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* The Monty Python foot icon is used to represent the [[slashdot.org]] post category "It's funny. Laugh." [http://slashdot.org/topics.shtml]
* The Monty Python foot icon is used to represent the [[slashdot.org]] post category "It's funny. Laugh." [http://slashdot.org/topics.shtml]
* The term [[Spam (electronic)|spam]], as used to denote unsolicited email, comes from Monty Python's [[Spam (Monty Python)|Spam sketch]]. The Hormel Company which produces Spam (R) has been very good-natured about the song and only requires that unwanted junkmail be referred to with a lower case "s".
* The term [[Spam (electronic)|spam]], as used to denote unsolicited email, comes from Monty Python's [[Spam (Monty Python)|Spam sketch]]. The Hormel Company which produces Spam (R) has been very good-natured about the song and only requires that unwanted junkmail be referred to with a lower case "s".
* Guinness Stout television advertising in the United States in 2005-2006 feature two British gentlemen animated in the Terry Gilliam style, with the catchword of the two gents being "Brilliant!"


==References==
==References==

Revision as of 22:24, 3 March 2006

File:MontyPythonCast.jpg
The Monty Python troupe in 1970. From left to right: Terry Jones, Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Gilliam, and Michael Palin.

Monty Python, or The Pythons, is the collective name of the creators and stars of Monty Python's Flying Circus, a British television comedy sketch show that first aired on October 5, 1969. It went on to eventually comprise 45 episodes over four series. However, the Python phenomenon was much greater, spawning stage tours, four films, numerous albums, several computer games and books, as well as launching the members to individual stardom.

The television series, broadcast by the BBC from 1969 to 1974, was conceived, written and performed by Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin. Loosely structured as a sketch show, but with an innovative stream-of-consciousness approach (aided by Terry Gilliam's animations), it pushed the boundaries of what was then considered acceptable, both in terms of style and content.

The group's influence upon comedy has been compared to that which The Beatles had on music. While their influence all over the British comedic spectrum has been apparent for years, in America it is especially evident in more recent absurdist television programming like Adult Swim, South Park, The Simpsons and many others.

The name was chosen simply because they thought it sounded funny. In 1998's Live at Aspen documentary, the group revealed how it came about. 'Monty' was selected as a tribute to Field Marshal Lord Montgomery, a legendary British general of World War II, and the team agreed that it wanted a 'slippery-sounding' name as well. The word 'Python' fitted the bill. These explanations aside, some believe that the name of a character in several of humorist P. G. Wodehouse's books, 'Monty Bodkin', served on some level as an inspiration.

In a 2005 poll to find The Comedian's Comedian, three of the six members were voted among the top 50 greatest comedy acts ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders. Michael Palin was at number 30, Eric Idle was voted 21st and John Cleese was at 2, just beaten to the top by Peter Cook.

History (pre-Python)

File:CleeseChapman1948Show.jpg
Cleese and Chapman in At Last the 1948 Show.
File:JonesPalinIdle.jpg
Jones, Palin, Idle (back row) with Denise Coffey and David Jason in Do Not Adjust Your Set.

Michael Palin and Terry Jones first met at Oxford University, while John Cleese and Graham Chapman met at Cambridge. Eric Idle was also there, but started a year after Cleese and Chapman. Cleese met Gilliam in New York while on tour with the Cambridge University Footlights revue Cambridge Circus (originally entitled A Clump of Plinths).

Graham Chapman, John Cleese and Eric Idle were all members of the Footlights, which at that time also included the future Goodies — Tim Brooke-Taylor, Bill Oddie and Graeme Garden — as well as Jonathan Lynn (co-writer of Yes, Minister and Yes, Prime Minister). During the time of Eric Idle's presidency of the Club, feminist icon Germaine Greer was also a member. Recordings of these so-called "Smokers" at Pembroke College include sketches and performances by Idle and Cleese. They are currently kept in the archives of the Pembroke Players, along with tapes of Idle's performances in some of the college drama society's theatrical productions.

