Episode 42 - The Light Entertainment Wars

"The enemy are not only fighting his war on the cheap, but they're also not taking it seriously... doing very silly things in one of the most vital areas of the war!" -  Graham Chapman as General Shirley 

This is the third of the six episodes Monty Python shot in the fourth and final series, without John Cleese. I've been looking around for anecdotes about this show, and have found very few. No one seems to have much by way of recollections about this particular episode. And frankly, I can't remember ever having seen it. I know that Cleese gets an writing credit, as does, for the first time, Neil Innes, who collaborated this week on the television show itself. But apart from that, I have little to add to just watching the damn thing, so let's. Get the box set, yadda-yadda.

We start with Palin and Jones (of course) as two very happy go lucky hobos walking down the street. Palin finds butts on the sidewalk, while Jones is more interested in playfully mocking passers-by. This is all for a TV show called "Up Your Pavement". There's a nice visual gag, when Palin and Jones root through a trash bin. Palin pulls out a soggy sandwich, while Jones pulls out an unopened bottle of champagne, complete with two glasses. But there's something new here, as well-- original music. A New Orleans style horn section plays a ditty called "How Does a Dream Begin?" penned by Innes. We don't know the song's title yet, but that's the song. Palin's giddy voice over starts up-- "It's with these two ha-ha-happy go luck rogues that our story begins..." (See? I told you they were happy go lucky.) As Palin and Jones walk off screen--

SCREEECH! They are run over by James Bond-ian Chapman. We think it's his story now, but-- it's his lumbago surgeon's story-- or the surgeon's neighbor, a Naval officer. Or his daughter. Or the voyeur that haunts her woman's college, who is also a hen teaser... it goes on from there, a dizzying relay of main characters and their stories, but after  3 1/2 minutes, it finally lands, appropriately enough, on an RAF landing field in 1944 England. (sigh of relief.) Nice meta bit there-- we've seen it before, with the Science Fiction sketch from season 1, as well as in a few "show so far" segments, but in this context, the switching off of main characters, it goes to a new level. Nice. But we are assured by Palin's voice over that this is really the story we're about to unfold.

In an corrugated metal hut, Jones reads a magazine. Idle comes in with some Biggles-ian banter--  "Bally Jerry took a waspy, flipped over his Betty Harper's and caught his can in the Bertie,"--, that proves to be incomprehensible to the captain Jones. Jones and Chapman have their own banter, which makes no sense to Idle, but Chapman doesn't understand Idle any better than Jones. The banter itself is silly greatness, and gets greater when Palin comes in. "Bunch of monkeys on your ceiling, sir! Grab your egg and fours and let's get the bacon delivered!" he yells. Even Idle doesn't understand him. As they try to suss it out, the Germans attack, dropping cabbage crates all over London. Yes, cabbage crates. It turns out that Palin's banter-y line "Cabbage crates coming over the briny" wasn't all that banter-y.

News footage and Idle's voice over gives us the whole A and E treatment, before we cut to Chapman as a General, getting news from the front-- the Germans are dropping cabbages instead of bombs, wearing fairy costumes at the front, and instead of rifles, they've got spiders in matchboxes, enticing the enemy. They're not taking this war seriously. There's a nice visual gag (pardon the pun) when corporal Idle finishes his debrief, Chapman says "Thank you, Shirley." This would be funny if Idle's name were Shirley, but then a woman in a WAAF outfit emerges from under Chapman's desk. Chapman rises (again), accompanied by the strains of Elgar's "Pomp and Circumstance", and promises that "anyone found trivializing this war will face the supreme penalty military justice can provide." A quick pull back shows us he's just saying this for the cameras.

Next, a military tribunal. Idle is in the dock, for ignoring his expensive rifle and attacking the enemy with a wet towel. But things unravel quickly. Palin mentions that the crime took place in Basingstoke. The Judge, Jones, interrupts him with questions about how Germany should have a town called Basingstoke. Palin reveals that the map (which names the town as Basingstoke) was made by Cole Porter. Not the Cole Porter we know and love, but a more obscure Cole Porter who wrote "Anything Goes". Not that "Anything Goes". Now Palin has to sing this strange song to the judge. Idle asks if he can go home. The lyrics are below;
"AnyTHING goes in
AnyTHING goes out
Fish, bananas, old pajamas,
Mutton, beef and trout!"
Yep, that's definitely not the Cole Porter we know. Satisfied, Jones allows the trail to proceed.

That blur n the right is the skating vicar. 

But wait! More distractions! Idle was wearing a pair of expensive gaiters (a lower leg covering). Jones wants to know why they were so expensive. And off we go on the gaiters. This feels much like a Palin sketch, where an authority figure is thwarted by some loser's OCD, but it doesn't work as well in this context as well as it did in, say, the argument between Arthur and Dennis in "Holy Grail". Who is the authority figure? It should be the Judge, but the Judge is the OCD loser, and he's not really. Kind of a mess. The details are funny, but the dynamic is just irritating. Do these clowns have a sketch to do, or don't they? Even Idle, purportedly the subject of this sketch, wants to go home. We finally get to a comedic cul-de-sac, as Jones persists in knowing why the gaiters were so expensive and why Idle had them-- turns out he performed sexual favors for the others in his unit. Even for Jones, this is TMI. Jones asks Idle for a statement, and Idle gives a well-reasoned assessment of the hypocrisy of military action. Gilliam, as Idle's attorney, objects that his client is being pretentious, and Palin objects, and then Jones brings the hammer down. "I'm in charge of this courtroom," he insists, and orders up a pixie-hatted musical number of "AnyTHING Goes", complete with hand gestures and choreography and a skating vicar. That'll teach 'em not to trivialize the war!

 A retro "Coming Attraction" clip, with tutu-wearing soldiers storming a beach, and a soap-opera-ic bisexual love triangle that devolves into bi-species and quad-species stories, fades out with an exhausted narrating Palin saying "Uh... and everything. Don't miss it!" A Gilliam-esque hairy ape with a fairy voice announces, with the Nude Organist and the "It's Man", the titles. It's the first time we've seen either Organist or "It's", and noticeably absent is Cleese's "And now..." Continuity, only without the continuity.

Just before we get to the final foot smooshing the half-a-troll, we cut to a sitting room. Jones and Chapman, as two upper class pepperpots, watch television from the couch. The foot comes down on their TV screen. Standing next to the TV is Gilliam, looking like an

 Indian slave in turban and loin cloth and nothing else. The turban has wires dangling from it. "Up Your Pavement" starts up. The ladies watch it for quite a while before Chapman complains "Bloody repeats!" She presses the clicker-- which sends an electric shock through Gilliam. Spasming, he changes the channel, then resumes his place. Nice visual gag, that!

Jones, ever the performer, talks over the huge laugh Gilliam's torture receives, but she basically complains. (She uses the word "micturate", which is my second Big Lebowski reference of this post.) Chapman is offended, as programming executives treat the public like idiots. "Well, we are idiots," Jones confesses, and as proof, shows clips of her being an idiot. The clips are pretty funny. Get Jones away from a live audience, and he can do some serious damage.

At this point, we cut to Jones (freaky-- we were just on Jones!) in a mustache and suit with a button on the lapel, proving him to be a "Chief TV Planner", looking down on Jones (told you-- freaky!) in the parking lot acting silly. "The public are idiots," Jones mutters. We might just as well show them the last five miles of the M2" (a road in England) "they'd watch it." Sure enough, back with Chapman and Jones as the upper class pepperpots in the sitting room, they're happily watching the traffic on the M2, pleased it's not more of the same old thing.

