Complete AND
Annotated 1
Luke Episode Fourteen
**Python.Blad.final.indd 1
Dempsey
4/23/12 5:49 PM
DINS
DALE? F
RT U O E
E
D E
N
E
P IS
O
˙Featuring˘ ‘Face the Press’
New Cooker Sketch
Tobacconists (prostitute advert) The Ministry of Silly Walks
the piranha brothers
**Python.Blad.final.indd 2-3
2
3
Monty Python’s Flying Circus
Episode Fourteen
4/23/12 5:50 PM
DINS
DALE? F
RT U O E
E
D E
N
E
P IS
O
˙Featuring˘ ‘Face the Press’
New Cooker Sketch
Tobacconists (prostitute advert) The Ministry of Silly Walks
the piranha brothers
**Python.Blad.final.indd 2-3
2
3
Monty Python’s Flying Circus
Episode Fourteen
4/23/12 5:50 PM
A man in evening dress, sitting in a cage at the zoo.
man (john) And now for something completely different. Pan to show ‘It’s’ man in next cage.
it’s man (michael)
IT’S . . .
Animated titles.
1
Bond Street is a shopping street in London’s West End known for its highfalutin fashion stores. “Maxwell” is a fake store name.
Cut to studio: interviewer in chair. Superimposed caption: ‘FACE THE PRESS’
interviewer (eric) Hello. Tonight on ‘Face the Press’ we’re going to examine two different views of contemporary things. On my left is the Minister for Home Affairs (cut to minister completely in drag and a moustache) who is wearing a striking organza dress in pink tulle, with matching pearls and a diamante collar necklace. (soft fashion-parade music starts to play in background) The shoes are in brushed pigskin with gold clasps, by Maxwell of Bond Street 1 The hair is by Roger, and the whole ensemble is crowned by a spectacular display of Christmas orchids. And on my right—putting the case against the Government—is a small patch of brown liquid…(cut to patch of liquid on seat of chair) which could be creosote or some extract used in industrial varnishing. (cut back to interviewer) Good evening. Minister, may I put the first question to you? In your plan, ‘A Better Britain For Us’, you claimed that you would build 88,000 million, billion houses a year in the Greater London area alone. In fact, you’ve built only three in the last fifteen years. Are you a bit disappointed with this result? minister (graham) No, no. I’d like to answer this question if I may in two ways. Firstly in my normal voice and then in a kind of silly high-pitched whine…You see housing is a problem really… Cut back to the interviewer. The minister is heard droning on in the background. The soft fashionparade music starts again.
2
More fashion fakery.
minister Don’t I say any more? interviewer No fear! 3 Today saw the appointment of a new head of Allied Bomber Command— Air Chief Marshal Sir Vincent ‘Kill the Japs’ Forster. He’s in our Birmingham studio…
3
British slang for "too right!”
Cut to close-up on what appears to be a monitor with Sir Vincent on it—in outrageous drag, heavy lipstick, big bust etc.—Draped on a chaise-longue. A small black boy is fanning him.
sir vincent (john) Hello Sailors! Listen, guess what. The Minister of Aviation has made me head of the RAF Ola Pola. As he talks we zoom out quickly from the set to reveal it is not a monitor in the studio but a TV set in a G-plan type sitting room. A housewife (Mrs Pinnet) sits watching, wearing an apron and a scarf, and with her hair in curlers. The doorbell sounds. She switches the TV off and answers the door which opens straight into the living room. There in the street stands a truly amazing figure of fun. A man in a bowler hat with an axe sticking out of it, big red joke nose, illuminated bow tie that revolves, joke broad shoulders, clown’s check jacket, long johns with sock suspenders, heavy army boots and leading a goat with a hat. 4 Close-up.
