane chasing his wife, there’s food poisoning, and this guy has to fly the plane down. We didn’t know what we were doing as far as the technicalities of film story structure and character arc, but we had Zero Hour!. That’s why Airplane! was so successful; it had all those great elements of drama as well as comedy. Plus, our idea was to cast serious actors, not comedians, in a comedy, which no one had ever tried before. Somehow Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg kind of shrugged and said, “Well, these guys did a successful movie called Kentucky Fried Movie in ‘77,” and they thought they’d roll the dice with us. A $3 million investment for the studio returned $160 million just on the original release. It was quite a story.
Diane: Let’s go into the art of resilience. Your career has spanned decades, and the industry cycles change. What obstacles tested your resolve the most, and how do you navigate and continue innovating and leading?
Diane: The first obstacle was just getting a movie made. In Hollywood, they will only let you do what you have proven that you already know how to do. The other thing is that Hollywood rules are that after 50, talent leaves. You have no talent after 50. Fortunately, we were way under 50, late 20s, early 30s, so we did Airplane!. Once we did that, my brother always said, “The movie business is impossible to get into or out of.” We found ourselves in the movie business, and we didn’t have an idea for a follow-up because everything was concentrated on that. That became a big obstacle to surmount. We did a TV show called Police Squad!, a movie called Top Secret!, and then another movie which wasn’t even a spoof, written by somebody else, called Ruthless People. Those were all hits in various degrees. Ruthless People was bigger, but then we did The Naked Gun, which was the first movie franchise ever created from a failed television series. Once we were doing that, we were great. The thing to surmount is always trying to come up with that next step. You’re always face-to-face with a second step. If you’re a hack, it’s easy; you can just do Naked Gun 4 with Liam Neeson. By the way, Liam Neeson is a fine actor, but it’s impossible to replace Leslie Nielsen. After The Naked Gun, I was again casting about for a new idea. I did a movie called BASEketball which was totally innovative. It was not a success when it came out, but in the years since, it proved it was way ahead of its time. Actually, I never had a flop; I just had movies which were ahead of their time! BASEketball now is regarded like Top Secret!, Airplane!, and The Naked Gun. It’s wonderful to have all these movies. Then I was casting about for an idea. I had young kids at the time, so I wanted to do a slapstick movie for families, a PG movie. I still think it’s a good idea, but I couldn’t come up with a script that was any good. Then I got together with Pat Proft and Mike McManus and wrote Naked Gun 4, and that’s still a great movie. We’ve retitled it Counter Intelligence, of course, spelled with one L and a J. We also wrote The Star of Malta, which is our film noir movie. I’m still trying to get those made. You’re always face-to-face with the second step. If you’re not a hack, you can’t just do the same thing over and over again. In fact, Naked Gun 4 was a flop. I could have predicted that, and it ended the franchise. Nobody is ever held accountable for it. They just go on. It’s like when a lion kills a wildebeest and all the other wildebeests scatter, and then after the carcass dries up, they drift back and have no memory of what happened. That’s the only thing I can think about Naked Gun 4.
Diane: So, finding your unique voice. Comedy and satire are your signature. How did you discover your creative voice in writing? And what advice would you give to up-and-coming creators that are still searching to really find their voice?
David: We had a unique sense of humor. Jim, Jerry, and I weren’t fans so much of comedies of the time, although we loved the Marx Brothers, Woody Allen, and Mel Brooks. What we had that was apart from anybody else was that we thought serious movies were funny. Other people had done re-dubbings of serious movies; Woody Allen did that with What’s Up, Tiger Lily? But we went a step further. After re-dubbing some things, we had the idea to recast it, remake the movie with serious actors, and then put in our jokes. We found our voice in that, and that became The Naked Gun and the Scary Movies. Every movie was done without comedians, without Jerry Lewis. We evolved 15 rules. In fact, one of the rules is “Jerry Lewis.” Not that Jerry Lewis is bad, but we just don’t have funny characters. I think Jim Carrey is hugely funny and talented, but we couldn’t use him in one of our movies. We evolved these 15 rules, and I’m teaching them now in my online comedy course called MasterCrash.com. We’re creating a community and people can join. Just go to MasterCrash.com. There’s a bunch of stuff, and I’m doing a podcast called Naked Comedy. We’re having a lot of great guests on that, and it’s fun. I’m using my time while I’m waiting to do Star of Malta.
Diane: Good use of time. So, talking about that, you’re building this community. You’re now stepping into a mentor space. Who were some of the mentors and colleagues that influenced your leadership and creative mindset? And how do they shape your approach now that you’re creating your own community?
David: We loved the Marx Brothers. They were innovative and smart. The Three Stooges were funny, but they became hacks like Naked Gun 4. We didn’t want to do the same thing over and over. The Marx Brothers did some marvelous movies like Duck Soup, which we saw in college with 600 stoned college students back in the ’60s. That’s where Jerry and I were introduced to the Marx Brothers. We just loved comedy and wanted to make people laugh.
Diane: Let’s dabble into you talking about your mentors.
David: We admired the Marx Brothers, Woody Allen, and Mad Magazine. We never had a real mentor until we got to Paramount, and it was our executive producer, Howard W. Koch, who was just great. Paramount put him on our production to be Paramount’s man on the Airplane! set, but he became our man at Paramount. He taught us a lot about directing and making movies. We evolved some of our rules from Howard. His saying was, “It’s an illusion business.” It means don’t throw money at a comedy. Don’t spend a lot of money on comedies. I watched the trailer for Naked Gun 4, and it’s this elaborate bank scene. We never would have done a scene like this. They said the budget was 40 million; I suspect it was probably a lot higher.
