Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus Episode 1

"The Germans came to us and said 'Look, we haven't got a sense of humor... Can we use yours?" - Eric Idle

At some point during the creation of the third season, Monty Python's Flying Circus invaded Germany. Being British, they were polite about it, and only did it upon the request of the Germans-- specifically TV producer Alfred Biolek, who watched a few episodes of Monty Python while in the UK and thought their brand of humor would play well in the Fatherland. As it turns out, he was wrong. "This was an absolute flop, it cannot be stated differently." And so, they took a page from Germany's world war playbook-- if something is an unmitigated disaster, do it again.


At first, the Pythons were reticent. They didn't speak the language, and they were smart enough to anticipate cultural gaps that many jokes would not manage to bridge. But there were more alluring possibilities as well. For instance, no studio performances. The entire show would be shot on film and edited at their leisure. This would have been catnip to Jones, Palin and Gilliam, the auteurs of the group. Gilliam, in particular, an animator with little lip-synching to worry about, would translate effortlessly. Also, not speaking the language would free them up from time-consuming links and set-ups. They could just go all out with silliness. The promise lured them to at least visit that damn place, and in October 1971, the lads took a trip out there.

They celebrated Oktoberfest, and Albrecht Durer's 500 birthday. They visited a concentration camp, and were allowed to leave. The country was buzzing with anticipation of the Munich Olympics coming the following year. Much of all of this made it into the content of their shows. But beyond all of this, the lads came to realize that they all had serious preconceived notions about the German people, especially regarding their sense of humor. Germany was one of the first non English countries to embrace Monty Python-- even if they didn't embrace this particular show. The creation of these two episodes became an exercise in cultural broadening for all the troupe. Plus, we get 1.5 hours of weird-ass television, with the company speaking pigeon German, which is good. Let's check it out!

Best Guest Performance Ever!

We begin with a pretty lady at a desk, doing her TV announcer thing. The speech she gives essentially translates as a "what you are about to see" schpiel. But the set collapses behind her, revealing a reedy fen. Two frog men emerge, take her and drag her back into the water. Throughout these indignities, the lady, Frau Newsreader Claudia Doren is unflappable, never even taking a break as she is pulled from her desk (and her mic) and dragged back into the swamp. Well done, Claudia! This is reminiscent of the newsreader sketch from the first season-- Cleese and his desk kidnapped and dumped in the ocean amidst gunfire and car chases-- but this is simpler and more elegant. Although, one could argue, a very sinister first impression.

Gilliam is up next, with two dark-eyed ladies staring at a scandalous picture. A gentleman comes up behind them, and voiced by Palin, announces "And now for something completely different," only in German. It's very strange for Palin to be speaking German, but I guess I'd better get used to it. he titles follow, the third season titles with the pipes at the start and the weight lifter at the end. Let the show begin!

A quick bit with Jones as the Olympic torch bearer, running through "Athens". Making sure to triple check this quiet road, he is promptly hit by a car. Not hit hard, just tapped a little in the knee.

We cut to a documentary about Albrecht Durer, which surprises us with the revelation that the painter was known, not only for his painting, but for his rent-a-car service. Cleese quickly steps in, apologizing for the inaccuracies. He is stern, authoritarian, and decidedly unsilly, as he promises to keep an eye on this documentary. Just as well, because the documentary soon claims that Durer was an insect. Then the documentary takes us over to--

Australia, Australia, Australia, we love you, ah-men! Palin, as a German-speaking Fosters-swilling Bruce, complete with corks dangling off his bush hat, says he doesn't know Durer from a kangaroo's rectum, then goes off on a Tourette's-inspired recital of "arse" and "bum", which gets buzzed by Cleese the killjoy, who apologizes again for the previous spokesperson. An appreciation of Durer follows, sung by Anita Ekberg-- only it's not really Ekberg, just a cut out, and the voice is Jones singing a subtle variant of the Dennis Moore song. Cleese returns again, to apologize, again. (They seem to be apologizing a lot for this show.) They finally give up on the documentary, and cut to "The Merchant of Venice"-- as performed by cows. Not just any cows, though-- The Bad Ischl Dairy Herd.

Once again, we get footage (of cows) voiced over, one of them with a yamulke and curly hair braid. We get some applause from the Woman's institute, and we're out. One of Shakespeare's shorter plays.

We go back to the Olympic torch bearer, bandaged and crutched. This time, he's not the victim, wreaking havoc with his torch. (Hey, we've all been there, am I right fellas?) He passes Chapman as a lady, and when asking for directions, he sets her umbrella on fire.

He's French, speaking English, with German subtitles

Gilliamination links us to the next bit-- a riff on Frenchmen. Jones, quintessentially British, claims to be a Frenchman who has not been to the bathroom in five years. Palin confirms this, speaking English in an outrageous French accent, subtitled in German. (It can get exhausting.) Palin has papers proving that Jones is French, and documents attesting to the fact that he hasn't been in five years. A series of impressive testimonials follow, from news footage of the Chancellor, to Nixon, to the Queen, all stating emphatically that yes, it's been five years. Finally, we get Chapman as a doctor, who should know-- he and Jones have spent the last five years in doctor patient bliss. But it couldn't last, as Chapman was drawn by his very nature back to the flock of Doctors he came from. Like the pigeon fanciers in Season 2, the doctors chirp and mill about a green field, finally rounded up by Farmer Idle, who brags on his current crop of doctors, including his "short-horned gynecologists".

So far, it all seems a bit stiff. The lads feel a bit off their game, uncertain as to which sketch to stick with and which to run screaming from. They are also without one of their best weapons-- language, and the delivery thereof. The process from the written to the spoken included getting a translator in the middle there to dictate the German translation so that the actors could learn it by ear. But that would imply that they were also memorizing the translator's delivery of the joke. In other words, Monty Python has essentially become its own tribute band, writing jokes which are then translated and re-performed by someone else, and doing those jokes. It's a little like The Who ding Elton John's version of Pinball Wizard, if Elton John were a German translator.

Still, for all its strangeness, you have to stop and wonder at the accomplishment and ambition. These guys are doing an original show, in a language they don't speak. Holy crap!