4
This is a close description of the amazing getup, though he’s actually wearing a pinstripe jacket with large red-and-white-striped lapels and cuffs; blue shorts; we can’t see his feet; and his tie is flashing, not revolving. Otherwise, dead-on.
interviewer Well, while the minister is answering this question I’d just like to point out the minister’s dress has been made entirely by hand from over three hundred pieces of Arabian shot silk (at this point we can hear the minister’s high-pitched whine beneath the fashion music) especially created for the minister by Vargar’s of Paris. 2 The low slim-line has been cut off-the-shoulder to heighten the effect of the minister’s fine bone structure. Well I think the minister is coming to the end of his answer now so let’s go back over and join the discussion. Thank you very much minister. Today saw the appointment of a new head of… 4 Monty Python’s Flying Circus
**Python.Blad.final.indd 4-5
4/23/12 5:50 PM
A man in evening dress, sitting in a cage at the zoo.
man (john) And now for something completely different. Pan to show ‘It’s’ man in next cage.
it’s man (michael)
IT’S . . .
Animated titles.
1
Bond Street is a shopping street in London’s West End known for its highfalutin fashion stores. “Maxwell” is a fake store name.
Cut to studio: interviewer in chair. Superimposed caption: ‘FACE THE PRESS’
interviewer (eric) Hello. Tonight on ‘Face the Press’ we’re going to examine two different views of contemporary things. On my left is the Minister for Home Affairs (cut to minister completely in drag and a moustache) who is wearing a striking organza dress in pink tulle, with matching pearls and a diamante collar necklace. (soft fashion-parade music starts to play in background) The shoes are in brushed pigskin with gold clasps, by Maxwell of Bond Street 1 The hair is by Roger, and the whole ensemble is crowned by a spectacular display of Christmas orchids. And on my right—putting the case against the Government—is a small patch of brown liquid…(cut to patch of liquid on seat of chair) which could be creosote or some extract used in industrial varnishing. (cut back to interviewer) Good evening. Minister, may I put the first question to you? In your plan, ‘A Better Britain For Us’, you claimed that you would build 88,000 million, billion houses a year in the Greater London area alone. In fact, you’ve built only three in the last fifteen years. Are you a bit disappointed with this result? minister (graham) No, no. I’d like to answer this question if I may in two ways. Firstly in my normal voice and then in a kind of silly high-pitched whine…You see housing is a problem really… Cut back to the interviewer. The minister is heard droning on in the background. The soft fashionparade music starts again.
2
More fashion fakery.
minister Don’t I say any more? interviewer No fear! 3 Today saw the appointment of a new head of Allied Bomber Command— Air Chief Marshal Sir Vincent ‘Kill the Japs’ Forster. He’s in our Birmingham studio…
3
British slang for "too right!”
Cut to close-up on what appears to be a monitor with Sir Vincent on it—in outrageous drag, heavy lipstick, big bust etc.—Draped on a chaise-longue. A small black boy is fanning him.
sir vincent (john) Hello Sailors! Listen, guess what. The Minister of Aviation has made me head of the RAF Ola Pola. As he talks we zoom out quickly from the set to reveal it is not a monitor in the studio but a TV set in a G-plan type sitting room. A housewife (Mrs Pinnet) sits watching, wearing an apron and a scarf, and with her hair in curlers. The doorbell sounds. She switches the TV off and answers the door which opens straight into the living room. There in the street stands a truly amazing figure of fun. A man in a bowler hat with an axe sticking out of it, big red joke nose, illuminated bow tie that revolves, joke broad shoulders, clown’s check jacket, long johns with sock suspenders, heavy army boots and leading a goat with a hat. 4 Close-up.
4
This is a close description of the amazing getup, though he’s actually wearing a pinstripe jacket with large red-and-white-striped lapels and cuffs; blue shorts; we can’t see his feet; and his tie is flashing, not revolving. Otherwise, dead-on.
interviewer Well, while the minister is answering this question I’d just like to point out the minister’s dress has been made entirely by hand from over three hundred pieces of Arabian shot silk (at this point we can hear the minister’s high-pitched whine beneath the fashion music) especially created for the minister by Vargar’s of Paris. 2 The low slim-line has been cut off-the-shoulder to heighten the effect of the minister’s fine bone structure. Well I think the minister is coming to the end of his answer now so let’s go back over and join the discussion. Thank you very much minister. Today saw the appointment of a new head of… 4 Monty Python’s Flying Circus
**Python.Blad.final.indd 4-5
4/23/12 5:50 PM
Line continues outside in street and goes into animation sequences which eventually bring us through to close-up on a small ad, which is one of many on the door of a small newsagent’s shop. A shabby man is running an evil eye down the adverts, puzzling, looking for something. He walks up to the counter. He has a reflex wink.