Variously, the Python members appeared in and/or wrote for the following shows before being united for Monty Python's Flying Circus:

Several of these also featured other important British comedy writers and/or performers, including Ronnie Corbett, Ronnie Barker, Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden, Bill Oddie, Marty Feldman, Jonathan Lynn, David Jason and David Frost.

Following the success of Do Not Adjust Your Set among the adult demographic, ITV offered Palin, Jones, Idle and Gilliam their own series together. At the same time, Cleese and Chapman were offered a show by the BBC, who had seen them on The Frost Report, among other programmes. However, Cleese was reluctant to do a two-man show, for various reasons — including Chapman's supposedly difficult personality. Cleese had fond memories of working with Palin, and invited him to join the team. With the ITV series still in pre-production, Palin agreed, and brought Idle, Jones and Gilliam along. Much has been made of the fact that the Monty Python troupe is the result of Cleese's desire to work with Palin and the chance circumstances that brought the other four members into the fold.

Flying Circus and the Python style

File:Terry Gilliam Elephants.jpg
Terry Gilliam's Beware of the Elephants animation

The Pythons had a very definite idea about what they wanted to do with the series, and were a little dismayed when they saw Spike Milligan recording his series Q5 (1969), as it seemed like he'd beaten them to it. The group immediately scurried for a new style to call its own. After much debate, Terry Jones remembered an animation Terry Gilliam had created for Do Not Adjust Your Set called "Beware of the Elephants". Having no real theme, it was more of a stream-of-consciousness piece. Jones felt it would be a good concept to bring to the series, allowing sketches to blend into each other. Michael Palin was just as fascinated by another of Gilliam's efforts, entitled "Christmas Cards". "It was absolutely brilliant," he later recalled, "with missiles coming out of church steeples. Terry's stream-of-consciousness animation was one of the examples of a way of doing things differently." As a result, the style of Monty Python was born.

The first series of the television show was originally planned as a vehicle for John Cleese's career. However, he wanted to work in collaboration, and so the group was assembled in an organised and disciplined manner. Each day of writing started at 9am and finished at 5pm. Typically, Cleese and Chapman worked as one pair of writers isolated from the others, as did Jones and Palin, while Idle wrote alone. After a few days of working in this configuration, they would all join together with Gilliam, critique their scripts and exchange ideas. Their approach to writing was democratic. If the majority found the idea to be humorous, it would be included in the show. The casting of roles for the sketches was a similarly unselfish process, since each member viewed himself as a writer, rather than an actor who was desperate for screen time. When the themes for sketches were finally chosen, Gilliam had carte blanche to decide how to bridge them with fanciful animations, armed with his camera, scissors, and airbrush.

Several names for the show were bandied about before the title Monty Python's Flying Circus was settled upon. Some of the more memorable were Owl Stretching Time, The Toad Elevating Moment and Bun, Wackett, Buzzard, Stubble and Boot. "Flying Circus" came about when the BBC explained to the group that it had already printed the name in its schedules and had no wish to amend it, leaving the Pythons no choice in the matter. Many variations then came and went. Gwen Dibley's Flying Circus was named after a woman Michael Palin had read about in the newspaper, thinking it would be amusing if she were to discover she had her own TV show. Barry Took's Flying Circus was an affectionate tribute to the man who had brought them together. Arthur Megapode's Flying Circus was suggested, then discarded. Cleese then added "Python", liking the image of a slippery, sly individual that it conjured up. The origin of "Monty" is somewhat confused, but Idle claims it was a popular and rotund fellow who drank in his local pub. People would often walk in and ask the barman, "Has Monty been in yet?", forcing the name to become stuck in his mind.