Anyway, Cleese returns, and in what must have been the dress rehearsal for the "Holy Grail" credits, he informs us that they are returning to the Durer documentary, and that the producers responsible for the last attempt have been sacked. The documentary begins, much like the second attempt, only now, strange things are happening to the wood carving art work. Large cannons peek out from hills, pierce other towns with neat little black spots. A horse is cross-sectioned, and looks much liker an orange inside. A rhino starts hopping on dancing naked ladies. Hey! Who let Gilliam in here?! In a great slow burn, the lads are playing the long game, giving us a "real" version of the documentary pictures, and a fake, anarchasized version. (It's a German word. Look it up!) Despite Programmer Cleese's apologetic efforts to stop it, the cartoons have taken over. Cleese surrenders and brings us back to the program.

Idle tractors the doctors back, explaining how farm-raised doctors allow cows more time to work in hospitals. And CRASH! Three story lines converge, as we see cows in an ER loading dock, mooing with subtitles both medical and Shakespearean. (With a brief apologetic interruption from the Durer documentary.) It's the end of Act 1 of the Merchant of Venice, as performed by cows. The strangeness is suddenly working for me. More than any other Python show, it feels as though revolutionaries have taken over the broadcasting company and are messing with the order. And of course, this is where they would do it, in Germany, where order is the national religion. Rather than attack propriety, as they did in the UK, they attack order itself.

Idle reviews the production form the ornate balcony of the theater, enthusing over how the cows have mastered the challenge of doing this particular play. Other animals have tried and failed, notably some chickens. But then Chapman, in a long walk-up to the camera, announces some Doctors doing the same play. They're terrible, getting distracted by medical diagnoses. Cleese's Programmer ducks in with another apology-- there will not be another Durer documentary attempt.

Great bit now with Gilliam. A trench coat wearing man stands backstage, watching the production, and did I mention it's terrible? He walks onstage, and we hear bullets and bombs as he expresses his free speech rights. Satisfied, he walks back off stage and out of the theater, where he encounters a billboard with a sexy model on it. Looking around to make sure there are no observers, he whips open his trench coat and flashes the billboard. He gets another shot with a split billboard, one ad with a man and one ad with a woman. He flashes the woman, repeatedly. He fails to notice a real woman walk up with a dress. Inspired by the flashers bravado, she flashes the male ad. They notice each other, and it's true love at first flash. Suddenly, their clothes are like butterfly wings, and they fly off together into the sunset. Very nice! Gilliam's first attempt at story nets us a real winner, equal parts crudity and inspiration. If the Germans didn't like this bit, we have to wonder what's in their water. The sunset turns out to be some gun-toting family's home. They shoot the animator, and he falls, screaming...

And lands on a road, where backpacker Jones tries to hitchhike. Half Gumby, half zombie, Jones leans from the waist, his idle arm dangling low-- is he Frankenstein to Chapman's Dracula? No one will pick the forlorn freeloader up-- until the torch bearer crutches on by. (Hey, wait a minute! Didn't Jones play the torch bearer, too? It looks more like Idle now, although the face is bandaged up.) The Torch bearer offers him a piggy back lift, and off they go. But behind them is a dark forest, once upon a time.  

Little Red Riding Hood vs...

We pan to the forest, and a voice over tells us the fairy tale of Red Riding Hood-- as played by John Cleese, tall, hyper-aggressive and repulsive. This bit made the rounds (with English voice over) in the live shows, so it's a familiar routine, despite the few times this show has been seen. The basic joke is Red's complete lack of vulnerability (or even femininity) as opposed to the wolf-- played by the cutest, most bashful and nervous dachsund ever. The wiener dog, with scraps of fur taped to his body, looks embarrassed to be a part of these childish proceedings, and must be manhandled into position or action. Not only do the governing hands point out the schlockiness of

The Big Bad Wolf

this production, they also provide some scale-- this is a pretty tiny dog. When the "wolf" says, in voice over, "She looks good to eat," it can't help but draw a quick laugh from one, unless you're a diehard PETA enthusiast-- 'cause the dog doesn't look like he's having much fun. But finally, his torment ends when he gets to Grandmother's house-- which turns out to be a NASA facility, and Buzz Aldrin's security guards have the dog shot. Off screen, of course, PETA members-- please put your red paint down. But Red isn't out of the woods yet. Heinz, the rapist of Stuttgart, sets his sights on Cleese's lovely body, and is strung up for his troubles. The other rapists of the forest (all in trenchcoats) come to cut him down, and everyone lives happily ever after in weird ways, which include the explosion of Grandma's cottage/NASA. There's not much that's funny in this, apart from Cleese' s interpretation of Red Riding Hood and the dog's interpretation of the wolf. It's pretty silly, to be sure, but silly in that random Palin/Jones way. It never achieves much actual humor, just a weird, surreal trance state.

Red winds up in Cairo, or Germany posing as Cairo, where she once again is accosted by Jones, this time as a dirty postcard salesman. He finally catches Red's interest with dirty pictures of-- Albrecht Durer. And we're back to Durer, this time in a turban, and all of his drawings have been altered to suggest Middle Eastern themes-- a camel instead of a horse, a pyramid in the middle of a village, and a rhino with a turban and sunglasses. (How sheik!) Cleese turns them all down. Where can I get some?

Back to the Torch Bearer, hobbling down the road with Jones piggy-backing him, and using the torch to cook an egg. He gives Idle the egg, and they go their separate ways. Jones puts up a tent in a forest clearing-- a very elaborate tent, with three stories, multiple gables, etc. It's a long bit, with him unpacking the tent in fast motion, the joke being that such an edifice could come from such humble beginnings. But again, not that funny. Just silly.  

This is impressive.

But now comes some truly inspired humor, as a the 27th Annual Silly Olympiad is announced in voice over. (I will point out that Kim "Howard" Johnson's episode description deviates from what I see on the show, so there may have been some fiddling with A nd E's presentation here.) Like Red Riding Hood, we've seen this bit before, too, and it's awesome! In the English version, there's a lot more voice over, but the jokes all still work, despite the silence in this version. We get the 100 meters for men with no sense of direction, a race for the deaf, freestyle swimming for non-swimmers, ("We'll be back when they fish out the corpses.") and a marathon for the incontinent. They start interweaving the events. My personal favorite-- the "Men with their mothers" event, where the racers are trying to get their mothers to please just move down the track, and the mothers have to shop or chat or just gripe. Hilarious!