Back at the TV planning session, we find out who the real idiots are. Idle, Chapman, Palin and Jones hash out ideas for shows based on motorways, only they don't want to spend money on new shows, so they decide to retitle the old shows. They brainstorm new title ideas, all of them silly, while someone knocks on the door. Whenever Idle says "Someone's knocking at the door," Jones replies "No, that title's too long." When Gilliam, on the other side, screams "Open the sodding door!"

Jones rejects the title-- you can't say "sodding" on television. Finally, Gilliam rolls in, a sword through his head, with the news that the World War series isn't "taking it seriously anymore." When Palin goes to check the TV news, he bumps Gilliam's sword. "Mind me war wound!" Gilliam bellows. There's a nice thematic through line here, of the younger generations rejection of canonizing past national traumas. We could do with a little of that over here in the states. It's not translating into any great sketches or lines, but I still appreciate it.

We get a Gilliamination here-- a "feature", if you will, and the first substantial bit of this season. We start with BBCs Television Center, rocking and bucking all over the place. A man (who looks remarkably like a bald John Cleese) enters and grumpily complains about all the war series they do over there. As he walks home, bombs drop around him, all of them duds, hitting the ground with a flatulent plop. Just before he gets home, he spots the evening star, and wishes for a good day tomorrow. He then goes to sleep-- but the evening star, having heard his wish, has turned the area around his home into a construction zone, building the requested beautiful day. When the man wakes up, he has a moment to appreciate the day-- before dropping dead from exhaustion. Terribly linear for Gilliam, and longer than it should be, but nice nonetheless.

We cut to a manor house, croquet wickets and sticks on the lawn, and a title that, after four tries, finally identifies the place as 1942 England. An 40's jazz song that sounds like it belongs in the credits of a Woody Allen film plays in the background. We go inside to see how the other half lives--
Chapman, Cleveland (Chapman's daughter) and Idle (Chapman's wife) in the sitting room, staring out from their various seating appliances, bored and still, in 20's attire. Behind them, the staff in waiting stands waiting-- one of them, the maid on the left, wearing sunglasses for some reason. Cleveland pours tea-- why she doesn't let the staff behind them do the pouring is beyond me, they're just standing there, and they must be expensive-- and Chapman, having nothing better to say, comments on how nice the croquet hoops are coming along this year. The trio agrees that wood hoops are better than tin hoops. This inane chitchat runs its course. "Gorn," Chapman explains, filling the silence. But he soon confesses that word "Gorn" gives him confidence. Soon, the three are categorizing words as either "woody" (good) or "tinny" (bad-- egregious and unconscionable). After chasing Cleveland out with accusations of "tinny", Chapman discovers that most lewd words are "woody" (They certainly can inspire wood) with the exception of "tit" (tinny). (I love tinny tits.) He gets a bit carried away rattling the lewd words off, and Idle has to douse him with a bucket of water. Then he shoots a caribou (woody) and heads of to fire the servant Simkins (tinny) and take a bath to break the boredom.

Early in Python's childhood, Cleese and Chapman would claim that many of their sketches began with a word that they found funny. For instance, "plummet" amused them, and as they discussed why, they came up with the flying sheep sketch. This sketch, while it never really gets going, feels like a transcript from a Chapman/Cleese writing session. Most of the fun of the sketch, as performed, is Chapman chewing over the various words he comes up with. "Gohhhhhrnnnnn." "Prrrrrrrobing." But it feels kind of like filler.

No fear! Palin steps in as the WW2 pilot. "Cabbage crates coming in over the briny" makes as little sense to Idle as it made before. Palin calls back the caribou, the woody sound of "She's gone off" and the tepid bath joke. Idle, out of nowhere, asks Palin to sing a song. "Okay," he agrees. If you're guessing that he'll sing "AnyTHING Goes", you're wrong. He sings "She's Going to Marry Yum-Yum" (from Gilbert and Sullivan's "The Mikado"), only he cozies up to her and then screams it, killing her instantly. "Crikey! The old song finished her off!" "What a blow for her," Chapman sighs when he re-enters and discovers his dead wife. This Orton-esque line gets a big laugh from the audience.

Suddenly, the sitting room is on the TV of the upper-class pepperpots, with Gilliam still standing by. They complain about why they're showing this "crap", when "there's still bits of the Leicester by pass what have never been shown." They change channels again, and the byway appears on screen, with a tally of what cars have appeared that day. Another channel change, and they see themselves complaining about the repeats. They, in turn, complain about the repeats. It's M.C. Esher's Flying Circus! Finally, they get to "Show Jumping", which the pepperpots call "Motor-Cross", to great hilarity incomprehensible to me.

"Show Jumping" is horses jumping over large musical casts, narrated by Idle as Dorian Williams, a horse jumping commentator in England, with special guest star, actual show jumper Marion Mould. This feels like another stab at the preemptive pony shows from the second year. The first show jumped is "The Sound of Music". They line up the huge cast, Maria starts to sing, and the horse trots towards them--

We cut to the pepperpots watching--

And the jump has been successfully made (off screen, of course). Chapman actually comments on it-- "You notice how we never actually see the horses jump?" But Python is all about rule breaking, even the rules they make. The Black and White Minstrel Show is next (a show that ran on the BBC from 1958-1978! Suddenly, the "Niggerbaiter" name seems more contextualized.) and the horse actually jumps this cast, although they are all clearly dummies. (They'd have to be, to be in that show.) The commentary tells us that the horse "just flicked Leslie Crowther with her tail", which is kind of ironic-- Leslie Crowther was a comedian who flipped his car and had a bunch of blood clots end his career. Anyway, back to the real jokes-- next up is the cast of Ben Hur. Chapman predicts "Bet we don't see this one." The horse runs towards the camera--

And real newscaster Peter Woods cuts in with an urgent bulletin-- WW2 has just gotten sentimental. "The Germans started spooning at dawn. The British Fifth Army responded by gazing deeply into their eyes, and the Germans are reported to have gone all coy." We cut to old footage of, I believe, Neil Innes, in WW2 uniform, singing to a woman (Shirley?) also in uniform, both standing in front of a plane. I've embedded it below (thanks, YouTube and ivorykisses!) The girl goes all coy, looking away, so that Neil has to keep grabbing her chin and pulling it back. Truth to tell, she seems more disinterested than coy-- she's just not into you, Neil!

So the song frames the show, and another episode comes to a close. This one, like Michael Ellis, had some nice moments, but they seem to be unable to really land the whole enterprise. It's all nice enough, and silly enough, but it lacks the pointedness or anger of prior Python shows. Still, the commentary on depictions of the war is great, and jumping over casts is also a lot of fun. Some fascinating new discoveries are coming to light, even as we can admit that the shows are a bit sub-par.

Next week; "Hamlet"!

Episode 41 - Michael Ellis

"Look on my feelers, termites, and despair!" -  Terry Gilliam as Percy Bysshe Shelley

Yes, John Cleese had left the building, and was no longer involved with Monty Python. Or had he?

Although Monty Python's Flying Circus has often been compared to rock bands such as the Beatles, they sure didn't break up like a rock band. No bitter acrimony, no press wars, no single albums... and no break up, Earlier in the year 1974, when the fourth "series" (aka "season") taped and aired, Monty Python (including John Cleese) had performed on London's West End to great acclaim and box office. The lads were also hard at work on an original feature, their first, written exclusively for the big screen. Cleese's separation from the troupe was limited to television. In all other respects, he was still a part of the Limited Partnership known as Python (Monty) Pictures. It's to the credit of the lads that they were foresighted enough to think in terms beyond the television show.

