sign in sign up
<<
Home , Absolutely Anything, All You Need Is Cash, Argument Clinic, A Private Function, Broaden Your Mind, Carol Cleveland

April 16, 2019 (XXXVIII:11) & : ’S THE (1983, 107m) The version of this Goldenrod Handout sent out in our Monday mailing, and the one online, has hot links.

DIRECTOR Terry Jones, Terry Gilliam ( and special sequence) WRITING , , Terry Gilliam, , Terry Jones, and PRODUCED BY John Goldstone CINEMATOGRAPHY Peter Hannan, Pratt (segment "The Crimson Permanent Assurance") MUSIC EDITING Julian Doyle

The won the Grand Prize of the Jury and was nominated for the Palme d’Or at the 1983 Cannes Film Festival.

CAST Graham Chapman of Life (1983), which won the Grand Prize of the Jury and was John Cleese nominated for the Palme d’Or at Cannes. In The Meaning of Life, Terry Gilliam he wrote and performed the song “” and Eric Idle wrote the song “Christmas in Heaven.” He has also directed such Terry Jones as: Personal Services (1987), (1989), Mr. Michael Palin Toad's Wild Ride (1996), Python Night: 30 Years of Monty Terry Gilliam Python (TV Movie documentary) (1999), and Absolutely Anything (2015). He has also acted in television series and films, such as: And Now for Something Completely Different (1971), Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus (TV Series) (1972), TERRY JONES (b. February 1, 1942 in Colwyn Bay, , (1977), (1981), Monty UK) is a Welsh (54 credits), writer, , Python Live at the Bowl (Documentary) (1982), Erik (51 credits), (18 credits) and historian, best known the Viking (1989), L.A. Story (1991), The Young Indiana Jones as a member of the Monty Python troupe. Jones Chronicles (TV Series) (1992), Monty Python & the Quest for graduated from University with a degree in history and the (Video Game) (1996), Not the : He's a began writing and performing with fellow Oxford student and Very Naughty Boy (2010), and The Secret Policeman's Ball (TV future Python member Michael Palin. They worked for several Special) (2012). high-profile programs, including (1967-1969) and (1966-1967), before TERRY GILLIAM (b. November 22, 1940 in , creating Monty Python's Flying Circus (1969-1974) with ) is an American-born British screenwriter (29 credits), graduates Eric Idle, John Cleese, and Graham film director (19 credits), animator (14 credits), actor, comedian Chapman, and American animator/filmmaker Terry Gilliam. and member of the Monty Python . The only Jones, who would begin directing films, was largely responsible Python member not born in Britain, he became a naturalized for the program's innovative, surreal structure, in which sketches British subject in 1968 and formally renounced his American flowed from one to the next without the use of punchlines. He citizenship in 2006. He began his career as an animator and strip made his directorial debut with the team's first film, Monty cartoonist. One of his early photographic strips for Help! Python and the Holy Grail (1975), which he co-directed with magazine featured future Monty Python member John Cleese. Gilliam and acted in, and also directed and acted in the When Help! folded, Gilliam went to , jokingly subsequent Python films, Life of Brian (1979) and The Meaning announcing in the very last issue that he was "being transferred Jones & Gilliam: MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE—2 to the European branch" of the magazine, which, of course, did Something Completely Different** (1971), and Monty Python not exist. Moving to England, he animated sequences for the Live (Mostly) (Documentary) (2014). And these are some of the children's series Do Not Adjust Your Set (1968), which also films, television series, and video games he has acted in: We featured Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin. Gilliam was a Have Ways of Making You Laugh (TV Series) (1968), Monty part of Monty Python's Flying Circus* from its outset, credited at Python's Fliegender Zirkus (TV Series) (1972), first as an animator (1985), Monty Python & (his name was the Quest for the Holy listed separately Grail (Video Game) after the other five (1996), The Meaning of in the closing Life (Video Game) credits) and later as (1997), Locked Out a full member. His (2006), Not the Messiah: cartoons linked the He's a Very Naughty Boy show's sketches (2010), A Liar's together and Autobiography: The defined the group's Untrue Story of Monty visual language in Python's Graham other media, such Chapman (2012), Jupiter as LP and book Ascending (2015), and covers and the title sequences of their (2015). films. His *Also wrote mix his ** Also acted own art, characterized by soft gradients and odd, bulbous shapes, with backgrounds and moving cutouts from antique photographs, GRAHAM CHAPMAN (b. January 8, 1941 in , mostly from the Victorian era. With the gradual breakup of the , England, UK—d. October 4, 1989 (age 48) in Python troupe between Life of Brian* ** in 1979 and The Maidstone, England, UK) was an English comedian, writer (49 Meaning of Life* ** in 1983, Gilliam became a screenwriter and credits), actor (29 credits), author, and one of the six members of director, building upon the experience he had acquired co- the British surreal comedy group Monty Python. He often played directing Monty Python and the Holy Grail* ** with Terry Jones. authority figures such as “the Colonel” on the Monty Python He also directed the animation and a special sequence in The television series and the lead role in two Python films, Monty Meaning of Life. He has classified his and 1990s films in Python and the Holy Grail* (1975) and Life of Brian* (1979). He terms of trilogies: the "Trilogy of Imagination,” composed of co-wrote an unsuccessful 1976 TV movie with the beloved * (1981), * ** (1985), which was nominated comedic novelist , . Chapman for an Oscar for Best Writing, and The Adventures of Baron died of tonsil cancer in 1989, the same year of Monty Python's Munchausen* **(1988). All are about the "craziness of our 20th anniversary, and his life and legacy were commemorated at awkwardly ordered society and the desire to escape it through a private memorial service at St Bartholomew's with the other whatever means possible" (Criterion). In the 1990s, Gilliam five Pythons. The five surviving Python members had decided to directed a trilogy of Americana: (1991), 12 stay away from Chapman's private funeral to prevent it from Monkeys (1995), and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas* (1998), becoming a media circus and to give his family some privacy. which was nominated for the Palme d’Or at Cannes. This trilogy They sent a wreath in the shape of the Python foot with the played on North American soil and, while still surreal, had less message: "To Graham from the other Pythons with all our love. fantastical plots than his previous trilogy (Imagine Magazine). In PS: Stop us if we're getting too silly.” These are some of the an interview conducted by the British-Indian novelist Salman other films, music video shorts, and television series he