Graham Chapman as the Colonel

Flying Circus pioneered some innovative formal techniques, such as the cold open, in which an episode began without the traditional opening titles or announcements. An example of this is the "It's" man: Michael Palin in Robinson Crusoe garb, making a tortuous journey across various terrains, before finally approaching the camera to state, "It's...", to be then followed by the title sequence. On several occasions the Pythons would even trick viewers by rolling the closing credits halfway through the show. Inspired by Milligan's earlier Q series, they also realised that they did not necessarily have to conclude a sketch with the traditional punchline. They experimented with ending segments by cutting abruptly to another scene or animation, walking offstage, addressing the camera, or introducing a totally unrelated event or character. A classic example of this approach was the use of Chapman's "Colonel" character, who walked into several sketches and ordered them to be stopped because they were "too silly."

The use of Gilliam's surreal, collage stop-motion animations was another innovative intertextual element of the Python style. Many of the images Gilliam used were lifted from famous works of art, and from Victorian illustrations and engravings. The giant foot, which crushes the title at the end of the opening credits, is in fact the foot of Cupid, cut from a reproduction of the Renaissance masterpiece Venus, Cupid, Folly, and Time by Bronzino. This foot, and Gilliam's style in general, have come to be considered the visual trademarks of the series.

The Pythons built on and extended the great British tradition of cross-dressing comedy. Rather than dressing a man as a woman for comic effect, the (entirely male) Python team would don frocks and make-up and play middle-aged women in an entirely straight manner (straight as in comedy style, rather than sexual preference). Thus a scene requiring a housewife would feature one of the male Pythons wearing a housecoat and apron, speaking in falsetto. The comic effect was accentuated by this, but the comedy itself was based on the role, not the cross-dressing aspect — had a genuine woman played the role, the sketch would still have had great comic effect.

Many of the sketches have endured, being quoted to this day. "The Dead Parrot", "The Lumberjack Song", "Spam", "Nudge Nudge", "The Spanish Inquisition", "Upper Class Twit of the Year", and "The Ministry of Silly Walks" are but a few.


Information about Monty Python

Information about Monty Python and the cast can be found in the books:

  • From Fringe to Flying Circus — 'Celebrating a Unique Generation of Comedy 1960–1980' — Roger Wilmut, Eyre Methuen Ltd, 1980.
  • The Pythons: Autobiography by The Pythons — Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin and Bob McCabe, Orion, 2003.

Life after Python

Python (Monty) Pictures

File:GeorgeHarrisonCash.jpg
George Harrison in All You Need Is Cash.

The five surviving members of the main Monty Python team are directors of Python (Monty) Pictures Limited which was incorporated in 1973 and now manages ongoing activities resulting from their previous work together. In the accounts return, the company describes its activities as the 'exploitation of television and cinematographic productions'. In the last financial year for which accounts are available (to March 2002), the company's turnover was £3.3M (source: Bureau van Dijk's FAME).

When Monty Python's Flying Circus was shown in the USA by ABC in their "Wide World of Entertainment" slot in 1975 the episodes were re-edited, thus losing the continuity and flow intended in the originals. When ABC refused to stop treating the series in this way the Pythons took them to court. Initially the court ruled that their artistic rights had indeed been violated, but it refused to stop the ABC broadcasts. However, on appeal the team gained control over all subsequent US broadcasts of its programmes. The case also led to them gaining the rights from the BBC once their original contracts ended at the end of 1980 (a unique arrangement at the time). 5

A driving force behind Python in the late 1970s was the Beatles' George Harrison, who not only funded and appeared in Monty Python's Life of Brian as Mr. Papadopolous (though his voice is dubbed by Palin) but produced a number of their songs from that period, including "The Lumberjack Song" single. He also made a cameo appearance in Eric Idle's cult Beatles parody All You Need Is Cash (aka The Rutles), which incidentally united (for the most part) the Pythons and Saturday Night Live, and was co-produced by Broadway Video, SNL's production company. Harrison once said in an interview, "Monty Python helped me get over the trauma of the breakup of the Beatles." 1