From this delightful murkiness which forbids the total exclusion of John Cleese from anything Monty Python does emerges this episode, much of it written by Cleese and Chapman for an earlier draft of "Monty Python and the Holy Grail". In that draft, King Arthur's search leads him to a modern mall in London, the Holy Grail Mall. (I suppose now he'd just order it up on Amazon.) This was before Palin came up with the coconuts gag, which clarified for everyone that the movie should be set primarily in medieval England. Once the coconuts were in, much of Cleese's mall material was out, and was recycled for this show. Thus, Cleese gets a writing credit, the only one he got for this "series".

The result is an odd hybrid, like when the Beatles did "Free as a Bird", a Lennon song sung by Julian after John's death and arranged and performed by the surviving three. Glimpses of greatness can be seen through the awkward performance. But don't take my word for it-- let's check it out. As always, if you haven't purchased the box set yet, please do it here! Ancient comedy writers need money, too-- those marriages to big-breasted acolytes aren't cheap.

We start with brand new opening credits courtesy of Gilliam! More on these later-- And having started the show-- the show ends. Closing credits and applause play us out. Well, that was fun, but frankly, I feel a little gypped. Still, we'll see you next week for Episode 42...

Wait a minute! We cut to film footage of a London department store, ala Harrod's, and the music sounds vaguely like Monty Python incidental music. Could it be they have fooled us again?! Yes! The footman at the door is Michael Palin in a long coat and thick mustache. He holds the door for a blonde man who looks like he's just gone to the rhinoplasty department. The bandaged man walks off down the street, making room for a chauffeured limo. Jones, as a matriarchal dowager (seriously-- who would fuck her?) gives Palin a proper and decorous knee in the groin. (I guess the real question is, with foreplay like that, who could fuck her?) It's fun watching the bystanders behind them trying not to smile or in any way register the comedy in

their midst. Palin gives Jones a small casual salute-- "Well done, Madame."-- before Idle, with his innocent straight man face on, rides up on a bicycle. Palin takes the bike from Idle, ostensibly to park it-- but parking it means tossing it into the street. Yes, my friends, this is the show, and we've already established what I imagine will be two or three running gags.

As Idle enters the store, a bevy of pepperpots come out, most with bandages on their noses. One old lady, played, I think, by Gilliam, has no bandage, but she slams into the glass door. I guess that bandage is in her future. A tiny man leads Gilliam away. Could the bandages be Gilliam's addition to the scene? I'm getting a whiff, through my own bandages, of Brazil.

Idle, slack-faced in true straight man fashion, examines the department store directory, with listings such as "Other Things" and "Ill Health Foods"(Check out what's available in the basement!) and a number of departments for complaints. This takes us to the first true gag of the show, as Carol Cleveland purchases a flame thrower, and successfully test drives it. Semi-successfully, anyway, as she apologizes to a man whose ass flames as Idle passes. (I bet Idle gets that a lot.) (I don't know what that remark means.) This is actually one of the hallmarks of this particular show-- danger. That's a real flame thrower Cleveland teases to eruption,and those are real flames on the man's ass. There's a man on fire in this sketch comedy show! But there will be more to come...

Idle rings the bell at the counter, and a green-masked figure emerges from beneath it, screeching in a strangled and oh-so-Chapmanesque way. Finally, Chapman takes off the mask-- "I'm terribly sorry, I thought you were someone else." After a bit of back and forth, Chapman reluctantly reveals that the "someone else" is Michael Ellis, the man for whom this show is named. Idle gets insulted when Chapman suggests that Michael Ellis is not from Idle's circle, but indeed, Idle doesn't know him, despite how he pretends to. Finally, a perturbed Idle demands another sales assistant. Not mollified by Chapman putting on a fake mustache and glotteral voice, another assistant arrives-- rising up behind the desk with the green mask. "It isn't

him'" whispers Chapman. The new assistant, Palin, is just as silly as Chapman, pretending to be the manager in an equally glotteral voice. Idle calls loudly for the (real) manager, and when Jones finally arrives with a blue "manager" button on his lapel, the two assistants hide behind the desk and scurry away through a purported tunnel, Idle assumes to "soft toys." Jones finally makes sense of it all by claiming that it's "rag week".

What the hell is rag week? According to "Monty Python's Flying Circus All the Bits Complete and Annotated", Rag Week is a traditional fundraising week at colleges, where students dress up and pull stupid pranks, and then ask

for money for a good cause. However, Jones admits, this isn't for the university-- just for the store. He tries to foist Chapman off once again as a senior sales assistant, but Idle will only accept a reconstituted Palin. And at last we get on with the reason for his store visit.

Idle wants to buy an ant.

In keeping with Python utter acceptance and deepening of a silly notion, Palin has a whole system down. A tiny rubber ring on the desk serves as the ant arena, ready to go. How much did Idle want to spend, because ants can go from half a p (pence) to 3 1/2 p "for a champion." There is the length to consider, and the breed-- an

Ayeshire, or a King George bitch, "and that one killing the little flitbat is an Afghan." (What is a flitbat? I don't know, neither does this annotation book, and neither does friggin' Google! Maybe a gnat?) Idle, being a true philistine, goes middle of the road all the way, finally sampling the flitbat-killin' Afghan. "It likes you," Palin coos. "What does it live on?" Idle asks. "Blancmange," Palin replies, calling back the sci-fi sketch from season 1, but the real answer is, youdon't feed them. They die. It's cheaper to buy a new one then feed the old one. After all this, Idle drops the ant. "Never mind, here's another one." Palin then tries to sell Idle an ant house (a bird cage! "Won't it get out of there?" "Yes.") and a set of ant toys-- a wheel, a swing a ladder, and a full-sized two way radio, and an ant-squishing book on ants. All told, the 1.5 p ant comes to 184 pounds, 1.5 p. But he gets a big box labelled "Live Ant Handle With Care". A nice little bit here. This sketch feels very Cleese-ian, complete with Palin behind the desk, cruelty to animals, and a nice build in energy. Palin seems very at home on the edge as he is.

Fire in the Hole!

As Idle walks away, Palin calls him "Mr. Ellis". Cue paranoia! Chapman tries to warn Palin "It's not him," but the ant is out of the bag. Idle claims not to care-- but he does. As he leaves this wacky department store, he passes "The Paisley Counter", where people dress as Ian Paisley, an anti-Papist Irishman who led the Ulster Union, and speechify into a mirror. A woman walks by with her coat and shopping cart on fire. (Fire! Though this time, on film. Still...) The elevator indicator light goes all over like a pinball machine. And the PA calls for Michael Ellis-- than repeats it as "Nigel Mellish." Idle grimaces as he leaves.

So, we have a solid old school sketch, surrounded by random running gags, probably courtesy of Jones/Palin, with a vaguely unsettling paranoid theme, as disinterested Idle is teased by the many mentions of Michael Ellis. Let's see where this is going...

