Welcome to the Deep Dive. If you're looking for
the shortcut to being the smartest person in
the room, you've come to the right place. Today
we are strapping on our... coconut halves and
engaging in a full scale exploration of the six
men who formed Monty Python. We're taking a deep
dive into the source materials detailing the
history, the anarchic style and the truly, well,
staggering cultural influence of this British
comedy troupe. It's a mission to unpack the unpackable,
really trying to define or categorize Python's
genius is exactly what they actively sought to
prevent. Yet their influence now is just, you
know, undeniable. It is. We are looking at how
Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric
Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin came together,
threw away the rules of television comedy and
essentially became what many have dubbed, and
the sources confirm this analogy, the Beatles
of comedy. That analogy is, I think, perfect
because we're not just talking about six funny
men. We're talking about a phenomenon that fundamentally
reshaped how we think about comedy structure.
Absolutely. They went from a niche, surreal BBC
program to a global cultural touchstone that
literally shaped the vocabulary of the Internet,
influenced major software engineers and even
financed British cinema classics. And to understand
this revolutionary outcome, we have to start
at the genesis, the crucial collisions that created
the circus. So we have six brilliant minds, but
they weren't exactly a unified group initially,
were they? The formative years show a clear geographic
and academic split based on where they went to
university. That's right. That famed Oxbridge
divide is key here. Comedy in post -war Britain
was, well, it was heavily dominated by the output
of these two institutions. Right. On the Oxford
University side, we had Terry Jones and Michael
Palin. They worked together in the Oxford Review,
which tended to favor slightly more whimsical,
visual, and sometimes historical forms of satire.
And on the other side, at Cambridge University,
you had the trio of Graham Chapman, John Cleese,
and Eric Idle. members of the famed Footlights
Club. The Footlights was and still is an absolute
crucible of comedic talent. At that time, it
was producing a kind of intellectual, highly
verbal, and often very political satire. And
not just them. The sources note that this group
also included people who would go on to be part
of the goodies. Yeah, exactly. People like Timbrook
Taylor and Bill Lottie, plus Jonathan Lynn, who
co -wrote the hugely successful political satire
Yes Minister. So you had two very different,
highly fertile environments feeding into what
would become the Python machine. And the person
who was the connective tissue to the New World,
the only non -British Python, Terry Gilliam.
He met one of the others in a really unexpected
location. Precisely. The critical initial meeting
between John Cleese and Terry Gilliam happened
not in a damp BBC office, but in New York City.
Wow. Cleese was touring America with the Cambridge
University Footlights Review, which was called
Cambridge Circus. Gilliam, who was this American
animator and cartoonist, was in the audience.
They met, they talked, and, well, the seed was
planted for the visual collaboration that would
define Python. But before Python, the sources
all point to a critical staging post that united
the British members. A pivotal satirical show
on the BBC. The Frost Report. The Frost Report,
yeah. Running from 1966 to 1967. Why was this
show so essential? It's crucial because it was
the first time the majority of the team were
in the same room, working together professionally
under... you know, immense pressure. Cleese was
a cast member and writer. Idol, Chapman, Palin,
and Jones were all writers on the program. So
it forced them to interact, to collaborate, and
to test their writing styles against each other.
It did. And it was a very traditional sketch
show, but it was highly political and focused
on class satire, something deeply prevalent in
British culture at the time. Cleese often pointed
out that the show helped them understand the
structure of comedy they wanted to eventually
destroy, didn't he? That's the key. In the Frost
Report, every sketch had a clear beginning, middle,
and a punchline. It taught them the rules of
establishment comedy. So they learned the language
of the enemy before launching their attack. Exactly.
They saw the limitations of that predictable
format. But they didn't jump directly from Frost
to Python. We see the group splitting into those
two main factions for these... midpoint collaborations.
Right. So Chapman and Cleese were working on
the highly formal but absurd at last the 1948
show. And then you had the other faction, the
three who would later drive the more visual and
surreal side of Python, Idle, Jones and Palin.