acted in: Rushdie, Gilliam identified with the term often associated with At Last the 1948 Show (TV Series) (1967), No, That's Me Over Rushdie and other authors of the Global South “magical Here! (TV Series) (1967), (TV Series) realism,” saying “It's about expanding how you see the world. I (1968), Presents (TV Series) (1969), The Magic think we live in an age where we're just hammered, hammered to Christian (1969), A Christmas Night with the Stars (TV Series) think this is what the world is. Television's saying, everything's (1969), Doctor in Trouble (1970), The Rise and Rise of Michael saying 'That's the world.' And it's not the world. The world is a Rimmer (1970), The Statue (1971), Euroshow 71 (TV Movie) million possible things” (The Believer). These are the other films (1971), And Now for Something Completely Different* (1971), he has directed: Storytime (Short) (1968), * Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus* (TV Series) (1972), Monty (Short) (1975), Jabberwocky* ** (1977), The Crimson Python's Flying Circus* (TV Series) (1969-1974), * Permanent Assurance (Short) (1983), The Brothers Grimm (1978), (TV Series), at (2005), Tideland* (2005), The Imaginarium of Doctor the * (Documentary) (1982), The Meaning of Parnassus* (2009), The Legend of Hallowdega (Short) (2010), Life* (1983), Permanent Assurance (Short) (1983), (Short) (2011), * (2013), * (1983), Still Crazy Like a Fox (TV Movie) (1987), and The Man Who Killed * ** (2018). These are : Can I Play with Madness (Video short) (1988), some of his other writing credits: Do Not Adjust Your Set (TV Jake's Journey* (TV Movie) (1988), and Stage Fright (1989). Series) (additional material - 4 episodes) (1968), And Now for *Also wrote Jones & Gilliam: MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE—3

writer (40 credits), director (8 credits), and producer (6 credits). Idle is a member of the British surreal comedy group Monty Python, a member of the rock band , and the author of the musical . Idle started at Cambridge only a year after future fellow-Pythons Graham Chapman and John Cleese. Idle starred in the children's series Do Not Adjust Your Set (1967-1969), co-starring his future Python partners Terry Jones and Michael Palin. While most Python members wrote material in teams, assuring more support when deciding what material to produce, Idle mostly wrote by himself. The second-youngest member of the Pythons, Idle was closest in spirit to the students and teenagers who made up much of Python's fanbase. Python sketches dealing most with contemporary interests like pop music, sexual permissiveness JOHN CLEESE (b. October 27, 1939 in Weston-Super-Mare, and recreational drugs are usually Idle's work, often , England, UK) is an English actor (164 credits), characterized by double entendre, sexual references, and other comedian, screenwriter (69 credits), and producer. He achieved "naughty" subject matter – most famously demonstrated in success at the Festival Fringe and as a scriptwriter and "." Idle composed many of the group's most performer on The Frost Report. In addition to being a founding famous musical numbers, most notably "Always Look on the member of Monty Python, he starred in two 6-episode series of Bright Side of Life," the closing number of Life of Brian (1979), (1975 and 1979), a series that was recently which has grown to become a Python signature song. He was selected by comedy experts for as the best British responsible for the " Song" from The Meaning of Life comedy series. He was nominated for an Oscar for the film he (1983). These are some of the films and television series he has also starred in (1988). These are other acted in: Alice in Wonderland (TV Movie) (1966), We Have films and television series he has acted in: At Last the 1948 Show Ways of Making You Laugh (TV Series) (1968), And Now for (TV Series) (1967), The Frost Report (TV Series) (1966-1967), Something Completely Different (1971), Monty Python's The Avengers (TV Series) (1968), The Magic Christian (1969), Fliegender Zirkus (TV Series) (1972), Monty Python's Flying And Now for Something Completely Different (1971), Monty Circus (TV Series) (1969-1974), Monty Python and the Holy Python's Fliegender Zirkus (TV Series) (1972), Monty Python's Grail (1975), Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl Flying Circus (TV Series) (1969-1973), Anyone for Sex? (1973), (Documentary) (1982), Yellowbeard (1983), The Adventures of Monty Python and the Holy Grail 1975), Life of Brian (1979), (1988), (1990), Um Passo, (TV Series) (1979), The Great Muppet Caper Outro Passo e Depois... (1991), Missing Pieces (1991), Monty (1981), Time Bandits (1981), Monty Python Live at the Python & the Quest for the Holy Grail (Video Game) (1996), Hollywood Bowl (Documentary) (1982), The Meaning of Life The Meaning of Life (Video Game) (1997), (1983), Yellowbeard (1983), Silverado (1985), Clockwise (1986), (TV Series) (1998), (1998), Rudolph the Red- The Big Picture (1989), An American Tail: Fievel Goes West Nosed Reindeer (1998), The Secret of NIMH 2: Timmy to the (1991), Mary Shelley's (1994), The Jungle Book Rescue (Video) (1998), Dudley Do-Right (1999), 102 (1994), Monty Python & the Quest for the Holy Grail (Video Dalmatians: Puppies to the Rescue (Video Game) (2000), 102 Game) (1996), (1997), George of the Jungle Dalmatians (2000), Pinocchio (2002), the Third (2007), (1997), The Meaning of Life (Video Game) (1997), Delgo (2008), Not the Messiah: He's a Very Naughty Boy (2010), (1998), The Out-of-Towners (1999), Python Night: 30 Years of Wolf Sheep (2010), Monty Python Live (Mostly) (Documentary) Monty Python (TV Movie documentary) (1999), The World Is (2014), Absolutely Anything (2015), and The Entire Universe Not Enough (1999), (Video Game) (TV Movie) (2016). (2000), 3rd Rock from the (TV Series) (1998-2001), and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001), Pinocchio (2002), Harry MICHAEL PALIN (b. May 5, 1943 in Ranmoor, , Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002), Charlie's Angels: Full Yorkshire, England, UK) is an English comedian, actor (70 Throttle (2003), (2004), Around the World in 80 Days credits), writer (61 credits) and television presenter. He is a (2004), Charlotte's Web (2006), (2007), Shrek member of the comedy group Monty Python. Since 1980 he has the Third (Video Game) (2007), Igor (2008), The Day the made a number of travel documentaries. Palin wrote most of his Stood Still (2008), 2 (2009), (2009), comedic material with Terry Jones. Before Monty Python, they (2010), Spud (2010), Change for the Oceans had worked on the Show, The Frost Report, and Do (Video short) (voice) (2010), The Big Year (2011), God Loves Not Adjust Your Set (1967-1969). Palin appeared in some of the Caviar (2012), A Liar's Autobiography: The Untrue Story of most famous Python sketches, including "", Monty Python's Graham Chapman (2012), Monty Python Live "Dead Parrot sketch", "The Lumberjack Song", "The Spanish (Mostly) (Documentary) (2014), Absolutely Anything (2015), ", "Bicycle Repair Man" and "The Fish-Slapping A.C.O.R.N.S.: Operation Crackdown (2015), Albion: The Dance." Palin continued to work with Jones after Python, co- Enchanted Stallion (2016), Trolls (2016), Charming (2018), and writing . He has also appeared in several films directed by fellow Python Terry Gilliam, such as Jabberwocky ERIC IDLE (b. March 29, 1943 in South Shields, Tyne and (1977), Time Bandits (1981), Brazil (1985), and Absolutely Wear, England, UK) is an English comedian, actor (83 credits), Anything (2015), and made notable appearances in other Python- Jones & Gilliam: MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE—4 adjacent films such as the John Cleese-written A Fish Called Daughter (1991), Milk (1999), Dough (2015), and Absolutely Wanda (1988), for which he won the BAFTA Award for Best Anything (2015). Actor in a Supporting Role. In a 2005 poll to find The ' Comedian, he was voted the 30th favorite by fellow comedians and comedy insiders. He has most recently appeared in the savage comic sendup of Soviet bureaucracy and one- upmanship in Armando Iannucci’s (2017) and a television adaptation of (2018). These are some other films, television series, and video games he has acted in: A Series of Bird's (TV Series) (1967), Frost on Sunday (TV Series) (1968), David Frost Presents (TV Series) (1969), Complete and Utter History of Britain (TV Series) (1969), And Now for Something Completely Different (1971), Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus (TV Series) (1972), Monty Python's Flying Circus (TV Series) (1969-1974), Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975), The Rutles: (TV Movie) (1978), Life of Brian (1979), Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl (Documentary) (1982), (1982), Michael Palin and Terry Jones: “How we made Monty The Meaning of Life (1983), (1984), Python’s The Meaning of Life” () American Friends (1991), (TV Movie) (1995), Mr. Toad's Wild Ride (1996), Monty Python & the Quest Michael Palin, actor for the Holy Grail (Video Game) (1996), Fierce Creatures Having done The Holy Grail and Life of Brian, we (1997), The Meaning of Life (Video Game) (1997), Python found ourselves with a much bigger budget for The Meaning of Night: 30 Years of Monty Python (TV Movie documentary) Life. This meant we could spend an entire week on things like (1999), The Last Day of WW1 (2008), Not the Messiah: He's a the sketch with [the monstrously fat diner]. The Very Naughty Boy (2010), (2011), The Secret sheer amount of minestrone used in the vomiting sequence was Policeman's Ball (TV Special) (2012), A Liar's Autobiography: only possible because we were with Universal. That part was The Untrue Story of Monty Python's Graham Chapman (2012), filmed at Seymour leisure centre in Paddington. On the morning Monty Python Live (Mostly) (Documentary) (2014), and after the final scene, in which Mr Creosote explodes and Remember Me (TV Mini-Series) (2014). thousands of gallons of vomit get hurled against the walls, the room was all cleaned up immaculately – and, within 12 hours, PETER HANNAN (b. February 1, 1941 in Sydney, Australia), two people were married in there. I wonder if they ever knew at a young age, was taken by the work of American photographer what had happened hours before. Richard Avedon. After graduating high school, he responded to The sketches drew on what we were feeling at the time. an advertisement to work at a TV station as a news cameraman. The Miracle of Birth came from Graham Chapman, who was At the interview, he was asked if he had a driver’s license and if actually a doctor, noticing that hospitals were changing, getting he could spell. Being dyslexic, he was able to answer positively lots and lots of machinery ("More apparatus please, nurse!"). to the former question, but he got the job. He moved from This gave surgeons more and more time to just chat as a patient working on the “hard news” to cinema newsreels for Cinesound, lay there, in our case a woman having a baby. But the most “a company with a great history in the Australian movie ghastly sketch and one I still find terribly funny was The Liver industry.” He then moved to another company and returned to Donor. Someone comes to a man's door to take his liver and he Cinesound, this time working on documentaries. His first says: "No, no, I'm not dead." And he's told: "Oooh, it doesn't say documentary was about sheep parasites and it won the Kodak that on the form." That harked back to Python's love of award. After moving to Europe, he eventually landed his first bureacracy: you know, people coming round from the council, 10 feature work as a camera operator for ’s 2001: A of them, with different bits of paper. Space Odyssey (1968). At twenty-nine he took on the role of The songs in the Python TV shows were always a little cinematographer (37 credits). His films include, Monty Python’s bit chirpy, done with our resident choir of about three people. So The Meaning of Life (1983), The Razor’s Edge (1984), it was just nice to be able to do things properly and record them Insignificance (1985), (1987) and TV movie The well. I think the soundtrack to The Meaning of Life is the best of Gathering Storm (2002). Asked about his most challenging film all the Python movies. as DP he replied, “They are all challenging. Once you think it is With Every Sperm Is Sacred, which we turned into a easy it is hard” (British Cinematographer). His other films lavish song and dance routine, we had to be careful with all the include: Tour to Istanbul (Documentary) (1972), Slade kids. Certain things had to be dubbed later. In the film, you hear in Flame (1975), The Moon Over the Alley (1976), The Haunting Terry [Jones] telling the children: "He has to put a little rubber of Julia (1977), The Stud (director of photography) (1978), thing on the end of his cock." What he actually said was: "A little Secret Orchards (TV Movie) (1979), Blade on the Feather (TV rubber thing on the end of his sock." The kids were either totally Movie) (1980), Sredni Vashtar (Short) (1981), A Dangerous mystified – or they understood perfectly what was really going Summer (1982), Brimstone & Treacle (1982), The Missionary on. (1982), Half Moon Street (1986), The Lonely Passion of Judith Also, although it looked as if it was happening in a Hearne (1987), A Handful of Dust (1988), Not Without My classroom full of pupils, the bit in Sex Education where John Jones & Gilliam: MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE—5