Now, and American West theme sneaks in, and out of the bar steps-- Albrecht Durer! Painter, philosopher and Marshal in these here parts. Cleese's program director soon puts a stop to that! (Do you suppose there was a tourist-y marketing attempt to commemorate Durer's 500 birthday and that's what Monty Python was mocking?) He orders up a game show, and Palin and Cleese oblige with a wild west game show called "Stake Your Claim". (I feel like I've seen this before, but I'm not sure where. I'll figure it out, though.)

After a false start and a change of venue, the show gets started properly. It's a great bit, the first "true" sketch of the show so far, where Host Cleese good-naturedly pierces guests impossible claims. Palin claims to have written the entire works of Shakespeare, but when  Cleese points out that Palin is only 43, and the works are known to have been performed 350 years earlier, Palin caves with masterful comic timing. "I was hoping you wouldn't bring that up..." Other guests, frightened by Cleese's acumen, abandon their claims, muttering "I'm no match for you." It's a simple bit, but very funny. Maybe I just like sketches. Pepperpot guest Chapman tries to change her claim, from jumping off a castle and being buried alive, to burrowing through an elephant, knowing that the show would not have an elephant handy. Cleese makes her honor her original claim, and let us raise a glass to toast her memory. Nice try, frau Chapman. As the show wraps, Palin returns with more outrageous claims, but Cleese won't let him back on the show. Whic is fine with Palin, because-- he always wanted to be a lumberjack!

In one of the first bits purloined from the British series, Palin sings "The Lumberjack Song" in German. Oh, that is weird. The background singers take it a little slowly, but they chime in with nice harmonies. The German frau (Palin's "best girl") is dubbed. Why? Maybe the whole sketch couldn't be mic'ed properly. It's trippy to watch it in German, but Palin gives us the same infectious thrill that he always had. A complaining letter follows, with an assurance that the remaining 30% of lumberjacks "form relationships with farm animals in the usual way." Added complaints follow about marsupials and indecent acts on trampolines, before the letter is shot right in the "a".

Gilliamination follows, with a photographer taking pictures of subjects, and a field marshal with preternaturally wide jaws eats an entire town before his head explodes with fanfare for-- the Bavarian Restaurant Sketch! ("Das Bayerisches Restaurant Stuck!) This is a little gem. It feels like a Cleese Chapman sketch-- it's that cruel. An American couple, played by Chapman and an actual lady come with their guidebook translations and pigeon German, to a Bavarian restaurant known for its authenticity. At first, it starts out with giddy huckster-ism. Palin and Idle polka and sing to an accordion as they take the coats or push in chairs, all in the finest Bavarian tradition. But when burgermeister Jones, carried out an a beir, sings and dances over with the menu, he hits Chapman on the head and the lady in the face.

Well might you ask...

Things go downhill from there, with evil liquids poured on them and food stuffed into their clothes, all in the name of Bavarian tradition. Finally, Chapman is tossed from the window with sauteed potatoes, and is too dead to get the check (which is traditional American behavior.) Cleese did warn them that "the food, the service, is all traditional, beyond good an evil." (A Nietzsche reference-- was he Bavarian?) The sketch mocks the kitsch of "traditional" restaurants, at the same time as it mocks the people who seek them out. Cleese is hilarious in the sketch, kicking his heels and tapdancing with that manic grin on his face, checking to make sure that the cruelty is consensual. "You did want an authentic meal," he reminds them.

The material prior to this piece is all well and good, but it felt a tad polite, like the lads were holding back, with the exception of the Munich Olympics bit. The whole show had a timid apologetic tone. But the Bavarian restaurant sketch ranks right up there with "The Dirty Fork" or "Job Interview". It feels like Python has decided to stop being so polite and swing for the fences. I'm curious whether the Germans found it funny-- but I do. The sketch is almost six minutes long, and it feels too short (as opposed to the Albrecht Durer documentaries, which are much shorter, but way too long.)

You can't say the lads don't know when to close it out. The credits follow, over a long filmed bit of Lord Jones ceremonially walking downstairs, accompanied by footmen, to a waiting carriage. Once inside, we hear a toilet flush. (Like I often say-- we're never that far from potty humor.) He steps back out, and the footman run the soiled coach away. This feels more English than German. Although Germany had its royalty back in the day, they have quite a different relationship than the English did, and still do.

Black and white Gilliamination follows, made unique by a completely colorless palate, nothing but pen and ink rendition of planes, trucks and trains all transporting this coach, until they pass a billboard. Zoom in on the billboard-- and the frogmen are returning the abducted newsreader frau Doren to her desk, where she bravely continues talking. It's a thankless bravura performance on her part, which I for one appreciate. There is no better praise than this-- I doubt Carol Cleveland could have done better. They seat her back st her desk, positioning her just so, and replace her background flat-- always leave a country like you found it. "And now," she finishes, "Albrecht Durer." Fade to black.

What a show! True, it fails as often as it succeeds, but while the lads were trying hard to be gentle, they were also refusing to be anything other than what they were-- anti-authoritarian anarchists, not so much lampooning television as destroying its hallowed (and hollow) conventions. And besides bridging cultural gaps with their inimitable sensibilities, they friggin' spoke German! And they did it without winking and nudging their way through it, but committed completely and without irony. The show is a true oddball treasure, proof that the lads didn't know what it meant to play it safe. They don't even have a studio audience to encourage them. I will "stake my claim" that if Monty Python is supposed to have revolutionized television, nowhere is the revolution more evident than in this subversive, dangerous show.

Next Week; Albrecht Durer! Or Show Zwei! (If I can find it.)

 

Episode 39 - Grandstand

"Ladies and gentlemen, no welcome could be more heartfelt than that which I have no doubt you will all want to join with me in giving this great showbiz stiff." - Eric Idle as Dickie Attenborough.

(Sniffle)

In many ways, the Monty Python legend was just beginning. Their shows were selling out, they were starting to make inroads in American broadcasting, and they had plans to get a movie made, their first original film, which would become known as "Monty Python and the Holy Grail".  Maybe you've heard of it.

But this blog is about the television show, and this particular episode marks the end of an era. It is the last show with the complete cast of Monty Python's Flying Circus. It's also an uneven show, filled with some wonderful high points, and a couple of low ones as well. This is another "myth-isode", rarely seen on the PBS pledge drives. It's also anomalous-- for all of their talk about non-topicality, this episode relies almost entirely on a degree of awareness of entertainment, cricket and sports television circa 1972. Many of the jokes simply do not translate. Finally, after three glorious years of seeing the lads come together to create a brand new type of show, this episode is when we really see the various comedic sensibilities start to fray and come apart. The center no longer holds. It's as bittersweet as it is inevitable.