They worked together on a children's program
called Do Not Adjust Your Set. And Gilliam provided
animation for that show. Which was so important
because being a children's show. It allowed them
greater freedom to experiment with non sequiturs
and breaking the rules of narrative precisely
because the expectation was lower. They were
honing that distinct brand of British surreal
satire outside the strictures of primetime adult
comedy. Now, we arrive at the actual and rather
chaotic formation of the troupe. It wasn't an
intentional artistic gathering, was it? It was
more a result of conflicting television contracts
and, well, personal management. You are absolutely
right. The sources depict a chaotic situation
driven by television deal -making. Thames Television
offered a late -night show to the Do Not Adjust
Your Set group. So, Idol, Jones, Palin, and Gilliam.
And at the same time, the BBC, eager to capitalize
on this satirical talent pool, offered a show
to the duo of Cleese and Chapman. So they were
on the verge of becoming two separate comedy
groups. What was the pivotal shift that forced
them all together? It hinged entirely on John
Cleese's deep reluctance to do a two -man show
with Chapman. Cleese cited Chapman's difficult
and erratic personality. Which was due partly
to Chapman's struggles with alcoholism at the
time, right? Yes, and it made their isolated
working dynamic challenging. Cleese had much
fonder memories of his collaboration with Palin
on other short -lived projects, like How to Irritate
People. So Cleese extended the invitation to
Palin, looking for a reliable collaborator. And
Palin, in turn, acted as the vital conduit. He
did. Palin invited his writing partner, Terry
Jones. plus Eric Idle, who then insisted that
Terry Gilliam be brought in to provide the crucial
revolutionary animations. So it really was Cleese's
desire to work with Palin, bypassing Chapman's
perceived unreliability, coupled with a lot of
opportune scheduling, that brought all six members
into the fold. It's amazing how high stakes career
decisions often boil down to personal chemistry
and, you know. And the sources pinpoint the specific,
rather mundane birthplace of this cultural revolution.
They do. It was a meeting at a Kashmir Tandoori
restaurant in Hampstead on the 11th of May, 1969.
That's where the group solidified the concept
and hammered out the terms of their collaboration
with the BBC. And then came the hard part. naming
the show they were unified in wanting a completely
nonsensical title feeling it would be inherently
funnier if the title had absolutely nothing to
do with the content it was a sort of anti -marketing
stance oh the list of rejected names is a comedy
sketch in itself they truly sought titles that
were absurdly academic or utterly meaningless,
like owl stretching time. And the toad elevating
moment. I also saw a horse, a spoon, and a basin
and bun, whack it, buzzard, stubble, and boot.
It's just brilliant. The one that actually stuck
flying circus only did so, quite hilariously,
because the BBC had already printed the name
in their schedules. And in classic bureaucratic
fashion, they just refused to amend the broadcast
listings. They were semi -forced into that part
of the name due to BBC inertia. But the Monty
Python part was deliberate, and it's a brilliant
window into their slightly sleazy sensibility.
So what's the full story behind Monty, then?
Eric Idle is consistently credited with the idea
for Monty. There are two conflicting accounts
from the team, both of which Idle seemed happy
to encourage. Okay. One version suggests it was
a gently mocking tribute to Field Marshal Lord
Montgomery. The famously rotund and bombastic
British general during WWII. And the other. The
other, perhaps more Python -esque, suggests it
was the name of a popular rotund fellow at Idol's
local pub. A character whose name sounded comically
pompous, but was actually quite ordinary. Either
way, the final name, Monty Python, was ultimately
chosen because the team envisaged it as the perfect
name for a sleazy entertainment agent. It's that
blend of the high and the low. A perfect encapsulation
of their methodology. They started as a group
of highly educated Oxbridge grads trying to invent
a new kind of surreal humor. And they named themselves
after a hypothetical sleazy entertainment agent.
They were challenging the establishment, even
with their own branding. With the name settled,
we jump straight into Monty Python's Flying Circus,
which ran from 1969 to 1974. The show instantly
became a landmark in the evolution of television.
It didn't just bend the existing rules of sketch
comedy. It actively sought to... well vaporize
them entirely the show was defined by its loosely
structured stream of consciousness approach but
the single most revolutionary element the one
that broke the entire mold was their anti -punchline
philosophy this is such a critical game -changing
concept They perceived a weakness in comedy where
a strong, funny sketch was often completely ruined
or killed by a weak or predictable ending. Forcing
a kind of narrative closure that wasn't deserved.