[Cleese] is "hard at work on the desk", had to be done without David Free: “ of Comedy” (Atlantic Monthly) any children present at all. Indeed, I'd have liked it to be filmed (A review of Luke Dempsey, ed., Monty Pythony’s Flying without any grownups present, too! But there we go – we were Circus: Complete and Annotated…All the Bits., 2013) contractually obliged to be in there. I found it hard to keep a straight face in the scene where In 1968, a group of young English comedians made a I was the back end of a tiger – which was OK, since you couldn't TV special called . Pitched for the U.S. see my face most of the time. Terry [Gilliam] had to play this market, the show was meant to get Americans excited about a extraordinary character: a black African in a skin that peeled off new wave of British comedy. It failed in that aim, but one of its to reveal a white man underneath. Poor Terry: it was a hot day sketches retains high interest for the archaeologist of humor. and he just couldn't get this skin off. All we could hear was a Written by a couple of Cambridge graduates named John Cleese little voice inside and Graham Chapman, saying: "Oh fuck, oh the sketch is set in the . I can't get outta workshop of a shady here." I thought there car salesman. A was something weird, disgruntled customer, wonderful and played by Chapman, psychologically returns his new car and profound about this – a registers a few white man who couldn't complaints: The gear get out of a black man's lever is loose. The skin. brakes don’t work. The writing Before the sketch is process was quite over, the vehicle’s cumbersome. An awful doors have fallen off. lot of material didn't get But the dodgy used. Holy Grail had a salesman—played by a structure, a loose one: promising comedian the search for the grail. named Michael Same with Life of Palin—has an answer Brian. With this, it wasn't so clear. In the end, we just said: for everything. “You must expect teething troubles in these new "Well, what the heck. We have got lots of good material, let's models,” he says. In real life, Palin had been sold a defective car give it the loosest structure, which will be the meaning of life." himself, and he had entertained Cleese with impersonations of Since we'd more money and weren't doing it for the his stonewalling dealer. The resulting sketch, which can be dug BBC, we were more daring. It's a darker film than the others. up on YouTube, took a few comic liberties with Palin’s real-life There were a lot of gasps, as we had expected. But some scenes, experiences—a few, but not enough. Like a lot of apprentice like Every Sperm and Creosote, are unforgettable. work, it’s too respectful of convention and literal truth to strike a distinctive note. Terry Jones, actor and director A year or so later, the BBC offered Cleese his own Douglas Adams phoned me up and said he'd just written series. He was interested, but he didn’t want to be the show’s a book called . I said: "Oh no! Our film is star. He preferred to surround himself with a team of Britain’s going to be called The Meaning of Life." That's why in the titles, cleverest young writer-performers. Chapman, Cleese’s writing there's a tombstone saying: "The Meaning of Liff." And then partner since their days in Cambridge’s club, was first some lightning turns the final F into an E. on board. Cleese also wanted to bring on Palin, but Palin had by It took me three hours to put the makeup on for Mr now acquired some teammates of his own, with whom he’d been Creosote. John was bursting with laughter when he was doing the working on a children’s program called Do Not Adjust Your Set. "waffa-thin mint" line. He just couldn't keep a straight face. The Cleese, who admired the show, was so keen to get Palin that he vomit was compressed soup, actually. We had canisters of it with recruited three of his collaborators too. One was an enthusiastic lumps in – and a catapult to fling it. Everybody wanted some Welshman named Terry Jones, whom Palin had teamed up with chucked at them. Although it became a food fight, we could only at Oxford. The second was Eric Idle, another Cambridge alum. throw it at those extras who had not-so-decent costumes on. The third was a louche-looking American named Terry Gilliam, We filmed Holy Grail in Scotland and Life of Brian in who’d come to London to work as a cartoonist and an illustrator, , and we were all on set every day. But The Meaning of and had vague aspirations to direct movies. Life was more disparate: only the people who were acting that So the new troupe would consist of six men, broken into day would come in. So we didn't have the combined opinion of three writing units—Cleese-Chapman, Palin-Jones, and Idle, who everybody. I missed that: the full burden of responsibility fell on worked by himself and specialized in songs and monologues—as me. well as Gilliam, who would be left alone to do his animations. The film was banned in Ireland, just like Life of Brian Their show would have an initial run of 13 half-hour episodes; had been. And another film I made, Personal Services, was but what was it going to be called? The team flirted with a long banned there, too. They've loosened up a bit now, you know. list of options—Will Strangler’s Flying Circus, E. L. Moist’s

Jones & Gilliam: MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE—6

Flying Circus—before they hit on a name that stuck: Monty Spamalot. But the five surviving Pythons live in different parts of Python’s Flying Circus. the world now, and the prospect that they will ever work together Working up material for the project, Cleese and again is small. Chapman took another pass at the car-salesman idea. It had Considering their tremendous influence, the Pythons possibilities, Cleese felt, that they had failed to exploit. What if had a surprisingly brief productive career. What set them apart— they shifted the action to a pet shop? What if the malfunctioning what made them the Beatles of comedy—was the uncanny car became a dead animal? A dog, say. Or a parrot. wattage of their collective energy. Their ratio of classic stuff to The dead-parrot sketch debuted on episode eight of dud stuff was freakishly high. Between 1969 and 1973, the Monty Python’s Flying Circus, which aired in Britain on original team made three TV seasons of 13 episodes each. At the December 7, 1969. The end of the third season, Cleese sketch epitomized everything withdrew from the show: he that was striking about the believed the good ideas were new show: its impatience running out. The others went on with the old formal rules, its without him for one more season, ability to take good ideas and consisting of only six episodes. compress them into The patchiness of those final diamonds. The car-salesman shows vindicated Cleese’s decision sketch had been about the to bail out. Either the Pythons had absurdity of bad service, but exhausted TV or it had exhausted it had attacked that absurdity them. Quitting the medium for in a naturalistic way: it good, the remainder of the troupe started with a plausible reunited with Cleese and started situation, and gradually made work on their first original film it sillier. The parrot sketch script. inverts that approach. It is The Pythons had appeared in absurd from the start, but its one film already—a reshoot of absurdity represents a some of their earliest sketches compact, dreamlike way of telling the truth. This time the role of called And Now for Something Completely Different (1971). That the aggrieved customer is taken