Idle gets home to Mom (Jones), who sloppily spoons out wads of dogfood into dogfood bowls marked "Gorilla" "Dromedary" and (heh) "Trout". (I can just imagine the look on that poor trout's face when supper is served.) Apparently, in an oft-seen moment, Idle is a pet enthisiast, constantly bringing home strange animals, and then moving on to the next pet, leaving Mom to care for the abandoned fancy. Now she  has to feed them,

 walk them, etc. Only, in true Python fashion, we're going further than most of these scenes tend to go. When Idle promises that he'll really look after this new ant of his, Mom replies "That's what you said about the sperm whale... now you're Papa's having to use it as a garage." This last hilarious line is rushed through, in typical Jones-ian fashion, and doesn't get much of a laugh, but I think it's hysterical-- a sperm whale as a garage. Makes the car smell like fish, etc. Great stuff. There's an earlier mention of a tiger included amongst the menagerie, and then we hear a growl, the shot widens, and holy shit! There's a tiger, in a straw floor cage off to the side. Jones says "Blimey. That's the tiger. He'll want his mandies." (Mandies are Quaaludes.) She heads

over with a big hypodermic syringe, talking about how awesome it is to have a tiger when the Jehova's Witnesses are about. Every one a Maserati! Finally, as Idle heads off to watch "one of the televisions", Jones mentions that Michael Ellis has been calling, and even visited, but was apparently chased off by the orange-rumped agouti. Another missed connection. This bit is Monty Python at its best, in my opinion-- taking a silly concept and exploring the crap out of it. Come on! Imagine driving your tiny British car into the mouth of a dead sperm whale. Now, that's comedy!

A quick visual gag, as Idle walks into the next room to watch television, and must choose amongst the dozens in the room. With his new ant Marcus in his palm, Idle watches a TV show called "University of the Air", which is about how to communicate with an ant. "That's a stroke of luck, Marcus!" Idle exclaims.

We go into the show itself, where Jones walks into a restaurant. Chapman waits as a waiter. They start bowing to each other, making antennae motions with their hands, leaping, pacing, and grabbing each others' butts. Subtitles reveal this is all the most mundane conversation' "May I take your coat?" "I don't have a coat. I'm an ant." The daily special is filet of anteater. "That'll learn it," Jones says in antomime, putting his foot on the table for emphasis.

Back in the TV room, Jones staggers in, bloody from an ostensible mauling, and turns off the TV just as they say something about... Michael Ellis. By the time Idle gets the TV back on (irritating the tiger,) the show has moved on to a surgery show-- for ants. We get a rare Gilliamination now as we explore the anatomy of an ant. The narrator waxes rhapsodic about how incredibly tough the ant is-- and then starts chopping it up with a scalpel. "He's not such a toughy. And his legs can carry hundreds of times his own weight..." A hand comes in to pluck the legs off. Funny, cruel stuff. More like Gilliam of old. Idle realizes that his ant is defective, and goes to the store for an exchange, promising poor mauled Mom to get the polar bear out of the neighbor's yard on the way back. He walks out through a yard filled with televisions.

On the department store elevator, Idle waits as Palin, the female elevator operator with a plastic lower jaw and a left hand hook, announces the floors and gives Idle confusingingly exact directions to the complaint counter. Idle arrives to find Chapman very silly indeed with a fake chin and mouth. Jones, less so in a sack. They direct him to the toupee section, and when Idle asks directions, everyone screams toupee as loudly as they can, thereby mortifying the well-haired Idle. This gag feels like a throwback, something you might see on the Sid Ceaser show, but they elevate it like a toad when Palin tells him that the toupee section doesn't have a sign "to avoid embarrassing people, but you can smell 'em." Old women-- real old women, because Jones and Palin are exhausted-- comment on Idle's poor toupee-- "You can see the join."

Idle walks in on a Victorian-era salon, which calls itself the Victorian Poetry Reading Hall, and although I suspect there are a number of toupees in sight, none of them are on display for sale. Nothing is for sale in this room except insofar as it is filled with writers. (Yes, we're all for sale.) Rather, Idle seems to have wandered into a time/space loophole, and gone back in time to the old salon days. Chapman stands on a raised platform as an old (and incredibly tall, made more so by the platform and the midget standing next to her) dowager with that posh twit speech and a love of poetry rivaled only by her love of sherry. She announces the poets in the room-- Wordsworth, Tennyson, Shelly, etc. getting their names wrong. Every time she mentions Shelly (played by Gilliam), she leaves off the "Shelly", and when he corrects her, - "Shelly."-- she gets a refill of sherry. That's a nice, reliable bit. She introduces "Wadsworth" so that he can read his new "pram", "I wandered lonely as a crab" (It's "I wandered lonely as a cloud," for those of you unfamiliar-- this is a Python blog, not a Victorian poetry blog.) "And it's all about ants", she winds up. Jones, as Wordsworth, reads the poem, making sure to correct Chapman on the first line. But the poem must have been an early draft, for it ends with "When all at once I saw a crowd, a host of golden worker ants!" to great applause. It turns out the dowager was right about something. Gilliam is next, in a half-Gumby drone, reading "Ozymandius-- King of Ants" which sends the crowd into a delirium of excrement release, apparently. "I'd like to ask on or two of you in the back not to soil the carpet" Chapman slurs. Idle is next as "Dennis Keat" (John Keats) who reads a horrific poem about anteaters. Howls of protest drown him out, and he's shoved out of the gathering, screaming "It's true! It's happened!" "Tenniscourt" is next, who reads "Charge of the Ant Brigade". "Half an inch! Half an inch!" the non-Python actor orates...

Before Palin steps in as Queen Victoria to great fanfare, the coffin of Sir Albert carried behind her. Although at first she sounds oh so regal, we soon hear a German accent creeping in, and soon it has taken over, like German things do, and she is decreeing that there be no more ants in Victorian poetry. (She also complains in German that he place smells like a "scheissehaus". I guess those poems were more bowel-loosening than we thought. Idle, as the ant-bearing straight man, decides he's had enough of all this, and walks out with Marcus.

It's an odd dynamic here-- the lads seem to insist that they can do anything, but at the same time they are more slavishly beholden to the framing devices than they have ever been. They will throw aside the logic of a department store and its attendant materialism, but they will not throw aside the device itself. This particular bit, while funny enough, seems to threaten to tear the fabric of their conceit, but they will not relinquish the conceit itself. Could this sketch not have appeared in another show? Did they really think it belonged in this one? Did they run out of materialistic material? It would have been nice to be an ant on the wall as they put this show together. This sketch feels inelegantly crammed in, connected by ants, but not by the department store or Michael Ellis.

Idle's next stop is the electric kettles department, but as he nears it, a hand snakes out and beckons him in, holding up a sign that says "toupees"-- it's the department store back alley. "Hey, bud-- wanna buy a wig?" Idle is practically pulled in, and soon surrounded by Jones, Chapman and Palin, who comfortingly reassure him that toupee is okay. "You don't know whether you'll believe this, sir, but one of us is actually wearing a toupee at this moment." Idle replies "Well, you all are, aren't you?" They rush to shaving mirrors on the desk and adjust their terrible toupees. They reassure one another that their toupees are perfect, then attack Idle on his toupee-- of course, he isn't wearing one-- and accuse him of getting it at Mac Fisheries, which was a chain fish store in the UK. Idle insists he's just looking for a manager to complain about his defective ant, but they try to pull his hair off. He knocks off their toupees and runs into the next room--

Extinguisher?

Which is the complaint desk. Palin sits behind the desk in a very crowded room. Cleveland is at the front of the line, complaining that her flame thrower doesn't have a safety switch. Palin assures her he'll speak to the manufacturers, and she leaves setting the toupee men on fire. Palin calls "Next." (There's a nice visual gag here-- a man sits next to a woman, and another man sits next to that woman, groping her and nuzzling her. The first man tries to wave Palin down-- "He's still molesting her. Not the least original way to deal with this sort of problem. Palin waves him off.)