So their solution was to just discard the traditional
ending altogether. They would simply cut abruptly
to an unrelated scene, or a character would walk
off stage, break the fourth wall. Or introduce
a completely irrelevant event, usually through
Terry Gilliam's animation. Right. John Cleese
famously captured this intellectual argument
in an early episode, turning to Eric Idle mid
-chaos and remarking, this is the silliest sketch
I've ever been in. And then they just walked
off the set. That moment isn't just a joke. It's
an intellectual critique of comedy structure
delivered as a joke. But was this level of anarchy
entirely new in British TV? The sources cite
a major immediate influence that pushed Python
to be even more innovative. They were undoubtedly
spurred on by Spike Milligan's concurrent BBC
series Q, which also premiered in 1969. Milligan's
show was already deeply irreverent and highly
anarchic. He would sometimes just give up on
sketches or appear to lose interest. So Python
wasn't the first to be anarchic, but they kind
of professionalized the chaos. Exactly. Terry
Jones in particular was vocal about this competition,
stating that Python had to innovate and be even
more groundbreaking than Milligan, refining the
chaos into an actual style. They institutionalized
the anarchy. Beyond just abandoning the punchline,
they popularized formal techniques that TV now
takes for granted. The cold open, now ubiquitous
in prestige, drama, and comedy, was a Python
staple. Their iconic cold open featured Michael
Palin, often decked out in Robinson Crusoe gear,
making a difficult, lengthy journey just to approach
the camera and declare, It's sick. Only to be
immediately cut off by the title sequence. They
sometimes even ran the closing credits halfway
through the show, didn't they? They did. Followed
by Cleese parodying a clipped BBC announcer over
the familiar Globe logo, tricking the viewers
into thinking the episode was over. This intentional
subversiveness made the audience realize they
could never trust the structure of the show.
And the sources are clear. This anti -authoritarianism
wasn't just stylistic, it was thematic. Cleese
stated, Anti -authoritarianism was deeply ingrained
in Python. Their targets were almost always institutions,
middle -class norms, bureaucracy, pomposity,
and the restrictive nature of the media itself.
By constantly undermining the medium they were
working in, they were delivering a meta -critique
of the establishment. The genius of Python wasn't
just the writing. Since they deliberately fragmented
the narrative flow, they desperately needed a
mechanism to connect those disparate ideas. That's
where Terry Gilliam's surreal stop -motion animation
becomes the absolutely essential glue. The stream
of consciousness style was primarily driven by
the Jones, Palin, and Gilliam faction, who relied
on the animation to move seamlessly between unrelated
concepts. Gilliam's style was so distinctive.
Stop -motion collage created using scissors,
an airbrush, and images lifted directly from
famous art and Victorian engravings. Juxtaposing
highbrow historical visuals with absurd modern
concepts. And the visual trademark that every
single person associates with the show's opening
credits, that giant crushing foot, is actually
a piece of art history itself, which is a perfect
metaphor for their whole approach. It's the foot
of Cupid. Specifically cut from a reproduction
of the Renaissance masterpiece, Venus, Cupid,
Folly, and Time by Bronzino. By taking a piece
of classical revered art and turning it into
a cartoonish destructive force, Gilliam visually
articulated their intent to satirize and crush
artistic pomposity. Absolutely. And if they didn't
cut away or use animation, the pythons had other
highly specific recurring methods of stopping
a sketch dead in its tracks. Like the anti -silliness
character. Right. Graham Chapman, utilizing his
freight man persona, played the colonel, who
would march into a sketch, usually while it was
devolving into complete chaos, and order it to
be stopped because things were becoming far too
silly. Or they'd use a physical cartoonish interruption.
Exactly. A knight in full armor. often played
by Gilliam himself, would wander onto the set
and simply hit characters over the head with
a rubber chicken, thereby concluding the argument
and the sketch simultaneously. But the most quoted
non -sketch line, the transition that became
iconic, was that famous clipped phrase uttered
by John Cleese, and now for something completely
different. It became the title of their first
film, cementing its status as an iconic part
of their style. It was the verbal equivalent
of Gilliam's smashing foot, a polite way of signaling
utter deliberate disruption. Let's talk about
the theme music, John Philip Sousa's The Liberty
Bell. I always assumed they chose it because
it sounded suitably bombastic and ridiculous,
but there's a great surprising financial footnote
here. There is. The bombast was part of the joke,
yes. But Gilliam... Having been published, the
United States was aware of U .S. copyright laws.