by Cleese—who plays him not movie, over which the Pythons enjoyed little creative control, as a straight man but as a Brylcreemed, raincoated weirdo. In the had been designed to break them into America, but it had proved world of Monty Python, even a guy with a valid beef is a lunatic. a flop. It wasn’t until 1974, when the first season of Flying As for Palin’s salesman, this time his denials of the undeniable Circus started airing on PBS, that Python’s American reputation have an existential audacity: he is ready to claim, and keep began to catch fire. The PBS sale was fortunate for Python in claiming, that the palpably dead parrot is just resting. Cleese, more ways than one: when the offer came in, the BBC was on the indignantly brandishing the bird’s corpse, is the victim of the point of the tapes for reuse. ultimate—the archetypal—rip-off; but he remains an In 1975, Python released its first proper film, the ragged Englishman. Nutty as he is, he declines to vault over the desk and but inspired Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Then came Life of punch Palin’s lights out. Language is the only weapon available Brian (1979)—the masterpiece, provocatively set in Judea at the to him. So his tamped-down rage becomes a torrent of time of Christ…. increasingly baroque synonyms for death, which Cleese and The 45 tv episodes remain the spine of Monty Python’s Chapman composed with the aid of a thesaurus. achievement. Going back through the scripts, you can see why When that outburst of manic poetry is over, the Pythons the troupe wasn’t destined to last for long. Its format was a don’t bother forcing the parrot sketch toward a well-made ravenous guzzler-up of good material. In no other comedy series conclusion. The quest for punch lines bored them. Instead the in TV history have so many brilliant ideas been packed into so sketch collapses into a series of bizarre digressions, and finally small a space. Consider Python’s semaphore version of Cleese’s character turns to the camera and declares that the Wuthering Heights. It wasn’t just that the Pythons had the wit to situation has become “too silly.” And that’s that: we move on to dream up the idea. They also, crucially, had the comic sense not the next item. I concede that there are people who don’t find the to attenuate it by stretching it over the rack of a four-minute parrot sketch funny at all. I know a couple of them personally. sketch. They took two minutes to harvest its richest They are unmoved by the sight of John Cleese in his raincoat, possibilities—Heathcliff and Catherine wave flags at each other wielding that stuffed parrot and saying, “It’s bleeding demised.” I across a moor, with explanatory subtitles; Catherine’s husband know them, but I can’t help them. confronts her, flagging irately; a baby cries by sticking two tiny …The Pythons have done no new comedy as a team flags out of its cradle—and then they moved on. They could since 1983, when they released the movie The Meaning of Life. afford to, because they had other ideas just as good around the The prospect of a full reunion was nixed conclusively in 1989, corner. When a sketch about striking miners starts to conk out, when Graham Chapman died of cancer. Since then, the surviving we cut to a news desk, at which Palin delivers some urgent members have reconvened for the odd group interview. They bulletins. “And finally, in the Disgusting-Objects International at have murmured, unconvincingly, about the possibility of future tonight, England beat by a plate of braised pus to collaborations. Individual Pythons have done spin-off projects— a putrid heron.” A less inspired bunch of writers would have notably Eric Idle, who had a Broadway hit with the musical spun that notion out into a full sketch, if not an entire half hour. Jones & Gilliam: MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE—7

For Python, the idea lasts precisely as long as it takes Palin to say common tactic in medieval sieges. So, apparently, was it. catapulting dead animals. Thus the completed film features When Monty Python came on the scene, the average Cleese’s imperishable turn as the French taunter, whose strange comedy show was like a stage with a few cameras pointed shouts of abuse from the battlements (“Your mother was a at it. The Pythons took liberties with the medium, the way their hamster and your father smelt of elderberries”) are followed by admired Goons had taken liberties with radio. They did things the flinging of the dead cow. you could do only on TV. If they felt like it, they rolled the During the Python era, writers like were credits in the middle of the doing similar comedy in show. Posing as BBC voice- America: popular, slapstick over men, they issued stuff that unself-consciously apologies for the contents of combed history and high their own sketches. When culture for inspiration. What a their ideas didn’t fit together, falling-off there has been since Gilliam supplied a minute or then. Most of today’s popular two of animation to link comedy looks willfully them. The nightmare logic of malnourished by comparison. his sequences—in which It’s poor form, these days, to cartoon figures were know more than your audience. constantly getting their limbs A modern comedian’s idea of or heads lopped off—echoed an obscure reference is to the violent unpredictability mention Mr. Miyagi, or the of the sketches. cantina scene in Star Wars. These allusions must be okay, The Pythons were masters of juxtaposition: their because every other comedian makes them too. Not even Tina signature move was to thrust something very salient into the Fey can escape the pop-culture echo chamber. Her book, wrong context. Dressed as garish figures from history or high Bossypants, is full of arcane but reassuringly junky cultural culture, they would bizarrely insert themselves into the drab, references—to Jon from CHiPs, to the guy from Arli$$. But rainy reality of England. The bursts when Fey risks a lone literary allusion, she feels bound to qualify into a series of middle-class living rooms. Picasso paints a it with a clanging footnote: “If you get this reference to David picture while bicycling down the A29. In an art gallery, the Foster Wallace’s 1997 collection of essays, consider yourself a figures in all the paintings walk off their respective canvasses to member of the cultural elite. Why do you hate your country and go out on strike. (The first volume of Michael Palin’s highly flag so much?!” readable Diaries, published in 2006, reminds you that the Britain The Pythons were luckier than , of course. The of Python’s era was a dysfunctional place, bedeviled by strikes air back then wasn’t thick with culture-war grievance. People and power outages.) were less uptight. They must have been: How else did the troupe The Pythons worked similar tricks of juxtaposition with possibly get away with some of the stuff in these scripts? These words: their most quotable sentences tend to feature some pages make ample mention of