Going solo

Each member pursued other film and television projects after the break-up of the group, but often continued to work with one another. Many of these collaborations were very successful, such as Fawlty Towers (written by and starring John Cleese and Connie Booth), and A Fish Called Wanda (1988) (also written by Cleese, and in which he starred along with Michael Palin). The latter pair also appeared in Time Bandits (1981), a movie written by Gilliam and Palin, and directed by Gilliam. Gilliam also directed and co-wrote Brazil (1985) and The Adventures of Baron Munchhausen (1988), which featured Michael Palin and Eric Idle respectively. The latter had success in Nuns on the Run (1990) with Robbie Coltrane. Palin and Jones wrote the parody series Ripping Yarns starring Palin with an assortment of British actors. Palin's BBC travel series have also proved extremely popular. In terms of numbers of productions, John Cleese has had the most prolific solo career, having appeared in 59 theatrical movies, 22 TV shows or series, 23 direct-to-video productions, and 6 video games2.

The End?

File:PythonReunion.jpg
Python reunion, complete with Chapman's urn, in Aspen, Colorado (from left: Terry Jones, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Gilliam, Michael Palin).

The Pythons are often the subject of reunion rumours. The death of Graham Chapman in 1989 (on the eve of their 20th anniversary) seemed to put an end to this speculation, but in 1998 the five remaining members, along with what was purported to be Chapman's ashes, were reunited on stage for the first time in eighteen years. The occasion was in the form of an interview (hosted by Robert Klein, with an appearance by Eddie Izzard) in which the team looked back at some of their work and performed a few new skits. At one point during the event, Chapman's urn was "accidentally" spilled, and the ashes were cleared away with a vacuum cleaner.

On 9 October 1999, to commemorate 30 years since the first Flying Circus' TV broadcast, BBC2 devoted an evening to Python programmes, including a documentary charting the history of the team, interspersing them with new sketches filmed especially for the event.

In an interview to publicise the DVD release of The Meaning of Life, Cleese said a further reunion was unlikely. "It is absolutely impossible to get even a majority of us together in a room, and I'm not joking," Cleese said. He said that the problem was one of busy-ness rather than one of bad feelings. Eric Idle has said that he expects to see a proper Python reunion, "just as soon as Graham Chapman comes back from the dead." (This echoed a comment George Harrison of The Beatles once made: "As far as I'm concerned, there won't be a Beatles reunion as long as John Lennon remains dead.")

The 2003 "autobiography", compiled from a series of interviews with the surviving Pythons, reveals that a series of disputes in 1990 over a Monty Python and the Holy Grail sequel conceived by Idle may have resulted in the group's permanent fission. Cleese's feeling was that Monty Python's Meaning of Life was both personally difficult and ultimately mediocre, and for other reasons, didn't wish to do the film. Apparently Idle was angry with Cleese for refusing to do the film, which most of the remaining Pythons thought reasonably promising. Idle then refused to do what he saw as the Cleese-dominated reunion show a few years later.

March 2005 saw the full reunion of the surviving cast members at the premiere of Eric Idle's musical Spamalot, based on the film Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It opened in Chicago, Illinois and has since played in New York on Broadway. In 2005, it was nominated for 14 Tony Awards and won three: Best Musical, Best Direction of a Musical for Mike Nichols and Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical for Sara Ramirez, who played the Lady of the Lake, a character specially added for the musical.

Owing in part to the success of Spamalot, PBS announced on July 13, 2005, that the network would begin to re-air the entire run of Monty Python's Flying Circus, as well as new one-hour specials focusing on each member of the group, called Monty Python's Personal Best. Each is to be written and produced by the individual being honoured, with the five remaining Pythons collaborating on Graham Chapman's programme.