**Python.Blad.final.indd 6-7
4/23/12 5:50 PM
Line continues outside in street and goes into animation sequences which eventually bring us through to close-up on a small ad, which is one of many on the door of a small newsagent’s shop. A shabby man is running an evil eye down the adverts, puzzling, looking for something. He walks up to the counter. He has a reflex wink.
**Python.Blad.final.indd 6-7
4/23/12 5:50 PM
18
It was, and may well still be, difficult to acquire adult entertainment products in the U.K. (though the Internet has probably helped.) Sex shops tended to be in seedier parts of town, and there was great stigma in entering such a place, hence Idle’s desperate hope that pussies, chests, and drawers (as in underwear) could be procured in the relative safety of what looks like a regular store.
19
Here, as Idle turns back to Jones, Idle’s glasses fall off his face and he catches them in his left hand—a brilliant piece of fielding, and one that somehow fails to crack them both up.
20 Here,“Quid” is British slang for pounds, as in money.
21
And so we see for the first time Cleese’s extraordinary creation, the silly walk, now a classic Python sketch. His hitch and turn of his leg inside the store still baffles and delights, all these years later.
**Python.Blad.final.indd 8-9
The camera pans along line of gas men all turning to each other and muttering incomprehensible technicalities, the line stretches across to front door. 17 customer (eric) Good morning. shopkeeper (terry j) Good morning, sir. Can I help you? customer Help me? Yeah, I’ll say you can help me. shopkeeper Yes, sir?
22
city gent (john) ‘Times’ please. shopkeeper Oh yes sir, here you are. city gent Thank you. shopkeeper Cheers. The city gent leaves the shop, from which we see a line of gas men stretching back up the road to Mrs Pinnet’s house, and walks off in an indescribably silly manner. 22 Cut to him proceeding along Whitehall, and into a building labelled ‘Ministry of Silly Walks’. 23 Inside the building he passes three other men, each walking in their own eccentric way. 24 Cut to an office; a man is sitting waiting. The city gent enters eccentrically.
minister Good morning. I’m sorry to have kept you waiting, but I’m afraid my walk has become rather sillier recently, and so it takes me rather longer to get to work. 25 (sits at desk) Now then, what was it again? 26 man (michael) Well sir, I have a silly walk and I’d like to obtain a Government grant to help me develop it. minister I see. May I see your silly walk? man Yes, certainly, yes. He gets up and does a few steps, lifting the bottom part of his left leg sharply at every alternate pace. He stops.
customer I come about your advert—‘Small white pussy cat for sale. Excellent condition’. 18 shopkeeper Ah. You wish to buy it? customer That’s right. Just for the hour. Only I aint gonna pay more’n a fiver cos it aint worth it. shopkeeper Well it’s come from a very good home—it’s house trained. customer (long think, goes to door, looks at ads again) Chest of drawers? Chest. Drawers. I’d like some chest of drawers please. shopkeeper Yes, sir. customer Does it go? shopkeeper Er, it’s over there in the corner. (indicates a wooden chest of drawers) 19 customer Oh. (goes to door, runs his finger down the list of adverts) Pram for sale. Any offers. I’d like a bit of pram please. shopkeeper Ah yes, sir. That’s in good condition. customer Oh good, I like them in good condition, eh? Eh? shopkeeper Yes, here it is you see. (picks up pram) customer (looks, pauses, goes back to the door, runs finger again) Babysitter. No, it’s a babysitter. Babysitter? shopkeeper Babysitter. customer Babysitter—I don’t want a babysitter. Be a blood donor—that’s it. I’d like to give some blood please, argh! (shopkeeper shakes head) Oh spit. Which one is it? (shopkeeper slips him a card from out of his pocket) Blond prostitute will indulge in any sexual activity for four quid a week. 20 What does that mean? A city gent comes into shop. He has a silly walk and keeps doing little jumps and then three long paces without moving the top of his body. He buys a paper, then we follow him as he leaves shop. 21
minister That’s it, is it? man Yes, that’s it, yes. minister It’s not particularly silly, is it? I mean, the right leg isn’t silly at all and the left leg merely does a forward aerial half turn every alternate step. man Yes, but I think that with Government backing I could make it very silly. minister (rising) Mr Pudey, (he walks about behind the desk in a very silly fashion) the very real problem is one of money. I’m afraid that the Ministry of Silly Walks is no longer getting the kind of support it needs. 27 You see there’s Defence, Social Security, Health, Housing, Education, Silly Walks…they’re all supposed to get the same. But last year, the Government spent less on the Ministry of Silly Walks than it did on National Defence! Now we get £348,000,000 a year, which is supposed to be spent on all our available products. (he sits down) Coffee? man Yes please. minister (pressing intercom) Now Mrs Two-Lumps, would you bring us in two coffees please? intercom voice Yes, Mr Teabag. minister …Out of her mind. Now the Japanese have a man who can bend his leg back over his head and back again with every single step. While the Israelis…here’s the coffee. Enter secretary with tray with two cups on it. She has a particularly jerky silly walk which means that by the time she reaches the minister there is no coffee left in the cups. The min-
8
9
Monty Python’s Flying Circus
Episode Fourteen
One of the most iconic moments in all of Python: Cleese silly walks past the line of gas men stretching up a British street—a moment of great surrealist comedy.