He chose the Liberty Bell specifically because
having been published prior to 1924, it was in
the public domain under U .S. copyright law.
So no royalties. No royalties required for its
use. which was a huge factor for a low -budget,
highly experimental BBC show. It was a major
financial win hidden beneath a silly Marshall
tune, a true Python -esque solution. Moving on
to the actual meat of the comedy, the iconic
sketches that define them, we have Dead Parrot,
a masterpiece of verbal aggression satirizing
the utter absurdity of poor customer service.
And of course, the Ministry of Silly Walks, an
absurd, brilliant take on bureaucratic inefficiency.
Cleese's character, demanding money to invent
increasingly ridiculous walks, is a direct assault
on the perceived wastefulness of government departments.
And spam. The sketch itself is simple. A couple
tries to order breakfast, only to find that every
single menu item includes spam. It was a brilliant
satire on the ubiquity of canned meat post -World
War II Britain. We'll definitely discuss the
incredible linguistic legacy of that specific
sketch later. You also had four Yorkshiremen,
which parodied those nostalgic conversations
about humble beginnings, smitting them into competitive
tales of hardship that grew exponentially absurd.
A surprising, enduring visual component of Python's
humor comes from the simple act of cross -dressing.
They maintained a long British tradition of men
playing female roles themselves. Speaking in
falsetto or just donning a dress and a hat. This
was a key part of their visual style. Terry Jones
was the undisputed specialist here, often playing
the working -class housewife, or what the BBC
themselves termed the ratbag old women. Palin
and Idol would often play the more posh or middle
-class women, providing a different class flavor.
Was there a specific reason they preferred to
play the female roles themselves? They felt they
were better at being funny in those parts than
the available actresses at the time, particularly
because they didn't require the women to be traditionally
attractive, allowing them to focus entirely on
the absurdity of the character. But when the
role absolutely required the character to be
conventionally attractive, they would turn to
a professional actress. Which brings us to Carol
Cleveland, the essential collaborator often described
as the unofficial seventh member. of the troupe.
She was the most important female performer in
the ensemble, appearing in about two thirds of
the episodes in all the films. She was initially
hired for just five episodes, but the Pythons
lobbied for her permanent inclusion after they
found that other actresses brought in by the
director were struggling to grasp their specific
rapid and surreal timing. Python's global success
wasn't instantaneous outside the UK, but it certainly
began early. They broke into North America via
the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the CBC,
in 1970. And the Canadian reaction was immediate
and passionate. When the CBC temporarily dropped
the show in 1971, they received hundreds of calls
complaining, and over 100 people actually staged
a protest at the CBC's Montreal studios. Wow.
The American breakthrough was considerably slower,
though. Their first feature film, and now for
something completely different. Didn't do that
well initially. No, the real catalyst was public
television, specifically Ron DeVillier, the programming
director for Kira in Dallas, Texas. He began
airing the episodes in the summer of 1974. And
the response was immediate and surprising for
a highbrow, surreal British import. The ratings
shot through the roof in Dallas. This success
prompted other PDS affiliates to pick up the
show, which led to the creation of the famed
British Comedy Night that became a staple of
PBS stations across the country. This unexpected
U .S. success, however, led to a famous and crucial
legal battle that set a landmark precedent for
artists' rights, which we have to explore. This
is the critical case of Gilliam v. American Broadcasting
Company's Inc. ABC, recognizing the show's popularity,
broadcast two 90 -minute specials of Python material,
but they heavily edited the content. They cut
a total of 24 minutes, right? Partly for commercials,
but also to remove what they called scatological
references. Exactly. They were essentially destroying
the flow and artistic integrity of the work to
fit commercial sensibilities. The Pythons, led
by Terry Gilliam, sued. And the core argument
was that the edits fundamentally distorted their
artistic vision and damaged their reputation.
And they won. The U .S. Court of Appeals for
the Second Circuit ruled in Python's favor. It
was a huge defining moment for creative control.
It established that artists could legally defend
their work against mutilation. It was a statement.
Python was not just content, it was art. They
won the right to preserve their intentional anarchy.
After that, their global reach just expanded.
In 1976, Python was the top -rated show in Japan.
And in a charming modern tribute, the town of
Spikenis in the Netherlands opened a silly walks
road crossing in 2018. The absurdity they championed
has literally been written into the civic landscape.