dagos, wops, fairies, ponces. sudden, jarring contrast between high language and low. “It’s Large-breasted women turn up in low-cut dresses, and are lunged probably pining for the fjords,” says Palin in the parrot sketch, at. One character’s name is Mrs. Nigger-Baiter. A looking to explain the Norwegian Blue’s painfully apparent rigor townswomen’s guild re-creates the battle of Pearl Harbor, having mortis. Like Cardinal Ximinez leaping into someone’s living previously staged an “extremely popular reenactment of Nazi room, the exotic word gate-crashes the unsuspecting sentence. war atrocities.” Graham Chapman, playing a character who “He’s not the messiah, he’s a very naughty boy,” says Brian’s believes himself to be Jewish, puts on an enormous polystyrene mother in Life of Brian. When people call something nose. Various Pythons appear in blackface. Chapman appears in , this is the sort of effect they mean. The Pythons the character of “a Chinaman.” kept dragging exalted themes into a context of English Fortunately, Luke Dempsey, in his capacity as the ordinariness, thereby revealing the absurdity of both. book’s editor, is on hand to chide the Pythons for these failures “Only those who are capable of silliness,” wrote to anticipate and heed our current mores. When Chapman’s Christopher Isherwood, “can be called truly intelligent.” Palin Chinaman starts delivering his lines, Dempsey steps in to quotes this maxim in his Diaries, with approval. Python’s observe, “Our modern, even postmodern, ears might find this silliness was extreme, all right, but it was balanced by the men’s stock Chinese accent tough to enjoy.” And when a script calls for wit and education. They did physical gags that could amuse a an art critic, played by Palin, to strangle his wife, we get another preverbal child, but they also employed language so vivid that wringing of the editorial hands: “This casual violent misogyny intellectuals quote it as if it were poetry. When Christopher strikes the modern viewer as horribly crass.” Hitchens spoke at the a couple years before Well, it’s good to know that our editor disapproves of his death, the audience demanded an encore. Hitchens obliged by spousal homicide. In troubling to let us know that he does, reciting the whole of Python’s drunken-philosophers song from Dempsey risks coming across as humorless; but these days even memory (“ of his own free will / On half a pint an annotator of Monty Python would sooner seem humorless of shandy was particularly ill …”).The Pythons knew their stuff; than culturally insensitive. At times, Dempsey sounds like a when they didn’t, they read up on it. Researching the Middle Victorian editor of Shakespeare, scolding the Bard for making Ages for Holy Grail, they learned that taunting the enemy was a Hamlet say bawdy Elizabethan things. He takes it for granted Jones & Gilliam: MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE—8 that our values are more enlightened than the Pythons’ were; he comedy ever conceived. If Cleese had left the show after the is confident that we’ve come a long way since then. But how far second season instead of the third, as he once threatened to do, have we come, really, if we now require footnotes to assure each the undertaker sketch might have been the last thing the entire other that we don’t approve of husbands strangling wives? Have troupe ever performed. It would have been a fittingly weird swan we really become so scared of one another? song. To watch the sketch for the first time is a strange, slightly No doubt we are shameful experience. The more enlightened than the laughter is ripped from Pythons were, in some ways. somewhere deep in you, But we’ve lost something, entirely against your will. too—a general laid-backness The sketch is set in a and goodwill. It’s hard to mortuary. Behind the desk rewatch Python’s old shows stands an elaborately dressed without feeling a nostalgic undertaker, played by pang for a time when the world Chapman. Cleese enters as a had a better sense of humor. solemn young man whose Those guys didn’t need to mother has just died. insert disclaimers to indicate Chapman, in a depraved that they were, when they cockney accent, embarks on a pretended to strangle women, graphic description of the only joking. They trusted their pros and cons of the services audience to see that. Yes, they were looser with their language available to him—mainly the cons. (“If we bury her, she gets than we are. But they were loose with it in the same innocent eaten up by lots of weevils and nasty maggots, which, as I said 1970s way that they were loose with everything: their unfettered before, is a bit of a shock if she’s not quite dead.”) Cleese’s hair, their indiscriminate ridicule, their pale unbuffed bodies, character looks appalled, but he has no right to be—it turns out which they exhibited for the camera at the smallest opportunity. that he’s brought his mother’s corpse along with him in a burlap They freely used words like poof; one member of the team, sack. Chapman peers inside it, and proposes that they eat the Graham Chapman, was openly gay. Neither of these things body. Cleese admits to feeling “a bit peckish,” but wonders seemed to strike their public as a big deal. whether eating his dead mother is really a good idea. And It’s a pity that the word irreverent has lost its weight, so Chapman says: “Look, tell you what. We’ll eat her. If you feel a that it’s come to seem a mere synonym for cheeky. The Pythons bit guilty about it afterwards, we can dig a grave and you can were irreverent in the deepest sense. They had automatic respect throw up in it.” Python tended to avoid punch lines, but that was for nothing. Everything was fit matter for comedy: religion, one for the ages. national differences, cannibalism, Hitler, torture, death, The BBC didn’t like the undertaker sketch, but it let crucifixion. They created a parallel world in which nothing was Python proceed with it—on the condition that the studio serious. They were like boys: they not only weren’t afraid; they audience could be heard and seen registering its disapproval. didn’t know they should be afraid. There were boos as the sketch got nastier. When Chapman Today’s comedians can’t go back to that prelapsarian delivered that magnificently rancid punch line, the audience got world. They can query or violate our current taboos, but they up and invaded the set. This was an unusually thoughtful stroke can’t unknow them. There has been plenty of excellent comedy of censorship: The undertaker sketch was a deliberate assault on since Python’s work, but most of it has been the comedy of a universal taboo. It was therefore appropriate that the audience social anxiety: comedy that walks the tightrope between what we members were seen looking offended—if they hadn’t been can and cannot say. The writers of Seinfeld, the smartest TV offended, there would have been something wrong with them. A show of the post-Python era, knew that propitiations had to be lot of them were