23
Whitehall is the street on which the British government buildings are found. Wonderful, again, to watch folks in the street watch this mad man walk by in a bowler hat.
24
It’s notable that only Cleese has the comic control to make his walk truly legendary —Jones, especially, merely jerks around a lot.
25 26
The end of this line is lost in the laughter of the audience.
A typical Python moment: a lovely non sequitur suggesting we’ve missed something, or that everyone is quite mad.
27
Here, Cleese flattens his legs out almost sideways, and he has some long, long legs. The audience loses its mind, and we lose any sense of what he’s saying. It matters not.
4/23/12 5:50 PM
18
It was, and may well still be, difficult to acquire adult entertainment products in the U.K. (though the Internet has probably helped.) Sex shops tended to be in seedier parts of town, and there was great stigma in entering such a place, hence Idle’s desperate hope that pussies, chests, and drawers (as in underwear) could be procured in the relative safety of what looks like a regular store.
19
Here, as Idle turns back to Jones, Idle’s glasses fall off his face and he catches them in his left hand—a brilliant piece of fielding, and one that somehow fails to crack them both up.
20 Here,“Quid” is British slang for pounds, as in money.
21
And so we see for the first time Cleese’s extraordinary creation, the silly walk, now a classic Python sketch. His hitch and turn of his leg inside the store still baffles and delights, all these years later.
**Python.Blad.final.indd 8-9
The camera pans along line of gas men all turning to each other and muttering incomprehensible technicalities, the line stretches across to front door. 17 customer (eric) Good morning. shopkeeper (terry j) Good morning, sir. Can I help you? customer Help me? Yeah, I’ll say you can help me. shopkeeper Yes, sir?
22
city gent (john) ‘Times’ please. shopkeeper Oh yes sir, here you are. city gent Thank you. shopkeeper Cheers. The city gent leaves the shop, from which we see a line of gas men stretching back up the road to Mrs Pinnet’s house, and walks off in an indescribably silly manner. 22 Cut to him proceeding along Whitehall, and into a building labelled ‘Ministry of Silly Walks’. 23 Inside the building he passes three other men, each walking in their own eccentric way. 24 Cut to an office; a man is sitting waiting. The city gent enters eccentrically.
minister Good morning. I’m sorry to have kept you waiting, but I’m afraid my walk has become rather sillier recently, and so it takes me rather longer to get to work. 25 (sits at desk) Now then, what was it again? 26 man (michael) Well sir, I have a silly walk and I’d like to obtain a Government grant to help me develop it. minister I see. May I see your silly walk? man Yes, certainly, yes. He gets up and does a few steps, lifting the bottom part of his left leg sharply at every alternate pace. He stops.