So we've established the style, but the real
magic and the inevitable friction lay in the
synergy between the six members. Let's talk about
how they worked and what ultimately fractured
the Flying Circus itself. The structure of their
collaboration was based on three distinct writing
factions, and the tension between them provided
a wide dynamic range of comedic styles. Let's
break down the three units. First, you had the
pair of Cleese and Chapman. They typically worked
in isolation. Their humor was highly verbal,
often aggressive, and centered on confrontations.
the perpetually frustrated bureaucrat, the customer
service nightmare. It was all about the precision
of the dialogue. Then you had the face -to -face
team of Jones and Palin. Their sessions were
highly collaborative, characterized by laughter
and a strong focus on shared ideas. Their work
tended to be more visual, more fanciful, often
involving historical satire. And finally, Eric
Idle, the third faction, who famously wrote entirely
solo. Idle was the master of wordplay, the self
-described, ludicrously over -literate writer
whose work leaned into long -form monologues,
parodies, and crucially, musical numbers. Gilliam,
as the animator, acted as the vital, unifying
bridge connecting these three disparate universes.
Despite this successful collaboration, the television
series couldn't last forever. John Cleese made
the pivotal decision to depart after Series 3
in 1974. Why did he step away? He felt creatively
drained, a sense of diminishing returns. He was
very open later about this, claiming that only
two sketches written by him and Chapman in that
third series, Dennis Moore and The Tree Shop,
were genuinely original. So it was a principled
departure rooted in a desire not to compromise
their innovation. Absolutely. He sought a more
disciplined form of comedy, which he would later
find in Fawlty Towers. He also cited the strain
of working with Chapman, who was struggling significantly
with alcohol dependence at the time. The remaining
five members decided to push on for one final,
shorter season, a six -episode half -season.
How did they manage without Cleese? They shifted
their dynamic, giving Jones, Palin, and Idol
more space. While Cleese was gone as a performer,
he was actually credited as a writer for three
of those six episodes, which is often forgotten.
Let's talk about Graham Chapman. He's perhaps
the most complex figure in the group. He often
anchored the most surreal sketches by playing
the absolute straight man. And he had a fascinating
background, having originally been a medical
student at Cambridge and was legally entitled
to practice as a doctor. In the films, he took
the absolute lead roles. He did. He was King
Arthur in Holy Grail and the titular Brian Cohen
in Life of Brian. He possessed a unique stillness
that made the absurd dialogue around him land
harder. Cleese considered him his most essential
writing partner, despite their difficulties.
Cleese often described Chapman as his greatest
sounding board. Cleese said, if Graham thought
something was funny, then it almost certainly
was funny. You cannot believe how invaluable
that is. Sadly, Chapman's life was cut short
by metastatic throat cancer in 1989. The ensuing
memorial service, however, remains one of the
most famous, darkly irreverent moments in the
group's history. John Cleese delivered the eulogy.
He began by famously claiming he was the first
person in history to say the forbidden word at
a British memorial service. And then he delivered
an utterly irreverent yet profound tribute. He
used the opportunity to recycle every single
euphemism for being dead from the dead parrot
sketch, right? Yes. He declared Chapman was no
more, that he had ceased to be, that he had expired
and gone to meet his maker. It was a fittingly
absurdist tribute to his partner. John Cleese
is known for his signature style of highly verbal,
often abusive and intimidating humor. But his
career truly dominated British comedy beyond
Python. Absolutely. His BBC sitcom Fawlty Towers,
which he co -wrote with his then wife Connie
Booth, is a landmark achievement. It is the only
comedy series to ever rank higher than Monty
Python's Flying Circus on the BFI TV 100 list,
topping the entire poll. That show took Cleese's
Python persona. the man perpetually on the verge
of a nervous breakdown, and gave him a sustained
environment to explore that rage. It was Python's
high -pressure, formal confrontation humor, but
contained and sharpened. His solo film success
cemented his status as a mainstream writer and
comedic actor. He wrote the screenplay for A
Fish Called Wanda. starring alongside Michael
Palin, earning an Oscar nomination. Terry Jones
was often characterized as the heart of Python.
Why that specific description? He was crucial
for maintaining unity and creative independence.