laughing, too: proof that being offended isn’t made. When Elaine dated a man whose ethnicity was the end of the world, and might even be a healthy thing. ambiguous—she didn’t know whether he was black or white— When the Pythons switched from TV to the movies, she found the question so ticklish that she sought George’s and they were relatively free to use profane language—if they wanted Jerry’s advice. “Should we be talking about this?” George asked. to. They rarely did: they remained more interested in the “I really don’t think we’re supposed to be talking about this.” subversive possibilities of the profane thought. In Life of Brian, The Pythons felt no such social dread: they talked about there is a scene in which Brian, played by Chapman, raises the whatever they wanted to talk about. There were, of course, ire of a Judean revolutionary, played by Cleese. In the original certain words they couldn’t use while doing so. By today’s cut of the film, Cleese’s character indicated his displeasure by standards, some of the verbal restrictions placed on Flying Circus yelling “You cunt!” In the final cut, the line was dubbed over as seem laughably draconian. All but the mildest of four-letter “You klutz!” Python made the change for artistic reasons, not to words were disallowed. The BBC wouldn’t let them say appease a censor. The profanity was cheaply startling, and the masturbating; when ABC ran a clip show in 1975, the network film had more-expensive shocks to administer than that. (Marlon bleeped out the phrase naughty bits. Brando is said to have cited a similar principle when, during the But beyond these constraints on verbal smut, Python shooting of Last Tango in Paris, he refused to be filmed naked. was miraculously free to inflict deeper offense. Its undertaker The audience, he told Bertolucci, would look at his dick instead sketch, which aired as the closing number of Circus’s second of his face.) season, still ranks as one of the most outrageous pieces of Jones & Gilliam: MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE—9

Brian stands as Python’s detract from the overall quality of the masterpiece because of the sketch. They decided that they would assurance with which it juggles the simply not bother to 'cap' their silly, the smart, and the sacred. To sketches in the traditional manner, and set a comedy during the time of early episodes of the Flying Circus Christ was a daring venture even series make great play of this in 1979. Today, such a project abandonment of the punchline (one would surely flame out on the scene has Cleese turn to Idle, as the launchpad. Not that Python set out sketch descends into chaos, and to mock Jesus, who makes only remark that "This is the silliest sketch two fleeting appearances in the I've ever been in" - they all resolve film. Instead it created Brian, whose life has certain parallels to not to carry on and simply walk off the set). However, as they Christ’s (he is born on the same night; he is taken for a prophet) began assembling material for the show, the Pythons watched but who is emphatically not the savior. The film was nevertheless one of their collective heroes, , recording his new deemed blasphemous, mainly by people who hadn’t seen it. series Q5 (1969). Not only was the programme more irreverent Those of us who have seen it know that the film has a and anarchic than any previous television comedy, Milligan respect for nuance that its detractors tend to lack. One refuses to would often "give up" on sketches halfway through and wander believe that Brian is more than 30 years old; it feels ageless, off set (often muttering "did I write this?"). It was clear that their eternally pertinent. The film’s closing scene remains one of the new series would now seem somewhat less original, and Jones in most sublime moments in film comedy. It shocks you by being particular became determined the Pythons should innovate funny and deeply moving at the same time. Brian hangs on his further. cross, bearded, shirtless, loinclothed, forsaken. The iconography After much debate, Jones remembered an animation is daringly authentic, and Chapman’s face carries a genuinely Gilliam had created for Do Not Adjust Your Set called "Beware affecting look of despair. For the Pythons, the degree of comic of the Elephants", which had intrigued him with its stream-of- difficulty became rather high here. How were they going to talk consciousness style. Jones felt it would be a good concept to their way out of this? apply to the series: allowing sketches to blend into one another. They didn’t. They sang their way out instead. “Always Palin had been equally fascinated by another of Gilliam's efforts, Look on the Bright Side of Life,” composed by Idle, rose entitled "Christmas Cards", and agreed that it represented "a way irresistibly to the occasion. When the corpses on the ground start of doing things differently." Since Cleese, Chapman and Idle tapping their toes to the tune, you can’t blame them. It’s were less concerned with the overall flow of the programme, it phenomenally catchy. But just as you start to feel that the movie was Jones, Palin and Gilliam who became largely responsible for has shifted away from seriousness, it dawns on you that what the the presentation style of the Flying Circus series, in which Pythons are really singing about up there is you: you, and the fact disparate sketches are linked to give each episode the appearance that you’re going to die too. “Always look on the bright side of of a single stream-of-consciousness (often using a Gilliam death / Just before you draw your terminal breath.” This is bold animation to move from the closing image of one sketch to the comedy: it gets right down into the roots of what we venerate and opening scene of another). fear. When comedy like this works, the payoff is huge. You feel Each day of writing started at 9am and finished at 5pm. lifted, part of an intelligent species. Typically, Cleese and Chapman worked as one pair of writers During the closing ceremony of the 2012 London isolated from the others, as did Jones and Palin, while Idle wrote Olympics, Idle turned up to sing the song live, flanked by a alone. After a few days of working in this configuration, they contingent of exhibitionist nuns wearing Union Jack underpants. would all join together with Gilliam, critique their scripts and It was a fitting and gutsy move to throw a touch of Python into a exchange ideas. Their approach to writing was democratic. If the ceremony designed to showcase Britain’s contributions to world majority found the idea to be humourous, it would be included in culture. Along with its language, England’s sense of humor is its the show. The casting of roles for the sketches was a similarly finest export, and Python is English humor’s apotheosis. “Life’s unselfish process, since each member viewed himself primarily a piece of shit / When you look at it.” True, but it’s hard to feel as a writer, rather than an actor desperate for screen time. When that way