We come to praise Caesar, not to bury him. Still, if you're into the whole burial thing, and you need a box, you may want to look at the box set of Monty Python's Flying Circus! Buy it, rip out box #12, and let's get going!

Doesn't he look like Dick Cavett?

We start with the "Thames" logo, something that we used to see in the states preceding many PBS programs. Apparently, it was the third (of three) English channels (not counting the actual liquid channels) and thought a lot of itself. A 60s era fop, with dotted shirt, "dry look" hair and a tan-- he actually looks a lot like Dick Cavett, announces that before the "action-packed" programming can begin, we must endure "a rotten old BBC program." (I'm sorry... "programme".) The presenter is David Hamilton, real-life host of the British "American Bandstand" show "Top of the Pops". This is yet another indication of the cultural altitude that the Flying Circus had reached. Rival television personalities, from rival networks, would come on the show for some gentle ribbing. It means little to us here in the states, but it probably had a huge impact in England-- the equivalent of Seinfeld showing up on Frasier.

The Nude Organist plays his chord in a field-- say goodbye-- and Cleese gives his "And now..." prelude-- say goodbye-- and Palin's "It's" Man reads out his word-- say goodbye-- and the titles... do not appear. As in the Cycling Tour episode (but without as much cause) there will be no titles for this show. We should have appreciated them when we had the chance.

Instead, we launch right into one of those sad crusty awards shows that everyone watches. (Why? Why do we subject ourselves to such hideous television every year? Boring speeches, embarrassing maudlin displays, terrible musical acts and those long gaps between the content and the commercial, all building up to some forgone conclusion such as "Will they give Best Picture" to the funniest film, or to the film about some semi-famous person that died? And I'm as bad as anyone. I've actually shushed people at Oscar parties. What is wrong with me? Why do I do it? Why?!) This episode's framing device, called the "British Showbiz Awards", is a cheap affair, not like the overblown Oscars here. Off to the side behind a panel desk sit two men in a tux, and making their third appearance, a pantomime Goose  and a pantomime Princess Margaret, apparently the VIP judges/presenters. In a caption, pantomime Princess Margaret is referred to as "Her Royal Highness The Dummy Princess Margaret". Walking through long strips of glittery tinsel, Idle steps out in a tux and a non-hair piece that looks pretty awesome. Make-up is stepping up their game.

Idle, as Dickie Attenborough, gives a speech that must have been written by a blender, with tortured phrases wandering in and out of each other. "... A guest who has not only done only more than not anyone, for our Society, but nonetheless has only done more." All this nonsense spoken with such emphasis and import, you are almost convinced he is actually saying something. Adding to the pathos, Idle pulls out an onion and wedges it beneath his eyes, eliciting tears.

The tears... the urn... the bowtie...

In prophetic shades of Chapman, Idle introduces a dead guest presenter, which is brought out in a bow-tie wearing urn. Fortunately, the urn can speak (if only Chapman's could), and announces the nominees-- Edward Heath (with some actual footage of some protestor throwing ink at him), the newscaster who said "Lemon Curry" in the Salad Days episode, and some group (it's hard to hear Palin from inside the urn) for the Oscar Wilde sketch, which we now get to see.

And oh, it's a sweet one! One of their best.The set-up is simple. Victorian era raconteurs Oscar Wilde, James Whistler and George Bernard Shaw are hanging out with the Prince of Wales. They lob bon mots back and forth at each other, some of which land beautifully, some of which fail spectacularly, some of which are rip offs of the ones that land beautifully, all in an effort to amuse and flatter the Prince of Wales. It's a wonderfully written set-up, establishing, through humor and conflict, the lion's den nature of the Victorian salon. Chapman is exquisite as Oscar Wilde, a part he was born to play. Things go south very suddenly, when Wilde attempts to flatter Prince Eddy. "Your Majesty is like a big jam donut with cream on the top." When this fails to get a laugh, for obvious reasons, the Prince starts to get offended. Trying to save his bacon, Wilde points at Cleese. "It was one of Whistler's!" Now Whistler has to salvage the insult. "What I meant was that, like a donut, your arrival gives us pleasure, and your departure only makes us hungry for more." Well saved, Whistler. But now it's Whistler's turn. "Your Highness, you are also like a stream of bat's piss... It was one of Wilde's." Wilde puts it off on Shaw, who saves it. But then Whistler and Wilde team up against Shaw, ("You bastards!" Shaw protests, like Dickens did last week,) and Shaw's response-- a raspberry-- reveals the honest core of all comedy. Underneath all that wit and wordplay, we're all really just giving each other raspberries. It's such an exquisite sketch on so many layers, it's a shame it had to be so short, but brevity is the soul of wit. (It was one of Wilde's!)

Gilliam keeps the party going, with pans of photos of the most happening scenes in London, black and white photos painted with occasional muted swaths of color, reminiscent of the early Saturday Night Live credits. We finally zero in on a glamorous couple. The slightly anxious but smiling lady, voiced by Cleveland, excuses herself to powder her nose. but once she disappears into the bathroom, the most ungodly sounds come out of there. (Speaking of raspberries!) Finally, after a veritable symphony of excreta, the lady comes out, looking as glamorous and anxious as ever. "Much better."

Then the party is broken up by CharWoman, the latest Gilliam superhero, a bare-breasted Tarzan-like woman who swings on a vine through this party, knocking the pretentious social climbers aside, and through London itself. "Charwoman!" Idle's voice over announces. "Sweeping away the last remnants of male chauvinism!" This seems more like a dig at aggressive feminism than at male chauvinism, as Charwoman beats her huge, bra-less breasts, until her nipples explode (presumably with delight.) Given the "in-your-face" sexuality of this bit, you have to wonder how the BBC ever got around to cutting anything.

Back at the awards show, Idle's host is now wearing bunches of onions around his neck as he introduces the next guest-- David Niven's fridge, also donning a bow-tie. The fridge can speak as well, and it announces the nominees for best director-- all of whom are Richard Attenborough (Idle), under thinly disguised psuedonyms. As he squirts tears from a bottle down his own face, Idle shows us a clip from the film that won't win, Pier Pasolini's "The Third Test Match".