Chapman is next, an ex-colonel with a complaint. "Please take a seat," Palin offers. "Sorry it's on fire." And it's true, the chair and the desk are on friggin' fire. Palin offers Chapman an extinguisher, since his suit keeps catching fire. "No, thank you, I think we'd better let it run its course." They have a series of silly small talk swaps, while all the time a woman sits placidly behind Chapman with a tennis racket stuck on her neck. The rambling conversation is interrupted by a PA announcement-- It's the end of Michael Ellis week-- the next week will be Chris Quinn week-- apparently the name of Idle's straight man character. The camera closes in on Idle, who breaks the fourth wall and complains "What a rotten ending!" (Can't say I disagree.)

We quick cut to the End of the Show Department, where Idle haggles for a better ending. Jones assures him that ending was their cheapest model, but he has a number of other options. There's the long Pull Out, where the camera slowly pulls out... No. There's the Chase. No sooner does Jones offer it when two men round the corner, point at Idle and shout "There he is!" A quick chase follows, that is aborted by Idle, back at the desk, saying "No..." The walk into the sunset is likewise refused. "It's all a bit off the point," Idle complains, and he's not wrong. Jones furtively suggests an ending where they wrap up the whole Michael Ellis thing, but then quickly moves on to a Happy Ending-- Cleveland embracing Idle passionately. "You wouldn't want that, would you?" Jones says, leaving Idle dissatisfied and alone. "Why wouldn't I want that?"

 Jones recommends a summing up from the panel, the panel being two pundits (three including a picture) that were apparently recognizable at the time, given the audience's reaction, but who have been mercilessly forgotten. A slow fade is slowly rejected, but the sudden end is, well and truly the end. A great sequence packed with meta humor that never falls so in love with its own irony that it forgets the underlying humanity of an unhappy customer and a clerk trying to please.

There it is-- a pretty nice show, especially at the start, with great bits in buying the ant and keeping a house full of strange pets. It falls apart a bit towards the end, but it finishes strong with the Victorian poetry and the ending schtick, none of which fits the central theme, but works anyway. This show has an enthusiasm that the previous show lacked, and we wind up with an oft overlooked and underplayed classic. Maybe Cleese is good for this group, even if he's only on the page.

Next week; Episode 42 - The Light Entertainment War

Episode 40 - The Golden Age of Ballooning

"It's not a balloon, you stupid little thickheaded Saxon git! It's a Zeppelin!" -  Graham Chapman as Mr. Zeppelin. 

The Pythons have enjoyed cult success of the like the BBC has never seen. Their albums are bestsellers, their books are high on the novelty lists, their live show has toured Great Britain and Canada, and they've sold out a West End Theater. They are in the midst of writing and developing their first original movie, which will become known as Monty Python and the Holy Grail. They are the toast of swinging London after three years on the BBC--

And now the BBC is going to give them a shot at a fourth year.

Why the trepidation on the part of the BBC? Simple-- the band is not complete for this particular series. John Cleese, the man who was offered the show in the first place, no longer wishes to do it, for reasons outlined previously. And although Cleese had been determined from the start to make Monty Python an ensemble effort, he was a huge part of the success of the show, both as a writer ("The Parrot Sketch") and a performer ("The Ministry of Silly Walks"). Can the lads get along without him?

They say yes. Jones and Palin, the two most disciplined and prolific writers, see an opportunity here to create more long form content. Jones, in particular, had always butted heads with Cleese over how the show should go, and by default, Jones wins. Now the dominant visionary in the group, Jones could pretty much call the shots. Idle had plenty of material ready to go, and Python was the best platform for him. Chapman seemed interested in proving himself as a writer who could stand alone, without Cleese, his partner. Plus, they had an ace in the hole-- Gilliam, who had not had much of an opportunity to perform, and was as explosive a performer as Cleese, if not as controlled. Finally, they brought Neil Innes in, to create more music for the show. It would be a different Python, but it would still be a funny, ground-breaking and surprising television show.

Let's see how they did. As always, if you haven't already, you can buy the box set here! Your sponging days are over-- no more living vicariously through this blog. It's time for the richer experience of watching the show yourself!

One of the usual signs of a show trying to redefine itself is the discarding of the old. In this particular episode, this means "No opening titles." We launch instead into the opening titles for a different show, "The Golden Age of Ballooning". Accompanied by classical music, hot air balloons crowd the air. It is a Gilliam-esque illustration, and gives us our only hint that this is Monty Python. But fear not-- more hints are coming. The title of this particular episode, we are shown in a graphic, is "The Beginnings".

Sharp cut to Palin as a mustached, mushroom-capped working class plumber dealing with a troublesome toilet whilst narrating the show, interrupting the narration every now and again to urge the toilet to let itself be fixed. He tells us of the Montgolfier brothers in 1783, the inventors of the hot air balloon, preparing their first launch. All about the juxtapositions here, plumber and stodgy BBC educational program, more strange than funny, but worth a laugh.

Idle and Jones play the Montgolfier brothers in the next scene, in flouncy period clothes and long grey wigs, full of import on the eve of their big day, looking out over the field and imagining their place in future encyclopedias. Jones has a little trouble with the French accent, riding it like a bucking bronco, but he manages.We get our first "joke thread" when Idle announces he will go and wash. This is hysterical, because, you know, he's French. Soon, the brothers have forgotten their big historical day and can only talk about bathing. Idle is too excited to do it, and Jones has been having trouble washing for years, to his great shame. "I am filthy! You are the cleaner of the Montgolfier brothers!"

This is (temporarily) interrupted by Chapman as an extraordinarily English butler, announcing a Mr. Bartlett-- only Chapman can't get the name right. Bartlett peeks in to correct him, wearing a "Gas Cooker" trenchcoat and hat, (played by Peter Brett?). After all that struggle to get the name right, Jones says "We don't want to see anyone. Tell him to go away." Nice little gag there.

And we're back to washing. Jones asks Idle what he will be washing, and Idle stops himself before he gets to the naughty bits. (There is a period plumber working on pipes behind Idle, echoing Palin's introduction-- not particularly funny, or even noticeable, but there it is.)  Idle then wraps the scene up with a dramatic monologue about the history they will make, and calls back the encyclopedia gag-    "Balloon-- just after Ballcock and just before Bang. What a position!"

But we miss most of it, because an anachronistic AV crew walks in through the balcony to set up a projector and screen, completely stealing focus. They wear black turtlenecks, and are ignored and ignoring. The projector plays some Gillaimination of two naked boxers bathing and boxing, bouncing in a tub of soap suds, while a Chapman voice over recounts the bath in fine historical detail; "Joseph Michael Montgolfier went on to scrub his torso, his legs, and his naughty bits..." (Yay, naughty bits!) "The End" pops up.

A cheesy 60s title card for "The Golden Age of Ballooning" cuts in, with Chapman's VO announcing

all the attendant merchandise that must be purchased to avoid jail and fines. There's a book, an audio book, crochet, and a talking frog. Yeah, I agree, lads, the constant push towards merchandise is egregious. And I love your books and albums and live shows and t-shirts! (As I write this, I'm looking at my talking Grail.) It's a cute if hypocritical gag, but it does go on a bit.