The Pythons

Michael Palin

The youngest Python by a matter of weeks, Palin is often labelled 'the nice one'. He attended Oxford, where he met his Python writing partner Terry Jones. The two also wrote the series Ripping Yarns together. Palin and Jones originally wrote together, but soon found it was more productive to write apart and then come together and review what the other had written. Therefore, Jones and Palin's sketches tended to be more focused than that of the other four, taking one bizarre, hilarious situation, sticking to it, and building on it. Examples include The Spanish inquisition sketch and the Mr. Creosote sketch in The Meaning of Life. These sketches take everyday situations (talking in the sitting room, dining out) but then introduce an unexpected, impossible to predict, rogue element (The Spanish Inquisition, a grotesquely overweight man). From here, Palin and Jones could play around with the newly created environment, taking it to impossible, unbelievably stupid extremes, for example, attempting to torture old ladies with cushions and comfie chairs, or having Cleese's waiter feed Mr Creosote until he actually explodes, showering the other diners in viscera. In recent years, Palin has starred in a number of documentary travel series for the BBC in which he visits various — usually remote — locales, often along some predetermined route, for example his series Pole to Pole and the BBC-sponsored Around the World in Eighty Days, where he followed the route of the fictional journey of Phileas Fogg in Jules Verne's novel of the same name. Palin is one of the most popular personalities in Britain today. He was also voted the best-looking member of the Monty Python group by the public.

Terry Jones

All the Pythons have an eclectic range of talents, but Terry Jones is particularly hard to compartmentalise. George Perry has commented that should you "speak to him on subjects as diverse as fossil fuels, or Rupert Bear, or mercenaries in the Middle Ages or Modern China and in a moment you will find yourself hopelessly out of your depth, floored by his knowledge." However, not everyone considers Jones a show off, merely that he has a good natured enthusiasm. It is this same cheery devotion that has led to his unflagging loyalty to the preservation of the group. As long as there is Terry Jones, there will be, in some way, a Monty Python. Jones' dedication to Python is not a recent occurrence however. As well as writing with Michael Palin, he committed himself to directing the Python films Monty Python and the Holy Grail and The Life of Brian, when it was felt that a member of the group should be in charge. Though the rest of the group appreciate such efforts, it would be a lie to say that there was not a little resentment at being bossed around by a man they viewed as an equal, especially when he acted as director. This has resulted in light-hearted joking at Jones' expense: Eric Idle, for example, constantly hails him as the most boring man on the planet. Of Jones' innumerable contributions to the show, his parodic, screechy-voiced depictions of middle-aged women are among the most memorable. In 2004, Jones was the presenter and actor for the History Channel miniseries, Terry Jones' Medieval Lives.

Eric Idle

Two writing partnerships were absorbed into the Pythons — John Cleese and Graham Chapman, Terry Jones and Michael Palin. That left Terry Gilliam in his own corner, considered to be a sensible position in view of the arcane nature of his work, and Eric Idle. Idle was content to be cast as the group loner, preferring to write by himself, at his own pace, although he sometimes found it difficult in having to present material to the others and make it seem funny without the back-up support of a partner. Cleese claimed that, though he often felt his position was unfair, Idle was an independent person and worked best on his own. Idle claimed, "It was easier in a show where there were thirteen in a series than with a film, where stuff was read out all the time, and you had to convince five others. And they were not the most un-egotistical of writers either." Idle studied at Cambridge, a year behind John Cleese and Graham Chapman. His participation was essential to the Python synergy. His talent for verbal humour is exceptional, leading the group to dub him "master of the one-liner". As a performer, he can master with ease tongue-twisting wordplays that verge on impossibility. He is also a talented songwriter and accomplished guitarist with a real ear for lyrics and styles. This talent lent heavily to the Python's work, composing, amongst others, 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life', which has become the group's signature tune. Idle is currently the writer of the Broadway version of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, named Spamalot.