Where Cleese pushed for tighter verbal structure,
Jones, often working with Palin, pushed for greater
visual anarchy and fantasy. The friction between
their two styles was essential. And his most
significant contributions were arguably behind
the camera, driving the feature films. Precisely.
Jones solely directed Life of Brian and The Meaning
of Life, having co -directed Holy Grail with
Gilliam. Jones was the one most insistent on
giving the films a narrative flow. And yet, despite
his directorial prowess, his most famous moment
is often cited as a performance role. Indeed.
He delivered arguably the most famous single
line in all of Python history in his iconic cross
-dressing role as Brian's mother, Mandy, in Life
of Brian. He's not the Messiah. He's a very naughty
boy. Terry Gilliam is the unique American member
of the troupe who actually renounced his U .S.
citizenship in 2006. He started as an animator
and strip cartoonist, crucial for bridging the
disparate sketches and provided the iconic visuals.
He was the visual director, the one who translated
the linguistic chaos into something audiences
could actually see flowing from one absurd idea
to the next. He co -directed Holy Grail with
Jones, but that co -directing role didn't last
into the later features. Why the separation?
Gilliam and Jones had different... directorial
philosophies. Gilliam had a penchant for elaborate
set pieces and visual ambition, whereas Jones
preferred a faster pace focused on character
dialogue. For the later films, Jones insisted
on solo directing. But Gilliam's solo career
as a live -action director turned him into a
visual auteur in his own right. Films like Brazil,
which is a monumental vision of dystopia and
featured Michael Palin, and Time Bandits, which
Gilliam co -wrote with Palin, established him
internationally. He has a prolific career that
grew directly out of his Python visual sensibility.
Eric Idle was the third faction, working solo
and specializing in elaborate wordplay and, critically,
his musical numbers. He wrote classics like The
Galaxy Song and Always Look on the Bright Side
of Life. Idle's work, much like Gilliam's, served
as a crucial change of pace, moving the show
into territory the other writers rarely trod.
He was the one who could stop the sketch and
start a fully orchestrated, witty song. Idol
utilized this musical inclination later in life,
resulting in a phenomenal success that makes
him, according to all financial metrics, the
most financially successful of the entire troupe.
That success is the Tony Award -winning musical
Spamalot, based on Holy Grail. It has been an
enormous, decade -spanning hit. Its financial
success far outstripped the earnings of the original
films. He followed that up with Not the Messiah,
an oratorio based on Life of Brian. The sources
confirmed that Idol's ability to take the Python
ethos and translate it successfully into a mainstream
theatrical format has generated revenue that
sustains the rest of the members to this day.
While the six men were the core, the seventh
Python title has been thrown around for years,
but two names stand out with the most meaningful
contributions. Those are Neil Innes and Carol
Cleveland. Let's start with Neil Innes, who was
both a writer and a musician within their orbit.
Innes is the only non -Python besides Douglas
Adams credited with writing material for Flying
Circus. He appeared in several films and sketches,
and crucially, he wrote all the music for Idol's
seminal Beatles parody mockumentary, The Ruttles.
He was the essential musical voice supporting
Idol. And then there is Carol Cleveland, the
Python girl. She was indispensable for two -thirds
of the episodes in all the films. She was the
most important female performer, playing roles
that ranged from the beautiful maiden to the
straight foil in sketches. She was vital because
she was a professional actress who understood
how to be the anchor. And we must mention the
brief but notable contribution of the future
science fiction titan. Douglas Adams. Adams earned
one writing credit in the final five member series
for a sketch called Patient Abuse, which satirized
mind boggling bureaucracy. He got the job during
Cleese's absence from the final season, forming
a short lived writing partnership with Chapman.
The satire bureaucratic indifference was strong
enough to slot seamlessly into their established
style. The feature films proved that their surreal
style could translate effectively to the big
screen, allowing them to move beyond simply reshot
sketches and into grand -scale satire. and now
for something completely different in 1971, was
simply reshot sketches. It failed initially at
the box office, though it later found cult success.
The Pythons themselves didn't consider it a true
artistic success. Their first true narrative
feature was Monty Python and the Holy Grail in
1975. This film is legendary, not only for its
low -tech satire, but also for its ridiculously
low budget, just £229 ,000, and the surprising
way they raised the money. It's an iconic rock
and roll footnote. The financing came partly
from investments by major rock groups of the
era. We're talking about bands like Pink Floyd,
Jethro Tull, and Led Zeppelin. The necessity
of saving money contributed directly to the humor.