Diane: And so, now how are you mentoring inside your community?
David: I find a lot of people who think, “Well, I’m funny at parties and I’m funny in my regular life.” I believe them, but they can’t translate that into a script. I tell them, “Okay, you want to transform that funny sense of humor you have into a script? You have to do it this way.” Jerry, Jim, and I learned by making mistakes; we didn’t have anybody to teach us. Now I can teach the 15 rules. There’s also a glossary of over 100 terms that we’ve assembled through the 17 or so movies that we’ve done. I’m teaching that, and our editors are putting in examples from movies for the rules and the glossary.
Diane: The entertainment industry demands both artistry and a business mindset. How have you balanced the creative process with brand positioning, sustainability, and market realities across your projects?
David: I don’t even think about that stuff. I just write whatever I think is funny. I’m doing a movie for a German company now. It’ll be done in German with a German writer and director for Amazon. It’s a streaming thing, so they’ve got some rules. The inciting incident, which usually doesn’t come until 20 or 25 pages in when I write a movie, now has to be in the first five pages. The new demands of 2026 and streaming are that people will turn off the TV if you don’t grab them in the first five minutes. This is a head-scratcher for me. It’s not especially creative, but I’m going to work with it and see if I can adapt to these rules and still make a good product while avoiding the hackism of Naked Gun 4. I think I invented another word.
Diane: Let’s go back to talking about some of the projects that you’re working on right now. What’s lighting you up? What are you most excited about, and where is this heading you in the industry?
David: I’m most excited about Star of Malta. That is a wonderful story with a wonderful ensemble cast, and it’s new. It’s never been done before. Counter Intelligence would have been a great Naked Gun 4, but it’s still that Naked Gun style humor and characters. Star of Malta is the next step. It’s the difference Woody Allen had between Bananas and Annie Hall. He went to the next level. Star of Malta takes spoof to another level. I’m very excited about that because it’s exploring new ground. It’s not doing the same old stuff, which is why I can’t go to a studio. They just want to do the same old stuff. However, I don’t want to paint it with a broad brush that everything is bad because Top Gun: Maverick was, in a way, the same old stuff, but boy, did they do a great job. It was fresh, funny, and kept you on the edge of your seat. So it can be done. Sequels aren’t all bad. Franchises can be made creative unless you hire people who just do the same old stuff, copy, paint by the numbers.
Diane: Beyond making audiences laugh, what other missions drive you today?
David: I’m deep into the environment, specifically trees. I’ve been on the board of a great LA tree planting organization called TreePeople. We’re changing LA one tree at a time. It’s an organization that requires community participation and individual initiative. We’re not lobbying the government; it’s not political. You can plant a tree in your own yard. You don’t have to wait. Trees are the basic engine of the environment; they clean the air and do a million things. I’m from Wisconsin where trees just grew naturally if you left a field alone, but in LA, trees need people, and people need trees. The saying is the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now. TreePeople also had a great poster once that said, “What LA needs is a few more skyscrapers,” and it was a picture of a giant Redwood. I had a ranch in Ojai, a little farming community with citrus groves covering the whole valley. I bought a 20-acre ranch and made a forest out of it. It’s still there today. I have great before and after pictures. That was my hobby for 20 years.
Diane: Is there anything that you would like to talk about, share, or something that’s impacted you?
David: I think the lesson of the book Surely You Can’t Be Serious is not just “Hey, you can do it,” but “Don’t be intimidated by people who are established or in uniforms.” We tell a story in the book called “Mrs. Zubatzky’s Law.” Mrs. Zubatzky was our next-door neighbor in Milwaukee. One day our roof caught fire. She was on her porch above her garage next door, and when the firemen arrived, they tried to raise the ladders to get up to the roof. But the ladders stuck. Mrs. Zabatzky just called out to them, “Forget about the ladders. Just aim the hoses up to the roof.” The firemen did that, and the fire was out in five minutes. Jerry, Jim, and I thought about this and said, “Mrs. Zabatzky’s Law is: never assume you can’t do somebody else’s job better than they can.” When we left Milwaukee for LA, everybody asked us, “You’re going to try to make it in Hollywood? What’s your plan B?” We said, “We don’t have a plan B.” We were just going to make it. We learned as we went along and weren’t intimidated by Hollywood. That’s pretty much what the book is about. I think anybody can draw a little wisdom from that, and also, of course, about being original.
Diane: What advice would you give to a young person wanting to start out in the entertainment business?
David: When I’m asked what advice I would give to a young person wanting to start out in the entertainment business, I say, “Quit now. You’ll never make it.” It always gets a laugh. The first time I said that, I thought it was kind of a mean thing to say, so I added, “But if you can ignore that advice, you’ll be halfway there.” I don’t want to tell anybody, “You can do it.” You have to be so determined, headstrong, and naive to think that you can make it. That’s what we were. We came out to LA, and there was no improv or sketch group that had anything like what we had. We built our own theater in an abandoned warehouse. We did it by being original and believing in ourselves. I’m sure that’s typical advice, but we knew we had it. We had no plan B; we were just going to make it, and we had no doubt. We had fun doing it. While we were doing the theater, it was a laboratory to test out what was funny. We had a live audience every night; if something didn’t work, we cut it out. We had an all-star cast. My brother was amazing. Steve Stucker, who played the flamboyant Air Controller in Airplane!, was in it, as was Dick Chudnow, our classmate from Shorewood High School. We had raw talent. Jim and I were just placeholders, but everybody else was a star.
Diane: David, I want to thank you so much.
David: This was wonderful. Talk to you later.