John Cleese

Perhaps the best known of the Pythons, Cleese attended Clifton College, Bristol where he caught the performing bug by appearing in the house plays. He moved on to Cambridge, where he met his future Python writing partner, Graham Chapman. His work with Chapman was, aside from Gilliam's animations, perhaps the most surreal of the Pythons' work and almost certainly the most intentionally satirical. Unlike Palin and Jones, Cleese and Chapman actually wrote together, in the same room. Cleese claims that their writing partnership involved him sitting with pen and paper, and Chapman sitting back, not speaking for lengths at a time, but when he did speak, it was often brilliant. Without Chapman's input, the Dead Parrot sketch would have been about the duller subject of a car (it is much harder to imagine Cleese throwing about a car in the same way he threw about the parrot). Their work often involved ordinary people in ordinary situations, doing incredibly strange and surreal things. For example, Cleese and Chapman transformed the ordinary sight "a civil servant in black suit and bowler hat makes his way to work" into a bizarre, unforgettable scene; the straight-faced Cleese used his physical potential to its full force as the crane-legged civil servant performing an athletic, grotesque, utterly unique walk to his office at the 'Ministry of Silly Walks'. This sketch was in fact written by Palin and Jones, but Cleese made it his own, showcasing his talent for physical comedy (also famously used in Fawlty Towers) and playing characters who could remain serious, even impassive, while doing something utterly ludicrous. His role as Sir Lancelot in Monty Python and the Holy Grail also showcases this, as he fights his way through a castle to save a damsel in distress, much like, say, Kevin Costner in films such as Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, although completely oblivious to the fact that he is actually savaging wedding guests. Another popular device used by the two was highly articulate arguments over completely arbitrary subjects, such as in the cheese shop, the dead parrot sketch or the Argument clinic. All of these roles were opposite Michael Palin, who Cleese often claims is his favourite Python to work with. Recently, he played Q's assistant (R) and finally the new Q himself in the James Bond movies. Cleese has recently had a species of lemur named after him, Avahi cleesei (or "Cleese's Woolly Lemur"). This was in recognition of his promotion of conservation issues after the release of his film Fierce Creatures, which featured such an animal, and Operation Lemur with John Cleese, which highlighted their plight on the island of Madagascar — their natural habitat.

Graham Chapman

Chapman was perhaps best remembered for taking on the lead roles in The Holy Grail, as King Arthur, and Life of Brian, as Brian Cohen. The movie roles were fairly straight, the comedy deriving from the stereotypical lead in bizarre situations, encountering eccentric characters, still being played as serious, and unflinching. These roles, however, were unusual for the Graham Chapman the public had come to know on the Flying Circus, where he figured as the tall, craggy pipe smoker who gave the impression of calmness, disguising a manic unpredictability as real in his characters as they were in reality. For behind the pipe-smoking, rugby-playing exterior lay an alcoholic homosexual, with whom the rest of the Pythons often had trouble dealing. This was one of the reasons that Cleese left the television show after series three. Chapman particularly had trouble filming the Holy Grail in Scotland, where he got a case of delirium tremens, often called DTs. During his worst alcoholism, he was reportedly consuming two quarts of gin every day.3 However, by the time his definitive role of Brian arose, he was sober and continued to produce some of his best work with the Pythons. Graham Chapman died of cancer on 4 October 1989. Thanks to the nature of the other Pythons, he is now lovingly referred to as "the dead one."

Terry Gilliam

Terry Gilliam — the only non-British member — started off as an animator and strip cartoonist. One of his early photographic strips for Harvey Kurtzman's Help! (magazine) featured John Cleese. Moving from the USA to England, he animated features for Do Not Adjust Your Set and then joined Monty Python's Flying Circus when it was created. He was the principal artist-animator of the distinctive, surreal cartoons which frequently linked the show's sketches together, and defined the group's visual language in other mediums. He mixed his own art, characterised by soft gradients and odd bulbous shapes, with backgrounds and moving cutouts from antique photographs, mostly from the Victorian era. The style has been mimicked repeatedly throughout the years: in the children's television cartoon Angela Anaconda, a series of television commercials for Guinness Beer, the Jibjab cartoons featured on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, and the television history series Terry Jones' Medieval Lives. The title sequence for Desperate Housewives and the visits to the land of the living in Grim Fandango is also highly Gilliamesque. Besides doing the animations for the Flying Circus, he also appeared in several sketches, usually playing parts that no one else wanted to play (generally because they required a lot of make-up or uncomfortable costumes, such as a recurring knight in armour who would end sketches by walking on and hitting one of the other characters over the head with a plucked chicken) and played side parts in the films. He co-directed Monty Python and The Holy Grail and directed short segments of other Python films (for instance The Crimson Permanent Assurance, the short film that appears before The Meaning of Life). Gilliam has gone on to become a celebrated and imaginative film director with such notable titles as Time Bandits, Brazil, The Adventures of Baron Munchhausen, The Fisher King, Twelve Monkeys and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas to his credit. His latest work is The Brothers Grimm, released in August 2005.