customer I come about your advert—‘Small white pussy cat for sale. Excellent condition’. 18 shopkeeper Ah. You wish to buy it? customer That’s right. Just for the hour. Only I aint gonna pay more’n a fiver cos it aint worth it. shopkeeper Well it’s come from a very good home—it’s house trained. customer (long think, goes to door, looks at ads again) Chest of drawers? Chest. Drawers. I’d like some chest of drawers please. shopkeeper Yes, sir. customer Does it go? shopkeeper Er, it’s over there in the corner. (indicates a wooden chest of drawers) 19 customer Oh. (goes to door, runs his finger down the list of adverts) Pram for sale. Any offers. I’d like a bit of pram please. shopkeeper Ah yes, sir. That’s in good condition. customer Oh good, I like them in good condition, eh? Eh? shopkeeper Yes, here it is you see. (picks up pram) customer (looks, pauses, goes back to the door, runs finger again) Babysitter. No, it’s a babysitter. Babysitter? shopkeeper Babysitter. customer Babysitter—I don’t want a babysitter. Be a blood donor—that’s it. I’d like to give some blood please, argh! (shopkeeper shakes head) Oh spit. Which one is it? (shopkeeper slips him a card from out of his pocket) Blond prostitute will indulge in any sexual activity for four quid a week. 20 What does that mean? A city gent comes into shop. He has a silly walk and keeps doing little jumps and then three long paces without moving the top of his body. He buys a paper, then we follow him as he leaves shop. 21
minister That’s it, is it? man Yes, that’s it, yes. minister It’s not particularly silly, is it? I mean, the right leg isn’t silly at all and the left leg merely does a forward aerial half turn every alternate step. man Yes, but I think that with Government backing I could make it very silly. minister (rising) Mr Pudey, (he walks about behind the desk in a very silly fashion) the very real problem is one of money. I’m afraid that the Ministry of Silly Walks is no longer getting the kind of support it needs. 27 You see there’s Defence, Social Security, Health, Housing, Education, Silly Walks…they’re all supposed to get the same. But last year, the Government spent less on the Ministry of Silly Walks than it did on National Defence! Now we get £348,000,000 a year, which is supposed to be spent on all our available products. (he sits down) Coffee? man Yes please. minister (pressing intercom) Now Mrs Two-Lumps, would you bring us in two coffees please? intercom voice Yes, Mr Teabag. minister …Out of her mind. Now the Japanese have a man who can bend his leg back over his head and back again with every single step. While the Israelis…here’s the coffee. Enter secretary with tray with two cups on it. She has a particularly jerky silly walk which means that by the time she reaches the minister there is no coffee left in the cups. The min-
8
9
Monty Python’s Flying Circus
Episode Fourteen
One of the most iconic moments in all of Python: Cleese silly walks past the line of gas men stretching up a British street—a moment of great surrealist comedy.
23
Whitehall is the street on which the British government buildings are found. Wonderful, again, to watch folks in the street watch this mad man walk by in a bowler hat.
24
It’s notable that only Cleese has the comic control to make his walk truly legendary —Jones, especially, merely jerks around a lot.
25 26
The end of this line is lost in the laughter of the audience.
A typical Python moment: a lovely non sequitur suggesting we’ve missed something, or that everyone is quite mad.
27
Here, Cleese flattens his legs out almost sideways, and he has some long, long legs. The audience loses its mind, and we lose any sense of what he’s saying. It matters not.
