This article is classified "Real"
Background
==========
In 1969 a team of writers merged to become the entity and persona known as
"Monty Python". Graham Chapman [1], John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle,
Terry Jones and Michael Palin had all worked for BBC (British Broadcasting
Corp.) before in various capacities. John Cleese had worked on a show
called "The Frost Report" and with Graham Chapman he co-wrote "At Last, the
1948 Show". Terry Jones, Michael Palin, Eric Idle and Terry Gilliam had
been working on a show called "Do Not Adjust Your Set". With the help of
the BBC's script editor and head of comedy the two groups merged and were
thrown straight into a series without a pilot for a run of 13 shows.
The show's title "Monty Python's Flying Circus" was derived from the BBC's
initial idea of "John Cleese's Flying Circus". John did not want the show
to revolve around him and as a result he suggested "Python" and Eric Idle
suggested "Monty".
The Shows
=========
In total there were four series of "Monty Python" containing 45 shows. By
the start of series 4 however John Cleese had left the group to work on his
own projects with his wife Connie Booth. The shows (for anyone who has
not seen them) were mainly a mix of zany madcap humour, satire and school
boy pranks and jokes. Memorable sketches include "Spam Sketch", "Nudge,
Nudge", "Upper Class Twit Of The Year" and the unforgettable "Parrot
Sketch". The main "theme" that the shows revolved around was that there
should be no beginning or end to the sketches but more of a stream of
consciousness instead. The Pythons inherited this idea from a show which
Spike Milligan did called "Q5" in which the same sort of idea was
expressed.
Writing The Shows
=================
The MP team soon had their own writing styles and groups. John Cleese
would write with Graham Chapman and often create surreal humour. Terry
Jones and Michael Palin (like John and Graham) kept their old writing
partnership and Eric Idle wrote on his own, normally a witty verbal
sketch. Terry Gilliam was not involved with writing the shows as such but
instead provided animations for the shows. According to John Cleese there
were a lot of "Artistic Fights" within the group over the show's content
and now and again furniture would be thrown and people would storm out of
the room. This was probably the main disadvantage with having five
writers all battling for the biggest ego.
The Films
=========
There were three films made by the Monty Python team and they proved to be
big successes on both sides of the Atlantic and at least one of the films
created a huge uproar of complaint.
The first film was called "Monty Python And The Holy Grail" and was a basic
parody of King Arthur and his knights of the round table. "The Holy
Grail" was an instant success on both sides of the Atlantic in 1975
despite the fact that the budget was limited.
The second film was called "Monty Python's Life Of Brian" and was about a
character that lived in the same period as Jesus Christ. It caused great
uproar in the church and was marked as being an attack at religion. The
film was banned in some southern states in America and for a time banned in
the UK from being shown on TV.
The final Monty Python film (although members of the group did make other
films together) was called "The Meaning of Life". The basic idea behind
this film was to follow the stages of life from birth to death in a series
of sketches rather than a continuous flowing film with the same characters.
Appearances from Simon Jones (who played Arthur Dent in the Hitch Hiker
series) were featured as well as more appearances by Terry Gilliam.
[1] Sadly Graham Chapman passed away on October 4th, 1989, the day before
the 20th anniversary of the first Python broadcast.