The 7th Python

File:CarolCleveland.jpg
Carol Cleveland as the stereotypical "blonde bombshell."

Commonly referred to as the "7th Python", or the "Python Girl", Carol Cleveland was the only significant female performer in the Monty Python ensemble. Originally hired by producer/director John Howard Davies for just the first five episodes of the Flying Circus TV series, she went on to appear in nearly every episode as well as in all of the Python films. Her common portrayal as the stereotypical "blonde bimbo" eventually earned her the sobriquet "Carol Cleavage" by the other Pythons, but she felt that the variety of her roles shouldn't be described in such a pejorative way.

Much in the same way that many people are alleged to be the Fifth Beatle, there are also other notable contributors to the Python troupe. John Cleese's ex-wife Connie Booth, who would go on to write and star with him in Fawlty Towers, was probably the only other significant female performer. She appeared in, amongst others, The Lumberjack Song and as the "witch" in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It has been suggested that she may also have assisted Cleese and Chapman in their writing.

Neil Innes is the only non-Python, besides Douglas Adams, to be credited with writing material for the Flying Circus. He appeared in sketches and the Python movies, as well as performing some of his songs in Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl. He was also a regular stand-in for absent Pythons on the rare occasions when they appear to re-create sketches. For example, he took the place of John Cleese when he was unable to appear at the memorial concert for George Harrison. Terry Gilliam once noted that if anyone qualified for the title of the "Seventh Python," it would certainly be Innes. Innes was one of the creative talents in the off-beat Bonzo Dog Band, appreciated for such nutty compositions as "The Intro and the Outro" and "I'm The Urban Spaceman". He would later portray Ron Nasty of the Rutles and write virtually all of the Rutles' compositions.

Eddie Izzard, a massive fan of the group, also occasionally stands in for absent members. When the BBC held a "Python Night" in 1999 to celebrate 30 years of the first broadcast of Flying Circus, the Pythons recorded some new material with Izzard standing in for Eric Idle, who was in America. He also appeared with them "Live at Aspen" and hosted a history of the group entitled "The Life of Python."

'Pythonesque'

Monty Python casts a considerable shadow over modern comedy. As such, the term 'pythonesque' has become a byword in surreal humour. However, this is perhaps somewhat misleading, since the humour of Monty Python, whilst certainly nonsensical and surreal, is still strongly characterised by a preoccupation with the British social class system — most notably with British working class stereotypes. These themes cannot be said to be essential to surrealist comedy as a whole.

Python media

For a more comprehensive list of Python media, including books, live shows, records, and video games, see: Monty Python mediagraphy

Television

The show that started the Python phenomenon. See also List of Monty Python's Flying Circus Episodes.
Two 45-minute specials made by WDR for West German television. The first was recorded in German, while the second was in English with German dubbing.

Films

File:MontyPythonHolyGrailCastShot.jpg
Cast on the set of Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

There were five Monty Python films:

A collection of re-filmed sketches from the first and second series of Monty Python's Flying Circus.
King Arthur and his knights embark on a low-budget search for the Holy Grail, encountering humorous obstacles along the way. Some of these turned into standalone sketches.
Brian is born on the first Christmas, in the stable next to Jesus'. He spends his life being mistaken for a messiah.
Live performance of skits directed by Ian MacNaughton.
The one with the machine that goes PING! An examination of the meaning of life in a series of sketches from conception to death and beyond, from the uniquely Python perspective.