This film, about cricket, shows many indie angles of a cricket match. Jones plays the bowler, under heightened stress as he sees visions of death, religion and sex. This is Jones doing his auteur thing, and pretty successfully, too. He rubs the ball against his thigh, eliciting orgasmic chirps from female spectators, all dubbed. He finally manages what I assume to be a successful pitch (I understand cricket a little less than I understand Pasolini,) loping over fornicating couples in the grass. He appeals to the judge, a Catholic bishop (played by Palin) who laughs maniacally.

Now there's a talk show called Back Chat, where a cricket team confronts Pasoline (Cleese) complaining about the lack of realism. "There's lots of people making love, but no mention of Geoff Boycott's average," they complain. "Who is Geoff Boycott?" Pasolini asks. Personally, I'm with Pasolini. This is actually a funny and smart bit, but it's hard to hear. Palin concedes that a famous cricketer works as a Marxist symbol, but what about his off-breaks?

A Pepperpot sketch follows, with Chapman and Jones this time. Both of the ladies are named Mrs. Zambesi. They turn off Pasolini and the awards show, and discuss the merits of giving blood. Silliness ensues. When the conversation confuses Jones, they start to shop for a better brain. It's surprisingly easy-- and cheap. (There's some caption jokes about currency conversion and decimalization which make almost no sense to me, but which I will assume were funny in 1972.) We get a nice call back to the Summarize Proust episode as Chapman calls for the brain-- she has to confirm her shoe size. After Cleese, in a low tight robot voice and wielding a severed limb, announces that the doctor is coming, we get the doctor's dummy, and then the doctor himself, Palin,who brings along a mechanical external brain that gets strapped to Jones head. "Doesn't it go inside my head?" Jones asks. "No, you're thinking of the brainette major." This model is the roadster. There's a great bit were the calibrate the brain, Jones reciting gibberish as Palin turns knobs and adjusts dials. Finally, once they get it close enough for government work, Chapman pays Palin with mime money and Palin leaves (with departure announced by Cleese.) Chapman and Jones go for a walk, and clearly there's more calibrating to do, as Jones calls out inanities and insanities to passersby. One great gag-- she calls out "Stpling machine, Mrs. Worral." A lady neighbor, an identical mechanical brain strapped on her head, replies "Stapling machine, Mrs. Zambesi. They also pass some unexploded Scotsmen (last week?) and penguins on their way to the blood bank.

The Blood Bank sketch is a more ordered silliness. Idle whispers to harried doctor Cleese that he wants to give urine, instead of blood. "We have no call for it. We have quite enough of it without volunteers coming in here donating it." Idle did it! He finally got in the "Wee-Wee" sketch! Plus, he got Cleese to be his co-conspirator! Take that, censors! Cleese refuses to accept Idle's urine, or sweat or ear wax, until Idle finally agrees to give blood-- and he's already got it waiting in a jar. Cleese, suspicious, smells the blood. "This blood is mine!" To get back his blood, Cleese finally allows Idle to donate his precious amber bodily fluids. I like this sketch-- short, simple, silly, but not ostentatious in its silliness like the prior bit, it's a tiny little gem, well done by both Cleese and Idle.

 An odd bit follows. Palin plays an announcer out on a grassy racehorse course, but the event in question is wife swapping. (Laughs from the prior sketch drown out his intro, "Welcome to wifeswapping from Redcar." It makes everything that follows a bit opaque.) The wives are listed like racehorses, only without the silly names. "No. 14 Mrs. Casey" In fact, most of them are "Mrs." That's why they call it wife swapping, yo! Turning this tawdry 60s trend into a horse race is a funny idea, but it never really ignites. It feels more sophomoric than clever. It's also another shot in the teeth to woman's lib, turning sexual empowerment into the ultimate objectification. (Any Sopranos fans out there? Remember the episode where Tony refuses to sleep with Ralphie's mistress, because "I already took his horse"? Remember how angry the woman in question got? That's how much women like to be compared to livestock. I'm sure Charwoman would be outraged, if not for her exploded breasts.) A quick Benny Hill-esque filmed bit follows, with women angling across a narrow London street, going in and out of random houses, back and forth across the street, accompanied by commentary from Palin. "Mrs. Casey coming up fast on the inside, it's Mrs. Casey coming from behind..." The interview afterwards with the wife's abashed "owner" Mr. Casey is funny, if offensive; "She's been going very well in training..."

Next is the "team event." "Come Wifeswopping" is a take-off on a show called "Come Dancing", a BBC ballroom dancing competition show. Idle is the host, in yet another bald wig-- it's his scalp coming-out party-- and surrounded by beautiful gown wearing babes, he extolls the previous "dancers" with phrases like "you couldn't get a melon between them." Which means one thing when you're dancing, but when you're wife swapping-- it means pretty much the same thing.  Appropriately, we see a line of formally dressed men and women, with numbers on the males' backs. The music sets us up for a mambo, but after making us wait for a few seconds, the British reserve disappears, and the men lunge for the squealing women. In typical Python style, they're trying a lot of variations on this theme, but one is no funnier than the other. It all feels a bit rape-y.

She's asking for it.

Fear not! They have one more trick up their sleeve. The Rugby competition! Two teams line up for the scrum, but instead of fighting over a ball-- they're fighting over a conservatively dressed wife, Mrs. Colyer. The woman in question is a dummy, and she's tossed in like a sack of potatoes. Screams are inserted in voice over as she's stepped on, tossed and carried across the line for a score. I imagine the gang bang in the locker room will follow? Finally, the closing credits of the show, with footage of various match-ups in a screen split by four playing behind. In each of the screens, more traditional orgies play out, which is a relief. (Check out the lower right quadrant-- two ladies.)

Every once in a while, I have issues with tone, and this is one of those times. They're very silly and no one means any harm, but the objectification here, and the absence of a woman's perspective, gives this whole bit a slight whiff of hostility and violence towards women. Certainly, it's a take on the male need to turn everything into an event, as well as a jibe towards the sexual revolution and the so-called sophistication that accompanied it, but just as Shaw's raspberry is the true nature of all comedy, so the violent objectification of women is at the core of this bit. I want to like it, admire it for its "Picasso on a Bike" relentless exploration of a theme, and laugh at it (and I do laugh during the rugby scene-- I hate myself for laughing, but I can't help it) but it all comes too close to the "hate" end of the British love-hate relationship with women.
 