Another episode of "The Golden Age of Ballooning" starts, "The Montgolfier Brothers in Love." (Another graphic has to clarify "Not with each other, obviously.") Our deepest, darkest fantasies come to life when we see Carol

Cleveland, strapped horizontally hanging from a balloon. It's a shame she had to wear such a form-concealing French costume-- or anything. She complains in a fetching French accent to Jones, who works at a desk nearby, that all he thinks about is balloons. She gives many examples, while he measures her with a large tong-like instrument. He seems to spend a lot of time measuring her breasts, and frankly, who can blame him? As he crawls beneath her to get yet another measurement of her balloons, Idle walks in, and stammers, embarrassed at catching them in such a compromising position. "It's all right," Jones reassures, "We've done the difficult bit." This gag would work great in a sit com. We expect better from Python.

Idle announces that their benefactor, Louis XIV, is coming to visit. "Isn't he dead?" Jones asks. "Evidently not," Idle replies huffily. Idle extracts a promise from Jones that he'll was for the King, and a title card dissolves us to "Later That Evening"

Doesn't Palin look Scottish?

Later that Evening, Chapman announces to Idle the arrival of Louis XIV of France. (Mr. Bartlett tries to piggyback on this occasion, but Chapman chases him away.) Louis steps in-- and it's Palin, with scars on his face and a Scottish accent, which gets the biggest laugh of the show so far. His two footmen seem equally street-worn and suspicious. Idle sends Chapman away for some claret, and a long uncomfortable (and unfunny) pause follows. Making small talk, Idle asks "You have come from Paris?" "Where?" Palin responds.

Chapman rescues us with a goofy bit, as his Butler tries to figure out where the claret is. Idle describes with all his night, but Chapman just ain't getting it. Finally, they work it out. Chapman exits, and returns with meaningless exposition about an Egyptian canal. The Pythons are showing off their Cambridge degrees. Idle shoos him out.

Finally, Palin cuts to the chase. He wants the maps, ostensibly to put in the archives of (what's it called?) France, but clearly to steal them. Jones steps in dramatically-- "Just a moment!"-- wearing a towel and a bath cap, and gleaming with wetness. He was washing! And apparently, studying history, because, he announces a la Richilieu in Episode Three, that Louis XIV died in 1717. "Oh," Palin covers in his brogue, "Did I say Louis XIV? I meant Louis XV." But the jig is up. Palin headbutts Jones, (which is apparently a Scottish thing,) and races out with the plans, just as Chapman arrives without the claret.

The AV crew returns, showing footage of Palin and his posse running off. Chapman's Voice Over asks all the cliff-hanger questions, and announces the next episode... NOW!

And now things get weird. Episode 3, "A Great Day for France", starts with a modern panel show. Chapman, Sir Dividends, argues for a military presence if lieu of the collapsed government, and Idle, as Sir Interest, agrees provisionally, provided the army doesn't interfere with street executions, "which I feel have been the shot in the arm that the British economy so desperately needed." This is a topical reference to the political issues going on in England circa 1974, although I'm not sure what the street executions reference. While they blather, the Moderator Palin continues the narration of the "Golden Age of Ballooning", setting the stage for George III's court in England.

Back in period, Idle reads King Chapman a children's book. Chapman's deranged but pleased expression is priceless. A knock at the door alerts them that hey're not alone, and Idle switches out the book for a larger book of state business. Jones (as Lord North, apparently,) announces Palin as Louis XVIII, but when George III denies there is such a person, Palin (off screen) headbutts his way past Jones. Poor bastard is getting his nose kicked a lot in this episode. Palin, now in a wool tam o'shanter, tries to sell the plans to Chapman, but Chapman insists on pomp and circumstance that the fraudulent Palin would rather avoid. Finally, Jones (again) as Montgolfier, still in towel and bath cap, scotches (see what I did there?) the proceedings. "This man is an imposter!"

"Oooo, no, I am not,"Chapman whines, holding a hankie to his ear."Honestly!" (My daughter used to hold a hankie to her ear. Ergo, my daughter is King George III, and America belongs to her.)

Things devolve from there. Gilliam the footman announces the Ronettes, who come in and sing "George the Third" over and over in a Neil Innes written song, Palin headbutts everyone, Mr. Bartlett tries to get in, and Chapman curls up on the floor, confused that his insanity is running ahead of schedule. This is my problem with stream-of-consciousness narrative... inevitably, we wind up in chaos and anarchy, as all the jokes pile on top of each other.

Fortunately, this is a fake series, and we can keep going. The AV crew has snuck in with a title card, taking us back to France, where Idle Montgolfier reads with fake ears while Cleveland paces the floor, worried about Jones. It's been six months. The plumber is still there. And Chapman's Butler is still looking for the claret, although Mr. Bartlett has finally left. Idle dismisses him with a "Thank you, O'Toole," eager to put his tongue in Cleveland's mouth. "Not at all, sir," Chapman replies. "I've

enjoyed being in it." As he leaves, a burst of applause brings him back onstage for a curtain call, to the shock of Cleveland and Idle, and he repeats the last few lines, to great laughter, acclamation and flowers. Even Jones (still in a towel) and Palin come out to congratulate him. An odd ending to this bit, but somehow engaging. Roll credits, with a quick voice over announcing that Neil Innes is for sale by the BBC.

This relatively single-minded narrative has taken up more than half the show, and there's been little deviation from the central story line. Even Gilliam's animations (the title sequence and the bathing sequence) were in service to the story, with little straying, apart from the two lines in the panel show discussion. We've had the standard silly deviations that keep getting called back in-- the washing, the awkward pauses, the Scottish thug trying to teal the plans (I'm including the head-butting in that), the self-aware historicity, the BBC merchandise, and of course, the balloons  But now that the narrative is over...?

The BBC graphic plays under Chapman's VO shilling GAB (Golden Age of Ballooning) suppositories, and then announcing a party political broadcast from... the Norwegian Party? Idle, with a picture of a snowy pond or lake behind him, speaks to us in Norwegian, with titles, extolling the virtues of Norway-- especially the woman, with big knockers, who will do anything. "They'll go through the card." He's cut off with a buzz, but Chapman's VO promises that the highlights will be discussed by... a lot of people with a very thin connection to Norway, including "Mr. Brian Waynor, whose name is an anagram of Norway..." More silly than funny, this, but they're giving Chapman a lot to read, so he must be sober.

Another episode of GAP follows, this one about Ferdinand Von Zeppelin. We begin with silent-ish footage of Jones as Barry Zeppelin, "the least talented of the Zeppelin brothers." He blows up baloons, only to have them plummet to the ground as though they were made of lead. But he keeps trying larger balloons. Finally, he tries a man-sized balloon-- which retaliates by inflating him, in a very cleverly shot and conceived special effect scene. Once inflated, he floats with no problem, although his balloon is left behind.  Nice one joke bit there.

Palin's VO transitions us to the first flight of the Zeppelin in 1908. Ferdinand, played by white-mustached Chapman, is approached by various German types who compliment him on his balloon. "It's not a balloon, you stupid little thick-headed Saxon git! It's a Zeppelin!" Frustrated by their inability to call it by his name, he tosses them out of the Zeppelin, where they land in the dressing room of a German cottage. It's great to see Chapman in fine form, yelling and screaming as in The Flying Lesson sketch or the Argument Clinic, but it's over before we know it, and the rest of the sketch takes place in the German cottage. There is a Gilliam animation of the bodies being thrown out of the zeppelin-- once again, in strict service to the surrounding material.

Those specks are people being pushed out. 