4/23/12 5:50 PM
John Cleese e once had a wife named Alyce Faye, and she always called him Jack. Which is notable only because his real family name, before his father changed it in 1915, was Cheese—not Cleese. John Cleese (a.k.a. Jack Cheese) was born in England’s West Country—the seaside town of Westonsuper-Mare, to be precise—a couple of months before the start of World War II. His parents were older—his father was 46, and his mother 40—which he claims made him more reserved than other kids, more careful. He was also tall, well into six feet by his teens. Even now his website lists him as “writer, actor, and tall person.” At Cambridge University, Cleese studied law and joined its Footlights performance group, where he met Graham Chapman. So successful was his work that one of the shows, Cambridge Circus (previously A Clump of Plinths) transferred from Edinburgh Festival to London and then to Broadway. In America he met Terry Gilliam and Connie Booth, an actress he would later marry (and with whom he wrote Fawlty Towers). Back in the U.K., in the mid-sixties, and like the other Pythons, he wrote for David Frost; he also acted on Frost’s shows and gained a modicum of early TV fame (he was hard to miss, being so tall and so funny). Later he, with Chapman, would write episodes for a popular sitcom, Doctor in the House, and on the back of that success they were asked to do a series of their own. Needing more support than he got from the difficult Chapman, he hit up Palin and the rest. And the Python troupe came into being. On the Flying Circus he perfected his knack for characters who shouted a lot, and whose fuses were short. Writing with Chapman, his penchant for wordplay—what contributed to his “thesaurus” sketches—was matched by his physical brilliance, most notably in a sketch he later came to despise. A signal creation of Cleese’s, the Ministry of Silly Walks is one of the most memorable pieces of physical comedy ever filmed. One only has to watch Terry Jones’s or Michael Palin’s attempts to play along to see how mesmerizing and shimmering are Cleese’s silly walks. That said, he had to be convinced to do the third series of Python (he was worried they were repeating themselves), and by the fourth series he was gone altogether, a loss that spelled the end of the show after just six episodes. He was crucial to the Flying Circus, and the British comic public missed him too much. But he could do angry like no other comic actor, which put him in good standing for his post-Python career. Written with his then wife, Connie Booth, whose first appearance in Monty Python’s Flying Circus came as the trusting blonde in the “Lumberjack Song,” Fawlty Towers first aired in 1975 and was an instant classic of comedy TV. The show followed the farcical efforts of Basil Fawlty (played by Cleese) to run a hotel in Torquay, on the English south coast. Badgered by a harridan wife, Sybil (played by the great comic actor Prunella Scales), and featuring Booth as an innocent chambermaid and Andrew Sachs’s masterful portrayal of a bumbling Spanish waiter, the twelve episodes are pretty much perfect. In 2000, the British Film Institute voted Fawlty Towers the best television series of all time, and it’s hard to argue with that. Cleese followed up this success with a number of beloved movies. A Fish Called Wanda features Cleese and Palin working together again in a crime caper; and Clockwise, in which a man can’t get anywhere on time, proves Cleese had lost none of his comic genius. Since that time, however, he’s become most known for his corporate training videos through his company, Video Arts, founded in 1972 with Anthony Jay and other TV stalwarts. In them, he turns boring corporate saws into something one wouldn’t entirely hate to sit through. Even more recently he’s starred in the show Alimony Tour, the title of which speaks for itself. 10 Monty Python’s Flying Circus
**Python.blad.essay.final.indd 2-3
4/30/12 5:17 PM
John Cleese e once had a wife named Alyce Faye, and she always called him Jack. Which is notable only because his real family name, before his father changed it in 1915, was Cheese—not Cleese. John Cleese (a.k.a. Jack Cheese) was born in England’s West Country—the seaside town of Westonsuper-Mare, to be precise—a couple of months before the start of World War II. His parents were older—his father was 46, and his mother 40—which he claims made him more reserved than other kids, more careful. He was also tall, well into six feet by his teens. Even now his website lists him as “writer, actor, and tall person.” At Cambridge University, Cleese studied law and joined its Footlights performance group, where he met Graham Chapman. So successful was his work that one of the shows, Cambridge Circus (previously A Clump of Plinths) transferred from Edinburgh Festival to London and then to Broadway. In America he met Terry Gilliam and Connie Booth, an actress he would later marry (and with whom he wrote Fawlty Towers). Back in the U.K., in the mid-sixties, and like the other Pythons, he wrote for David Frost; he also acted on Frost’s shows and gained a modicum of early TV fame (he was hard to miss, being so tall and so funny). Later he, with Chapman, would write episodes for a popular sitcom, Doctor in the House, and on the back of that success they were asked to do a series of their own. Needing more support than he got from the difficult Chapman, he hit up Palin