Back to the Showbiz Awards. Idle is literally pumping water out of  his eyes like a geyser, with two metal pipes at either side of his head. "There they go, the credits of the year," he weeps. After some goofball jokes, we get to the highlight of the show-- the Award for the Cast with the Most Awards Award. The cast of "The Dirty Vicar" sketch comes out on stage. There's Cleveland, and another busty woman in Victorian garb. There's Jones, as a vicar (he looks pretty clean to me,) and there's Chapman in a tux. Suddenly, Gilliam steps out in a German mountaineering outfit,with shorts, high socks and pick ax, folowed by two other men in tuxes. Having accepted their award from the dummy princess, they perform the sketch.

And it's terrible! Seriously. It's terrible. We've discussed in the past how material was written and chosen for the show. Chapman and Cleese would write fifteen or so pages, Palin and Jones would write 15 or more, and Idle would have about ten minutes of his own. That's 40 minutes of material right there, not counting titles, credits and Gilliam. They would have to throw out at least one quarter of their material, to fit the show length. Somehow, this horrible, embarrassing sketch, made the cut.

Let's summarize. Two proper Victorian ladies share tea and conversation. Chapman the butler announces that the new vicar has arrived. As he obsequiously goes to fetch him, in the scene's one spasm of inspiration, Gilliam and the two tuxes wander in happily. They realize they're on the wrong set, and run out. Very nice. It's all downhill from here. Jones the vicar arrives, goosing Chapman, who screeches like a pepperpot. He spots the non-Cleveland lady, grunts "What a lovely bit of stuff!" and proceeds to rape her, tearing off her blouse, throwing her over the back of the settee. Ignoring her friend's screams, Cleveland pours tea like nothing's happening. The vicar then goes after Cleveland, saying "I like tits!" He rips her blouse open, grabs her. Then he comes to his senses, apologizing. "First time in my new parish, and I completely lost my head."  Both ladies are prepared to forget the unpleasantness ever happened, and they pour him some tea. Polite conversation lasts about a thirty seconds before Vicar Hyde returns, assaulting Cleveland and throwing her to the ground. (Cleveland's screams of protest are funny-- they sound a lot like Christopher Lloyd's death scene in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" At this point, Idle walks in as Dickie, to end the sketch. The cast takes their collective bow, the ladies scarcely bothering to cover their exposed under garments.

For the record, I get the whole "camp" ethos, how sometimes something is so bad that it's good, and we occasionally see the lads trolling these waters. But there is just nothing to recommend this sketch. There's no motivation, little structure, and apart from Gilliam's gaffe, nothing new or inspired about it. Perhaps it's trying to be a "fart in the Vatican" kind of thing, but Jones isn't human for long enough to experience any real mortification, and Cleveland and the other one never acknowledge the offense. Consequently, the whole sketch just seems churlish and mean, with Jones the rapacious id having his way with gorgeous but unwilling women, and the women are complicit in their own ravaging because they are slaves to propriety. The fact that the lads knew it was a bad sketch is revealed by the honors it receives in this bullshit awards show, but that doesn't mean that we had to watch it.

In an example of art imitating art, Idle steps out to end the award show. Like this particular episode, his closing speech is the low point of his oratory, unfunny and not particularly bombastic. He finishes to silence, looks around to the other actors-- "Are we done?"-- and the lights fade out.

And thus ends Season 3, the last episode of the last season in which Cleese still performs. Cleese's departure from the group only extended to the TV show. He still worked with them on the live shows, the albums, the books, and of course, the movies. But the character of the TV show would forever change with Cleese's departure, in ways both good and bad. On the plus side, Gilliam would step up as a performer. On the minus side, there would be no Apollonian sensibility to stand in the way of the randomness of Palin, or the chaos of Jones.

Goodbye

But before we move on, we still have more "vintage" Python to celebrate. I'm talking the German shows! Twenty five years after Germany attempted to invade England-- Monty Python returns the favor!

Next Week; The Lost German Episodes!

Episode 38 - A Book at Bedtime

The Einstein of Penguins!

"Would Albert Einstein ever have hit upon the theory of relativity, if he hadn't been clever?" - John Cleese as Presenter.

Welcome back to the Python blog, which will trudge tirelessly through the televised body of work that is Monty Python's Flying Circus, examining the peaks and the valleys with equal fervor, creating a portrait of the creative life of an ensemble of semi-geniuses. While it may suck the fun out of the show like marrow from a bone, while it may seem like a death march as we press forward to the end, still we do it, in the hopes that some of you will be inspired to buy the goddam box set! Seriously. I should have gotten a thank you note from one of them by now.

In last week's "Dennis Moore", we were treated to something new-- a framing device for the overall show that had its own narrative momentum and build, with the other, shorter, slighter bits giving us a brief break for the purposes of variety and time lapsing. Would the lads do it again, it having worked so well?

Nnnnnno. Monty Python don't play that. You think they're gonna do something again, just because it worked? Noooo! That would get in the way of trying new things. And even if those things aren't quite new, well, at least they're trying to try new things, right? They were locked into random, into silly. Even though the "Dennis Moore" paradigm is what the lads would turn to when they started to make their narrative movies, they were not ready or willing to saddle themselves to the yoke of predictable forward progression, no matter how malleable or wonderful that progression could be.

Like I said-- semi-geniuses.

A and E quality control department

Ironically, the "new" that the lads hew to isn't, really. New. The targets of this show-- penguins, loonies, Scotsman-- have been drawn on before. Still, we get some interesting twists and variations, and overall a pretty funny show. Yet, for some reason surpassing any understanding, this is the tragic "lost episode", wherein a good five minutes of the show have been removed. The missing sketches (there are two of them) don't seem particularly egregious-- in fact, one of them is just silly-- and certainly, edgier material can be seen in other intact episodes. Just one of those things, and I think somebody with resources and a love of artistic completeness should get on this and issue a DVD with the complete episode. Let's check out what's left! 

We start with an incredibly jarring opening-- the titles! No pre-titles bit, no Nude Organist, no Cleese-ian "And now..." and no "It's Man". "Let's get past all that nonsense and get to the meat," the lads seem to be saying. Only the lads never said it. They had a pre-titles bit, and it somehow didn't make it onto the reruns of the show, nor the A and E re-issue. What we don't see is Cleese, as a politician, addressing the television audience. In the middle, he starts to do a strange (silly) dance. He goes up on his lines, and the choreographer, Idle, steps in to enthusiastically walk him through the routine, lines and all. There's a great exchange where the bashful Cleese says "I can do it when you're here," and Idle fondly pats his cheek and reassures "I won't be far away." As Cleese finishes his routine, the rest of the lads do a pretty impressive kick line behind him, singing their party lines. We pan across to the rival party rehearsing their response, and animation of Edward Heath at the bar practicing plies. Then we get the Nude Organist, ostensibly accompanying a rehearsal, and then we get Cleese and Palin doing their thing. To see what I so poorly described, Click Here. 