They couldn't afford real horses, so they used
coconuts. It delivered enduring lines that have
become absorbed into global pop culture, like
the Black Knight's hilariously defiant Tis But
a Scratch. Next came Monty Python's Life of Brian
in 1979. This film generated massive religious
controversy, but the Pythons were always clear
about their target. Not Christ, but his followers.
I think we need to emphasize that distinction,
as it was at the heart of their defense. The
pythons agreed beforehand not to mock Jesus or
his teachings directly. Instead, the film is
a brilliant surgical satire on credulity, blind
devotion and hypocrisy among the followers of
Brian Cohen, a man who is constantly mistaken
for the Messiah. And who financed this controversial
project when others spooked by the script pulled
out. George Harrison, the former Beatle. He formed
handmade films specifically to raise the four
million pound necessary to produce the movie,
later calling it the most expensive cinema ticket
ever purchased. What's fascinating is the retrospective
intellectual defense of the film. Noted theologian
Richard Burridge called Life of Brian an extraordinary
tribute to Jesus, arguing that the pythons were
actually satirizing blind fundamentalism and
the way people quickly split into factions, a
theme that remains perpetually relevant. Their
last collaborative project was 1983's Monty Python's
The Meaning of Life. It returned to the sketch
format, loosely following the ages of man. It
was arguably their darkest and most visually
spectacular work. It featured the morbidly obese
Mr. Creosote exploding over restaurant patrons
and the liver donor scene, which satirized bureaucracy
in a medical setting. And they achieved critical
recognition for this darkness. They did. The
Meaning of Life won the Grand Prix at the 1983
Cannes Film Festival, marking their artistic
swan song as a unified film unit. Beyond their
own creative output. The Python members used
their enormous fame to raise serious awareness
for international human rights, particularly
through the secret policeman's ball benefit shows
for Amnesty International, which was John Cleese's
brainchild. Between 1976 and 1981, these shows
raised considerable funds and, crucially, media
awareness for the human rights cause. They transformed
the perception of Amnesty International, bringing
its serious issues to a younger, massive audience.
And the cultural influence of these shows extended
far beyond the comedy world, right? It directly
impacted rock music and subsequent global activism.
Very direct. Bono of U2 told Rolling Stone that
seeing the ball sowed a seed that became a part
of him and U2's advocacy work. Sting explicitly
credited the show with informing him about Amnesty.
And Bob Geldof, the organizer of Live Aid, famously
took the ball and ran with it, according to Sting,
modeling his massive charity rock concerts on
the successful platform Python had established.
It's incredible to connect Python's early anarchy
to the biggest global charity efforts of the
80s and 90s. The speculation over a complete
reunion ended definitively with Graham Chapman's
death in 1989. However, the remaining five members
did gather on several non -formal occasions.
The 1998 reunion live at Aspen was particularly
notable. That was the time when they were reunited
on stage with what was purported to be Chapman's
Ashes, a bizarre moment that culminated in Eric
Idle scattering them dramatically over the audience.
But the eventual, truly final reunion was driven
by less artistic motives and more direct financial
necessity. It was a direct consequence of a lost
legal battle in 2013. They lost a lawsuit over
royalties for Spamalot and owed a massive combined
sum of £800 ,000 in legal fees and back royalties.
To pay this monumental bill, they proposed a
live reunion show. And the demand proved just
how enduring their popularity was. Tickets for
the first O2 Arena show in London sold out in
a mind -boggling 43 seconds. Nine additional
shows were quickly added, resulting in Monty
Python Live. Mostly. One down, five to go. Michael
Palin stated unequivocally that the final performance
on July 20, 2014, would be the last time the
troupe would ever perform together, and that
final show was screened live to 2 ,000 cinemas
globally. Idle commented on the scale of the
moment, noting that the Pythons got the massive
global public final bow that the Beatles didn't
get. It was a final unifying moment for a group
defined by disruption. So what does this all
mean for comedy and culture today? They started
by trying to demolish the existing structure
of British culture, yet they grew into an enduring
institution. The key to their institutional status
lies in the very nature of their surreal humor.
The term Python -esque. has officially entered
standard dictionaries as a byword for surreal,
absurd, often satirical humor. That is the ultimate,
delicious irony which Terry Jones himself acknowledged.