while watching Python. The troupe behaved as if the themes for sketches were finally chosen, Gilliam was free to nothing was sacred and everything was ridiculous. It is a deeply decide how to bridge them with animations, armed with his subversive attitude—and a deeply liberating one. camera, scissors, and airbrush. While the show was a collaborative process, different “The Python Style,” from “Monty Python” (Fandom) factions within Python were clearly responsible for different The Pythons had a very definite idea about what they elements of the team's humour. In general, the work of the wanted to do with the series. They were all great admirers of the Oxford-educated members was more visual, and more fanciful work of , , and Dudley conceptually (e.g. the arrival of the Spanish Inquisition in a Moore on , and had worked on Frost, which suburban front room), while the Cambridge graduates' sketches was similar in style. They also enjoyed Cook and Moore's sketch tended to be more verbal and more aggressive (for example, show Not Only... But Also. However, one problem the Pythons Cleese and Chapman's many "confrontation" sketches, where one perceived with these programmes was that though the body of character ends up intimidating or hurling abuse at another, or the sketch would be strong, the writers would often struggle to Idle's characters with bizarre verbal quirks, such as The Man then find a punchline funny enough to end on, and this would Who Speaks In ). Asked about this, Cleese has Jones & Gilliam: MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE—10 confirmed that "most of the sketches with heavy abuse were camera (breaking the fourth wall), or introducing a totally Graham's and mine, anything that started with a slow pan across unrelated event or character. A classic example of this approach countryside and impressive music was Mike and Terry's, and was the use of Chapman's "Brigadier" character, who walked into anything that got utterly involved with words and disappeared up several sketches and ordered them to be stopped because things any personal orifice was were becoming "far too silly." Eric's." Gilliam's animations, Another favourite way of ending meanwhile, ranged from the sketches was to drop a cartoonish whimsical to the savage (the "16-ton weight" prop on one of cartoon format allowing him the characters when the sketch to create some astonishingly seemed to be losing momentum, violent scenes without fear of before cutting to the next scene (a censorship). , who would wander on-set Several names for and hit characters over the head the show were bandied about with a rubber chicken, served a before the title Monty similar purpose)…. Python's Flying Circus was The use of Gilliam's surreal, settled upon. Some of the animations more memorable were Owl was another innovative Stretching Time, The Toad Elevating Moment, Vaseline Review intertextual element of the Python style. Many of the images and Bun, Wackett, Buzzard, Stubble and Boot. "Flying Circus" Gilliam used were lifted from famous works of art, and from stuck when the BBC explained to the group that it had already Victorian illustrations and engravings. The giant foot which printed that name in its schedules and was not prepared to amend crushes the show's title at the end of the opening credits is in fact it, leaving the Pythons no choice in the matter. Many variations the foot of Cupid, cut from a reproduction of the Renaissance then came and went. Gwen Dibley's Flying Circus was named masterpiece Venus, Cupid, Folly, and Time by Bronzino. This after a woman Palin had read about in the newspaper, thinking it foot, and Gilliam's style in general, have come to be considered would be amusing if she were to discover she had her own TV the visual trademarks of the series. show. 's Flying Circus (also Baron Von Took's Flying The Pythons built on and extended the great British Circus) was an affectionate the man who had brought tradition of cross-dressing comedy. Rather than dressing a man them together. Arthur Megapode's Flying Circus was suggested, as a woman purely for comic effect, the (entirely male) Python then discarded. Cleese then added "Python", liking the image of a team would write humourous parts for women, then don frocks slippery, sly individual that it conjured up. The specific origin of and makeup and play the roles themselves. Thus a scene "Monty" is somewhat confused (see above). requiring a housewife would feature one of the male Pythons Flying Circus pioneered some innovative formal wearing a housecoat and apron, speaking in falsetto. While this techniques, such as the cold open, in which an episode began accentuated the humour, it was not, in itself, the (had a without the traditional opening titles or announcements.[5] An woman played the role, the lines would have had the same comic example of this is the "It's" man: Palin in garb, effect). Generally speaking, female roles were only played by a making a tortuous journey across various terrains, before finally real woman (usually Carol Cleveland) when the scene approaching the camera to state, "It's...", only to be then cut off specifically required that the character be sexually attractive. In by the and the theme song. On several occasions some episodes and the later Monty Python's Life of Brian they the cold open would last until mid show, after which the regular took the idea one step further by playing women who opening titles would run. Occasionally the Pythons would impersonated men. attempt to trick viewers by rolling the closing credits halfway Many of the sketches have become extremely well- through the show, usually continuing the joke by fading to the known outside the hardcore of Python fans, and are still widely familiar "globe logo" used for BBC continuity, over which Idle quoted to this day. "The Dead Parrot", "The Lumberjack Song", would parody the clipped tones of a BBC announcer. On one "", "Nudge Nudge", "The Spanish Inquisition", "Upper occasion the credits ran directly after the opening titles. They Class Twit of the Year", "Cheese Shop" and "The Ministry of also experimented with ending segments by cutting abruptly to Silly Walks" are just a few examples. another scene or animation, walking offstage, addressing the

COMING UP IN THE SPRING 2019 BUFFALO FILM SEMINARS (SERIES 38) Apr 23 Stanley Kubrick Eyes Wide Shut 1999 Apr 30 Frederick Wiseman Monrovia, Indiana 2018 May 7 Alfonso Cuarón Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban 2004

CONTACTS:...email Diane Christian: [email protected]…email Bruce Jackson [email protected] the series schedule, annotations, links and updates: http://buffalofilmseminars.com...to subscribe to the weekly email informational notes, send an email to addto [email protected] cast and crew info on any film: http://imdb.com/ The Buffalo Film Seminars are presented by the State University of New at Buffalo and the Dipson Amherst Theatre, with suppport from the Robert and Patricia Colby Foundation and the Buffalo News.