"A Book at Bedtime" a title reads, and Palin sits in a dramatically dim yet somehow soothing room, a la Alastair Cook. Idle introduces him in voice over, and with all due (and more than due) respect, Palin greets the audience, and starts to read. Only, he can't. At all. He's tripped up first by the word "sunset". Cleese steps out from the wings, giving Palin a reproving glance; "How did you get this gig?" He takes the book, and reads perfectly-- until he gets to beyond where Palin read, and every word trips him up as well. The book in question, "Redgauntlet" by Sir Walter Scott, deals with Scottish pipers on the battlements of Edinburgh Castle, which only matters in the next sketch. (Shout out to my daughter, who took me walking through Edinburgh and around its castle when I visited her at nearby St. Andrew's U. If you've never had a pint with your daughter, it's one of the true glories of fatherhood.) Insofar as the sketch goes, the pattern has been established, and the lads play it out. Idle joins them, then Chapman as a technician, a make-up girl, all struggling with the simplest words. It's great to see Palin stammering, as his lower jaw begins to jut out, and we see a little Gumby peeking through. But mostly, it looks like the lads are having fun playing off each other. It's a nice little bit, and not so little actually, as we'll see.

We cut to the battlements ("bat-tull-leh-ments!") in question, and sure enough, there is a lone piper--  who suddenly leaps off, screaming, and hitting the ground. The Pythons are throwing dummies off a building again, and dammit, it never gets old. Inside, Jones is herding a line of kilt-wearing, bagpipe playing Scotsman towards the open window, where they (as we see) get out on the ledge and leap off. Palin's voice over, spectacularly Scottish, explains that this is the "Queen's Own McKamikaze Highlanders", so successful that their numbers have dwindled from 10,000 to 1,000 in just under a month. When asked why they do it, recruits say "The water skiing's good."

We've all seen the armed service commercials, the ones that claim they will make you superhuman if you join up and let them have you killed. Back in the 60s/70s, when there was a vicious war going on in Southeast Asia, we marketed the army as a fun place where you would learn all these groovy skills, like music and flying your own plane. These commercials were designed to lure the stupid into letting the army kill you. This sketch spoofs this remarkably well, at the same time as it allows the Pythons to release some of their irrational contempt for the Scottish. (I hope some interviewer has the stones someday to ask one of the lads, otherwise extraordinarily liberal, what they had against Scotland and Australia.)

Now the sketch gets a little sick, as Cleese steps in with a job for the remaining regiment. (I'm sorry, not a job-- an adventure!) But even as he tries to explain the mission, the regiment survival rate keeps dropping (with the regiment) as the lined up Scotsman leap out of the window, one by one. "We've got a job for your five lads," Cleese says. A man screams to his death, and Jones barks out "Four, sir!", and to the next man in line, "Good luck, Taggart."  Cleese, alarmed, asks if maybe they shouldn't halt the training. "They have to be trained, sir," Jones responds, and sends another Scotsman to his death. Finally, there's only one left-- Chapman, who struggles rabidly to get to the window, locked in a state of "Itsubishi Kyoko McSayonara." With no clue as to how to snap him out of his frenzy, (the Kamikaze instructor Yakamoto never made it off the airport-- niiice! Jones has all these great lines, but you can hardly hear or make sense of them. He seems to be where great material goes to die. Still, in his defense, he's playing the beat and not the joke. That's what they call acting.)

As they wonder how to break Chapman out of the state, we get a nice little cut away of Palin walking into a strip mall kind of shop for the Kamikaze Advice Centre-- which is basically a door leading out of a tall building.

Now things get strange. With Chapman struggling beneath Jones, Cleese says that there's "no time to lose." The phrase completely flummoxes Jones, and he can get no sense of what it means or how to use it, in the vernacular of our times. The audience seems to be flummoxed as well, as the laughs die off rather precipitously. They hang in there, though, as Jones tries to fit in. "We'll be able to make time, eventually, without to lose, sir, no." As he's clearly not getting the hang of it, we cut to the tutorial.

Palin, in the same outfit as before when he sought advice on Kamikaze (and look how well that ended,) walks into an identical strip mall storefront, with one key difference. This time, the sign reads "No Time To Lose Advice Centre." (They still misspelled "center", though.) There is a strange looking cross between a dinosaur and a dough boy to the left of the door, soliciting donations whilst perched on a box. Anyone know what that is? See, these are the kinds of OCD paydays you get when you watch it and pause it ad nauseum. I do the obsessing so you don't have to.

Inside, in an office identical to the previous office, Palin meets Idle, who greets him with "Good morning. No time to lose." The sketch is basically a bunch of silly ways for Idle to display the phrase, my favorite being a pop-up paper sign that he bursts through like a football team. (Although the back of his jacket is pretty good, and Idle is very limber. I'm sorry, limbre.) Still, Palin can't get it. Jones and Palin are the poor thespians once again, unable to get their lines right. Idle finally resorts to line readings, evoking "To lose-- like Toulouse in France."

That brings us to a short but classic animated bit-- "No-Time Toulouse" about "the wild and lawless days of the post-Impressionists." I'll say this-- it's a gag about being short. But it's very funny and beautifully done.

Back to the bat-tull-leh-ments-- Chapman still tries to kill himself, grabbing a saw and going at his own neck. Cleese finally manages to assign the mission, Jones finally gets the phrase right (to Idle's admiration,) and we finally get to the action. The mission is extraordinarily dangerous-- but only for the suicidal Chapman, who keeps trying to kill himself as he's transported to the mission site.

In a great bit, he leaps off the back of the truck, runs in front of it and lays down, only to be missed by the tires. Chapman actually did this, according to Kim "Howard" Johnson's book, and he did it while drunk and shaking, which makes it all the more harrowing. In the context of the sketch, though, it's hysterical. Finally, Cleese debriefs on the mission goals in a very silly speech. The debrief-ee turns out to be his mother, knitting and disinterested.