Albums

Theatre

Written by Eric Idle, directed by Mike Nichols, with music and lyrics by John Du Prez and Eric Idle, and starring Hank Azaria, Tim Curry, and David Hyde Pierce, Spamalot is a musical adaptation of the film Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It ran in Chicago, Illinois from December 21, 2004 to January 23, 2005, and began showing on Broadway on March 17, 2005.
  • Monty Python's Flying Circus — the first and only authorised stage version of the sketch show itself — is currently touring Great Britain, and is highly successful, (Terry Gilliam calling it, 'better than we could manage at the time'). This is despite its twist — the fact that it is being performed in French. It was originally performed in Paris where it was successful before being a surprise hit at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. With the strapline, 'Et maintenant pour quelquechose complètement différent!'. it is titled for English audiences with similar facilities to those used for deaf or hearing-impaired. Find out more here.

Trivia

  • On May 4, 1982, during the Falklands / Malvinas War, the Royal Navy destroyer HMS Sheffield was fatally struck by a French-built Exocet anti-ship missile launched from an Argentine Air Force jet. As the crew gathered on deck for rescue, they struck up a chorus of "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" from Life of Brian.
  • The September 17, 2004 episode of Jeopardy! featured Python-related category titles in the Double Jeopardy round: 'Monty Python', 'Bring Out Your Dead', 'Spam', 'Summarising Proust', 'I'm a Lumberjack,' and 'Knights Who Say "Ni"!'
  • All of the Beatles were fans of Monty Python. Ringo Starr made a cameo appearance after the credits of the Flying Circus episode 'Mr. & Mrs. Brian Norris' Ford Popular', playing himself. Besides George Harrison's work mentioned above, he also appeared as a mountie during the Lumberjack Song at the Python's City Center venue. The last song on the warm-up tape before Harrison's concerts was the Lumberjack Song.1
  • A fossil of a previously unknown prehistoric species of large snake from the Miocene was discovered in Riversleigh, Queensland, Australia, in 1985. The Australian palaeontologist who discovered the fossil snake was a Monty Python fan, and he gave the snake the taxonomic name of Montypythonoides riversleighensis in honour of the Monty Python team. [1]. (Translated from Latin to English, Montypythonoides means "like Monty Python".)
  • The title Monty Python's Flying Circus was partly the result of the group's reputation at the BBC. Michael Mills, BBC's Head of Comedy, wanted their name to include the word "circus", because the BBC referred to the six members wandering around the building as a circus. The group added "flying" to make it sound less like an actual circus and more like something from World War I. "Monty Python" was added because they claimed it sounded like a really bad theatrical agent, the sort of person who would have brought them together.4
  • The Python programming language by Guido van Rossum is named after the troupe, and Monty Python references are often found in sample code created for that language.
  • The Monty Python foot icon is used to represent the slashdot.org post category "It's funny. Laugh." [2]
  • The term spam, as used to denote unsolicited email, comes from Monty Python's Spam sketch. The Hormel Company which produces Spam (R) has been very good-natured about the song and only requires that unwanted junkmail be referred to with a lower case "s".
  • Guinness Stout television advertising in the United States in 2005-2006 feature two British gentlemen animated in the Terry Gilliam style, with the catchword of the two gents being "Brilliant!"

References

  1. Clarkson, M. (1994). Monty Python...Facts and Trivia. Britcomedy Digest 1 (3).
  2. Chapman, Graham (1997). Graham Crackers: Fuzzy Memories, Silly Bits, and Outright Lies. Career Pr Inc. ISBN 1564143341.
  3. Morgan, David (June 1999). Monty Python Speaks; a Spike imprint, Avon Books, Inc., New York, New York ISBN 0-380-80479-4
  4. Anglin, A. (2004). The Alt.Fan.Monty-Python FAQ. Retrieved Dec. 5, 2004.
  5. IMDB; as of January 2005; includes pre-release items.
  6. BBC Comedy Guide

See also

External links

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