He claims the very existence of the word Python
-esque proves the extent to which they failed,
as their initial aim was to create something
so new it would be impossible to categorize.
Instead, they just created a new category. And
that successful failure defines modern comedy.
The list of comedians who cite Python as a major
influence is a who's who. Mike Myers, Jim Carrey,
Tina Fey, and Matt Groening, the creator of The
Simpsons. And the most important structural lesson
they passed on, according to Tina Fey, it wasn't
the jokes, it was the structure. She pointed
out that sketch endings are overrated. Their
key was to do something as long as it was funny
and then just stop and do something else. That
anti -punchline philosophy became standard operating
procedure. Their influence directly colored the
work of the early editions of Saturday Night
Live, leading to shows like Kids in the Hall
and continues through to modern shows like South
Park. Let's move beyond comedy into the surprising
reach of their influence technology and science.
We're talking about things that bear the Python
name that have nothing to do with comedy, but
everything to do with their cultural absorption.
Let's start with the one that affects all of
our daily lives. Spam. The universally used term
for bulk, unsolicited email is derived directly
from the 1970 spam sketch. Explain the connection
again. Why did this particular sketch lend its
name to junk mail? In the sketch, a chorus of
Vikings drowns out all conversation by aggressively
and repeatedly singing spam, spam, spam, spam.
The idea is that the content is overwhelming,
unavoidable, and drowns out anything meaningful.
That's phenomenal. A satire of ubiquitous canned
meat became the technical descriptor for ubiquitous
junk mail. But the biggest scientific tribute
involves one of the world's most popular programming
languages. Yes. The Python programming language
was named after the troop by its creator, Guido
van Rossum. He wanted a name that was slightly
playful and memorable. And the tributes within
the coding world don't stop there. Not at all.
The default integrated development environment
is named IDLE in honor of Eric Idle. The package
index is called the Cheese Shop. There's a refactoring
tool called Bicycler Repair. And a project to
merge Python with Pearl was dubbed Parrot, after
the dead parrot sketch. The sheer number of scientific
and celestial namesakes is staggering. Seven
asteroids are named after the pythons, or the
troop, including 9617 Graham Chapman and 13681
Monty Python. They're literally written into
the solar system. And terrestrially, we have
two remarkable biological tributes. An endangered
lemur found in Madagascar is named Avahi Kleesai
after John Klees. Klees was very happy about
this, often joking that he was finally being
recognized for being a primate. And a gigantic
prehistoric snake fossil discovered in Australia
was given the taxonomic name Monopathenoids riverslansis.
Even geneticists are fans. A mutant gene discovered
in flies that makes them live longer was dubbed
Indy, which is an acronym for the famous defiant
line of dialogue from Holy Grail. I'm not dead
yet. Finally, the pythons weren't afraid to use
their institutional status for large scale, ridiculous
public performance and world records. In 2007,
the cast of Spamalot gathered in Trafalgar Square
under the tutelage of the two Terrys, Jones and
Gilliam, to attempt a record for the largest
coconut orchestra. They led 5 ,567 people clip
-clopping in time to always look on the bright
side of life. And in 2019, to mark the 50th anniversary,
they attempted a world record for the largest
gathering of people dressed as dumbees. Those
characters of limited intelligence known for
yelling, my brain hurts. A truly fitting way
to celebrate 50 years of institutionalized absurdity.
So we've traced the history from the Oxbridge
rivalry to their massive, unexpected impact on
social activism and technology. They discarded
the traditional rules of sketch comedy, replacing
them with a style so distinct it earned its own
dictionary entry. What stands out and what allowed
this enduring genius to flourish is the fact
that the pythons insisted on and secured complete
creative control from the very start. They had
BBC executives who, though initially confused,
ultimately let them experiment and innovate wildly.
And this raises an important question for you,
the listener, to consider. In our current age
of high commercial optimization, audience metrics,
and immediate social media feedback, could a
brand new, highly surreal comedy troupe today
secure the same level of total, hands -off freedom
from executives to be as anarchic and uncategorizable
as Monty Python was in the late 60s and early
70s? Or was their perfect, permissive timing
as crucial to their success as their undeniable
genius? That is definitely something completely
different to think about. Until next time, keep
digging and always remember to look on the bright
side of... life.