and the rest. And the Python troupe came into being. On the Flying Circus he perfected his knack for characters who shouted a lot, and whose fuses were short. Writing with Chapman, his penchant for wordplay—what contributed to his “thesaurus” sketches—was matched by his physical brilliance, most notably in a sketch he later came to despise. A signal creation of Cleese’s, the Ministry of Silly Walks is one of the most memorable pieces of physical comedy ever filmed. One only has to watch Terry Jones’s or Michael Palin’s attempts to play along to see how mesmerizing and shimmering are Cleese’s silly walks. That said, he had to be convinced to do the third series of Python (he was worried they were repeating themselves), and by the fourth series he was gone altogether, a loss that spelled the end of the show after just six episodes. He was crucial to the Flying Circus, and the British comic public missed him too much. But he could do angry like no other comic actor, which put him in good standing for his post-Python career. Written with his then wife, Connie Booth, whose first appearance in Monty Python’s Flying Circus came as the trusting blonde in the “Lumberjack Song,” Fawlty Towers first aired in 1975 and was an instant classic of comedy TV. The show followed the farcical efforts of Basil Fawlty (played by Cleese) to run a hotel in Torquay, on the English south coast. Badgered by a harridan wife, Sybil (played by the great comic actor Prunella Scales), and featuring Booth as an innocent chambermaid and Andrew Sachs’s masterful portrayal of a bumbling Spanish waiter, the twelve episodes are pretty much perfect. In 2000, the British Film Institute voted Fawlty Towers the best television series of all time, and it’s hard to argue with that. Cleese followed up this success with a number of beloved movies. A Fish Called Wanda features Cleese and Palin working together again in a crime caper; and Clockwise, in which a man can’t get anywhere on time, proves Cleese had lost none of his comic genius. Since that time, however, he’s become most known for his corporate training videos through his company, Video Arts, founded in 1972 with Anthony Jay and other TV stalwarts. In them, he turns boring corporate saws into something one wouldn’t entirely hate to sit through. Even more recently he’s starred in the show Alimony Tour, the title of which speaks for itself. 10 Monty Python’s Flying Circus
**Python.blad.essay.final.indd 2-3
4/30/12 5:17 PM
COMING IN NOVEMBER 2012 Includes every script of every episode plus thousands of annotations, photos, and Terry Gilliam’s iconic artwork. Monty Python’s Flying Circus’s influence on television and on comedy is towering—it has be compared to the Beatles influence on music. It is one of the most popular, enduring, oft-quoted, and inspiring shows of all time. Now the complete scripts for every one of the 45 episodes of The Flying Circus— every silly setup, every clever conceit, every snide insult, and every saucy aside from these classic sketches—is included in the forthcoming: Monty Python’s Flying Circus: Complete and Annotated…All the Bits. This massive book also includes more than 2,000 color photographs and illustrations, all the stage directions, and over 1,000 insightful and informative annotations. It’s all here…all the bits. Everything the most obsessive Python fan could every want. Read the annotated, illustrated text of the famous sketches including “The Ministry of Silly Walks,” “The Dead Parrot,” “Banter in a Cheese Shop,” “Spam,” “The Funniest Joke in the World,” “The Spanish Inquisition,” “The Argument Clinic,” “The Fish-Slapping Dance,” “The Lumberjack Song,” and all the rest. The extensive annotations cover the plethora of cultural, historical, and topical references touched upon in each sketch. Sidebars and commentary throughout include profiles of the principles—Graham Chapman, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin, Terry Gilliam, and John Cleese—and insider stories from on and off the set, including arguments, accidents, and practical jokes; set design and shooting locations; goofs and gaffes; and much more. Also included are hundreds of stills and artwork from the shows.
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of booklist.com, and the author
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Luke Dempsey is deputy editor of the memoir A Supremely Bad
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Idea. A native of England—and
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a massive Python fan—he cur-
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rently lives in Brooklyn, NY.
$60,000 marketing/publicity budget DESIGN BY EIGHT AND A HALF, NEW YORK
ISBN-13: 978-1-57912-913-2 No. 81913 9.5" x 8" Hardcover 800 pages 2000 color and black-and-white photographs and illustrations throughout $55.95 Can./£35.00 U.K./$59.99 Aus. $50.00 U.S.
National media campaign, including print, radio, and online media
www.blackdogandleventhal.com Published by Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers Distributed by Workman Publishing Group 10
Advanced Uncorrected Proof—Not For Sale Art courtesy of Python Productions For publicity contact Sally Feller: (212) 647-9336 x102; sally@blackdogandleventhal.com For sales contact Maureen Winter: (212) 647-9336 x115; Maureen@blackdogandleventhal.com
Monty Python’s Flying Circus
**Python.Blad.final.indd 10
4/23/12 5:50 PM