In the cottage, Palin and Jones play the man and wife, respectively, that live in the German cottage. Palin's reading of exotic recipes is interrupted by all the dead bodies landing in his drawing room-- not sitting room, as he corrects Jones. They try to figure out what to do about the bodies, and the best they can come up with is to sort them. The big laugh comes when Jones says "We should call the government," and Palin points out "This is the government." The performances of Palin and Jones are nuanced, but the sketch never seems to land (unlike the bodies), and the energy, after Chapman's rants, drops with an inexorable and lethal momentum (just like the bodies.) I've heard and read Python apologists referencing this scene when they try to validate the last season-- isn't it a great and interesting concept, to have this German couple sorting all

the dead bodies? Perhaps, but I don't get much of a laugh out of it. Between the odd editing into the scene, and the muted quality of the scene itself, there just isn't much about it that's funny.

We end with a photo montage showing a result of the mass murder that Zeppelin committed that day; one of the deaths was responsible for the birth of the producer/director the GAP. Life goes on. Or does it? The balloons crowding the sky are all popped by hypodermic syringes and other medical instruments, as a new, edgy title appears-- the Golden Age of Colonic Irrigation! Not the shortest title, but the kids love it. A pair of upended buttocks rise up to great one of the instruments, and in the interests of good taste, we cut away. This feels more like Gilliam, breaking from the narrative with violent tastelessness. We've missed you, sir!

Chapman's VO, over black, still lists the Norway commentators, the connections to Norway growing thinner and thinner. Finally, a Masterpiece Theater type of movie, "The Mill on the Floss" starts. Music swells as the Part 1 title pops up; "Ballooning". (Thought you'd escaped, eh?) Jones and Cleveland in Victorian costume hold hands in the brush of an English meadow. So deeply in love are they, they float up into the sky with an ease that would make Barry Zeppelin green with envy. Fade to black.

Well... some funny bits, and the performances and production value are all there, with brief moments of comic inspiration lighting up the rest of the content. But the show seems to have lost its edge in all the randomness. Monty Python has always been silly, but it's never been pointless. Though some through lines are played out exhaustively, they never really pay off. Maybe the conflict that Cleese brought to the proceedings was more valuable than anyone knew. Or maybe the lads are just rediscovering their balance after his departure. One things is clear-- for better of worse, Cleese won't be coming back.

Next week; The Return of Cleese! (sort of.)

Monty Python Live at Drury Lane

"And so, the show had begun! For these seven young boys and a girl, it was their chance of a lifetime, their dream come true! The spotlight was on them. Fame stood tiptoe in the wings. The audience gurgle gah..." -  Terry Jones as the Narrator.

The year is 1974, a watershed year for the lads. Five of the Pythons were busy creating material for the next BBC series. One of them wasn't. In many ways, this year marks the beginning of the end of Monty Python.

But, the year before, Idle had taken the group on the road. (Ostensibly, it was Tony Smith and Howard Goldsmith who approached them with the idea, but I'm convinced if Tony and Howard hadn't done it, Eric would have done it anyway.) Inspired by the rock n' roll life style of many of his contemporaries, and something of a musician himself, he put together a tour, creating and refining a live show from three years of Python television, (or, as Palin referred to it in his diaries, " a second hand collection of old TV material,") along with some songs. Did I mention he was a musician?

Palin and Jones tried to keep the free-wheeling style intact, Cleese showed up and Chapman got drunk and laid a lot, up one side of England and down the other, as well as through the wilds of Canada and even dipping a toe into the frigid shark tank of Los Angeles (with disastrous results). The lads noticed a marked appreciation that bordered on cult. Idle wanted Monty Python to be rock stars, and by the end of the tour, that's what they were.

What better way then to follow up that experience with a short run on the West End? Tellingly, they played some huge theaters in Canada, theaters that seated 3,000, which is what gave them the confidence to believe they could occupy a stodgy old London theater. The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane is a London theatrical legend that has housed the most famous and iconic musicals in the modern history of theater. (It's currently owned by Andrew Lloyd Weber, according to Wikipedia.) There were Doric columns and porticos and balustrades, statues of famous theater legends, oil paintings-- the place dripped with history and social approbation. And now, the Pythons were coming.

This represented a huge burst of establishment acceptance for the Pythons. It must be a very sweet phenomenon to make your living and reputation as a mere sketch comedian, in the land of Shakespeare and Pinter, and wind up at the friggin' Drury Lane. Suck it, Olivier! (Laurence Olivier is now dead, and does not suck.) But perhaps higher on the pros list was the convenience of it all. It was like a regular job for them, especially family men like Palin and Jones. They'd go to work, do their jobs, and take the tube home. But the Stones and Floyd would still come to hang out in Idle's dressing room. It was the tail end of the era, but this was still swinging London.

The show was initially booked for two weeks, and it ran four, with scalpers out in front of the theater hawking coveted seats. The reviews were good, or at least kind, and startlingly extensive. Apparently, the Pythons as a phenomenon were more print-worthy than they were as a TV show. (Palin, in his diaries, was a bit miffed that the reviewers tended to get him and Jones confused, and said that they "screeched" a lot.) For this huge endorsement to come while they were prepping for a hobbled show at the BBC must have seemed like good fortune for the PMCs (Pythons minus Cleese). It must have inched the BBC towards greater confidence in the marketability of the upcoming series, if the BBC ever worried about such things as ratings.

But, apparently, it was also fun, to find a new context for their madcap-ism. They called the show "Monty Python's First Farewell Tour (Repeat)" and had an overprint announce "Not Cancelled". They maintained the zany, free-association they had developed on the show, as well as the silliness. They put a dummy Queen Elizabeth up in one of the balcony seats, making the show unmistakably rrrregal. They established what would be their standard line-up, and they even recorded this particular show, making it the first non-bootleg Monty Python concert on album. (If anyone has an earlier bootleg, drop me a line.) The album was available only in Great Britain, and not in the US until they released it as part of the "Instant Monty Python Record Collection" in 1994. It's now available on CD, and you can buy it here!

But let's get to it. You've paid the price of admission by sitting through all this tiresome prose. Now let's check out the show together, via more tiresome prose!

We start with a hushed and portentious introductory voice over from Idle, setting the "stage". "Amongst the glittering audience here tonight, I can see, uh... what's his name?... the fellow with the glasses on telly." He can't remember the name of the lady next to the fellow with the glasses either, although she's the one with the big knockers on the jam commercial, and it's more forgivable. Ah, television fame is so fleeting. It's clear that despite the Python's new positions in the television industry, they never lost sight of how silly it all is. Good for them.

The audience cheers as the dummy queen raises her hands. "Another great chapter is about to be written in the history of Drury Lane." And out comes the Llama sketch!

With a voice over from Idle giving the English translation, the lads, led by Cleese, give the raucous and outrageous sketch their all. Of particular note is Cleese screaming "Cuidado! Llamas!" with true terror in his timbre. He may be diffident about continuing with the Pythons, but on stage he is committed! Or should be. I'm unclear on how the audience got the translations-- must be a visual thing.

Idle introduces the "Reader in Comparative Flower Arrangement at the University of Lynn Redgrave", Mr. D.P. Gumby. Palin gets huge laughs before he says a word, but when he speaks, even more. It's clear the audience loves Gumby as much as the Pythons do.