Back to "A Book at Bedtime"- yes, it's a framing device!-- Palin still stutters and stammers through the book, surrounded by a vast and ever growing mob of equally illiterate techies, one who carries a stuffed flamingo. This takes us to a Gilliamination, a classic bit-- we blaze a trail across a map of Europe in an Indiana Jones-ish route line. The map cracks down the middle like an egg. The route line falls down through the darkness, through the subterranean bowels of the earth, stopping, at last, in a craggy, dry landscape. A hairy ape-like figure who walks on two legs approaches the route line, which looks now like a black pole, and touches it, seeing a bright light high above it. A celestial chorus sings.

Yes! It is the Dawn of Man! For the second time, Gilliam is taking a whack at 2001: A Space Odyssey. In this great slow burn spoof, Gilliam plays out the scene, already iconic only three years after it was first seen. The Ape, frightened by the light, races away from the black pole to a pile of bones. It gets an idea, complete with the proverbial light bulb, and starts to smash the bones with the club like femur bone, in slow motion. Finally, in close-up, it tosses the femur up into the air-- and it transforms magically into a space ship, shaped like a femur. A classical waltz plays as we slowly pan out-- but the waltz warbles, the space ship wobbles, and drops abruptly out of orbit-- landing on the ape! Ah, well done, Mr. Gilliam!

Next we get a nice little bit about penguins, and Australians. Cleese starts us off with a breathless but very funny monologue about science, then segues us over to the main story-- there's a new study being done about penguins. Chapman, the Australian head of the study, explains his theory that penguins are smarter than humans. The fact that human brains are larger doesn't stop him. He just makes the penguins the same size as humans, and as a result-- the penguin's brain is still smaller. "But," Chapman insists, "it's larger than it was before!" Woven with all of this is the theme of tennis. The doctors are speaking from tennis courts, locker rooms, the showers. And of course, they're all Australian. Finally, in a ground-breaking experiment, penguins are asked simple math questions. They get no answers correct (as determined by a tennis judge.) But when the scientits ask the same question to non-English speakers, in the same conditions (a penguin habitat at the zoo), the results are equally non-right. This proves that Penguins are as smart as non-English speakers, and smarter than BBC program planners (aka "programme planners"). Soon, there is a rush on filling the less intellectually taxing jobs (such as royal consort and President of the United States) with penguins, who will work for fish. Although this lacks the overall brilliance of Doug and Bob Dinsdale or the Mice Problem, it's still pretty good, and the tennis is woven in pretty well.

We cut to the Russo-Polish border, where a penguin works as a guard. Jones is driving suicidal Scotsman Chapman into Russia. (A nice gag shows a sign that is misspelled and corrected, in keeping with Palon's "Book at Bedtime" misreading of the same word.)  Cleese and Idle as two Russian generals, pore over some important documents-- when a bagpipe playing Scotsman appears in shadow at the skylight. A crash, and Chapman lies on the documents, ticking like a bomb and twitching like a drunk. They call the Unexploded Scotsman Disposal Squad, which is busy defusing another Scotsman in a field. In a series of tense close-ups, we see Jones and Palin sweating over the Scotsman, until they finally manage to defuse it-- by taking off his head and dumping it in a bucket of Vodka (which is subtitled "Whiskey".) The Scotsman doesn't seem to mind, gurgling musically in the fine fluid.

The final image links us to "Spot the Looney!", a very close cousin to last week's "Ideal Loon Exhibition", this time in the context of a game show. Contestants are tasked to press a buzzer when they "spot the loony" (or loonies.) As with "Blackmail" or last week's "Prejudice", the fun is the variations on the theme. My favorite is the big finish-- a production of "Ivanhoe" turns out to be five loonies in front of a hospital admission counter-- the looney is the writer, Sir Walter Scott. Scott blames it on Dickens, who cries out "You bastard!" (Shades of next week's Oscar Wilde sketch.)

If that sketch seemed a bit well worn for Python, the next is brilliant. Cleese plays a documentarian, holding a hand mic against a glorious wooded landscape. His subject, Sir Walter Scott (of "Redgauntlet" and "Ivanhoe" fame.) But no sooner do we get comfortable then Palin steps in and asks to borrow the mic. Befuddled, Cleese gives it to Palin-- and Palin walks off to do his own documentary, on the Forestry Commission. Cleese shamefacedly tries to get his mic back, but Alpha documentarian Palin won't budge, just walks off right, drawing the camera with him. Finally, Cleese grabs it,

continuing with Walter Scott. Palin grabs it back, Cleese tackles him, and now they wrestle each other, getting in a few lines before losing the mic. Cleese manages to affect a cutaway to a Walter Scott expert. There, before university walls, a goateed Chapman talks literature-- until Jones' pudgy hand sneaks in from behind a pillar and takes his mic, getting back to forestry. Cleese drives up, snatching the mic from Jones, but he's being chased by Palin's car. Thrilling music accompanies the car chase, anbd we get some Jackie Chan action from Palin, who stands on the sideboard of his car to grab the mic from Cleese, while the cars are in motion. The back and forth continues around a bend, and we hear a crash. The camera obediently wobbles. This is where competition for resources gets you. Let's socialize microphones!

Back to "A Book at Bedtime". An even larger crowd surrounds Palin in his chair, including a camera and an unexploded but ticking Scotsman. "The End", Palin finally works out. A "The Graduate" silence falls over the group-- "Was it worth it?" Over the closing credits, various loonies are spotted, including Edward Heath and the people that nominated him, supposedly. And past-credits, over the BBC globe logo, Idle promises us next week's book at bedtime will be "Black Buh.. Black Bad... "Black Bottom... Black buh-eeee-..." You get the idea.

Furthermore, at the end of the episode, there should have been Idle announcing other television offerings over the BBC globe. Shows promoted include "Dad's Doctors", "Dad's Pooves", "The Ratings Game" "Up the Palace" and "Limestone Dear Limestone". These shows are described with funny pictures, and can be read about HERE.  To be frank, we didn't miss much from this brief and overdone bit, but still-- if you buy the complete series, you want the complete series, A and E! (To be fair, I don't think that A and E is guilty of censorship-- just sloppiness.)

A fine episode, overall, and though it lacks the inspiration of some of the prior efforts, it still manages to land most of the time, and the Kamikaze Scotsman conceit, while comically uneven, still seems fresh and daring. And, of course, they end with the mic bit, one of the strongest sketches in weeks. Even without all the removed bits, the show succeeds very well. And oh, my God--

There's only one left of the season! No time to lose!

Next week; Grandstand!