Jones buys some time with a stirring announced summation. "And so, the show had begun!..." After trotting out the hilarious show biz cliches, he is apparently strangled or kicked (by Cleese?) so that they can start the next sketch. This is, in some ways, a new sketch, one that I hadn't heard before. But it's also an old sketch, in that it follows the Cleese-ian playbook established by the Moutaineering Sketch, the Job Interview Sketch, the Merchant Banker Sketch, and the Selling String sketch, said playbook being "Normal Guy walks in for a job (or something) and meets Insane Authority Figure." In this instance, Idle applies for a job with the Secret Service. Cleese must determine if he is up to snuff. (Literally. The first question is "You have a good nose, do you?") and Cleese be crazy. It's a fine sketch, a bit on the prosaic side for Cleese, but he performs it to the hilt, earning the first burst of spontaneous applause of the evening. The joke is a cricket anecdote. Cleese describes being hit in the head with a cricket ball, and apparently the concussion and trauma are still fresh in his bruised mind as he stammers and starts the story over again, multiple times. Finally, he describes it yet again; "He put his left foot down the wicket, hit the ball back at me like a bullet, never had a chance to move, couldn't protect myself, ball hit me straight smack plumb between the eyes.... 'Course, I was getting used to it by then." He wasn't repeating himself-- he's been hit in the head dozens of times. Cue laughter and spontaneous applause... You had to be there. Idle earns a great laugh when Cleese asks him if he can stand up to physical torture. "Oh, yes, I hope so!" Idle responds with much more enthusiasm than the question should merit. But, as with the crazy authority figure sketches, there's rarely an easy out. Cleese accidentally shoots Idle.

Palin steps up next as a wrestling announcer. He gives it his all, too, but when he starts talking gibberish, it doesn't seem to land as well as Cleese's, but it's very funny. This is the Colin "Bomber" Harris sketch, where Chapman wrestles with himself if hilarious and strange yoga positions, ultimately knocking himself out. I recall hearing this sketch on the City Center album, but on this album, they cut in with another Idle voice over. "Whilst this mainly visual sketch is going on..." Idle gives us a brief history of the Drury Lane, as well as his wardrobe. We get a nice call back when he tells us "Many of England's most greatest actors have performed here, including... um... you know, that fellow on telly with the glasses." We also get a scratchy recording of the famous Sir Henry Irving doing the Parrot Sketch monologue. Henry Irving is played hilariously by Palin in his stodgiest acting since the Prime Minister sketch.

"It's a stiff?"

Idle steps out next and announces World Forum with appropriately stentorian tones. The sketch kills, as always, and Jones/Karl Marx's "Oh, shit!" at the end sends the audience into delirium. Gilliam appears as Mao Tse Tung; "Sing, Ritter Bildy?" Finally, Idle introduces Neil Innes as "John Kissinger, brother of the famous Ronny Kissinger!" Neil Innes sings "How Sweet to be an Idiot", giving the lads time to change into something more pertinent to the next sketch.

A quick word about Neil Innes, as he will be playing a role in things for the rest of Pythonia. He was a novelty songwriter, famous for "I Am an Urban Spaceman" (produced by Paul McCartney, amongst others) and "Death Cab For Cutie" (which inspired a current same-named band,) as part of the "Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band". Said band (don't make me type it again) was the house band on the television show "Do Not Adjust Your Set", which starred Jones, Palin and Idle, with animations by Gilliam. I think that wannabe rocker Idle is the key word in that last clause, and when it came time to put together live shows, Neil Innes was a perfect fit-- a self-contained act with

his own silly lineage, he added more music to the proceedings, thereby recreating the cabaret structure that the lads cut their teeth on, as well as creating a respite in the show so that everyone could change costume. He generally performed two of four songs. "How Sweet..." is one of them, a silly yet sentimental homage to societal misfits. And while the songs are cute, I often find myself jonesing to get on to the good stuff. I'm sorry, I think that rock musicians have it so much easier than writers. "She Loves You, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!" Really? That's a great song? (Of course it is, I'm just saying...) And don't get me started on "Gabba-Gabba-Hey!" But Neil's "How Sweet..." is pleasant enough, and I get ab occasional whiff of Lennon as he sings. (Did Neil Innes have much to do with the historical songs on the "Matching Tie" album? If so, I take it all back!)

Albatross is next, apparently played by Cleese in the audience, with Jones on stage. Cleese is all foul-mouthed belligerence, with audience members asking "How much?" only to get spat on. Chapman steps out as the unsilly Major, to stop the sketch, reprimanding Cleese; "You're not even a proper woman." "It's not my fault!" Cleese replies bitterly. Chapman gets the show back on track with Nudge, Nudge-- which gets a burst of applause at the first line. The sketch plays as expected, with the exception of a brief toss-in by Idle. "Mmm... Breakaway. Ewww!" This is a reference to the commercials Idle has been doing as the Nudge Nudge man, and it gets the second burst of spontaneous applause of the evening.

Goofy music plays us out-- ironic because playing out sketches with goofy music so irritated the Pythons five years ago that they rejected the necessity of punch lines in their sketches, and now here they are, using the goofy music they so condemned. Yet the music is so goofy, it almost plays as a spoof of the goofy music cliche, as Idle's voice over tells us the show is going well so far.

The next sketch is another bit of new material, called Cocktail Bar. It's hard to make out what happens on the CD, it being a pretty visual sketch, but apparently they order drinks with dead mallards and squeezed lemmings in them, and drink them, and vomit them all over, and then ask for more, all amongst the standard British gentility of a cocktail bar. Cleese orders a Harlem Stinger at one point, and Gilliam comes in as a black man by way of Louie Armstrong/Zulu Warrior named Rastus. (Nice, you gap-toothed, inbred Nancy Boys.), and then, according to Eric Idle's "Monty Python Live" book, Rastus puts all the liquor in his mouth, swishes it around, and spits it out into a glass. Expectorated, not stirred. The lads let their harshness out at one point-- Cleese mentions that "Nixon's had an asshole transplant," and Palin replies that in more recent news, "The asshole has rejected him." More spontaneous applause. Finally, a lady, (Connie Booth?) steps out an apologizes for the sketch. "We're very sorry... We're so fucking sorry."

We move on to the Travel Agent's Sketch, which plays as expected with a few additions; After Palin suggests replacing the letter "C" with the letter "K", (Idle can't say the letter "C",) Idle calls himself "a silly bunt." Idle also has added to the long monologue at the end, which is how they end the act. The monologue is impressive, another gauntlet thrown to the obsessive fans that has not been picked up as often as the much more manageable Parrot monologue. Idle finishes with a reference to the Labor government, which gets a burst of applause, and his voice over tells us we have twenty minutes to go to the Drury Lane bar and get pissed.

Cleese starts off Act 2 with the "Spot the Brain Cell" game show, the one where Jones the Ratbag asks for the Blow on the Head, instead of the "dagger up the clitoris." (Adapted for the stage.) The darkie joke is still offensive, but it plays well at the Drury Lane. I'm guessing Paul Robson never played there. Cleese draws the laughs from the crowd with every unctious fake laugh of his own. As the giant hammer comes down, I think you can hear Cleese crack up, along with Jones' skull.

Idle and Palin (and others, I assume,) step out as the Bruces, to sing the Philosopher's Song. Having heard this song in many future concerts and films, this one felt a little stiff to me. But I definitely heard melody-- was that Palin, or has Innes snuck into the action?

Cleese and Palin zip through the Argument Clinic next, interrupted by the "I've Got Two Legs" bit-- did his guts spill out, even then? The Four Yorkshiremen sketch comes next-- Palin has been in the last three sketches, and I'm wondering how he made the costume changes. Next, we get Cleese narrating Election Night Coverage (Sensible Party vs. Silly Party), apparently included because 1974 was an election year in Great Britain. This must have been great to see on stage, although it moves too fast for the audience to keep up. Funny story; Neil Innes played one of the losing Silly Candidates, and started singing "Climb Every Mountain" when asked for a comment, cracking everybody up. That's fine in a live show, I guess, but they were taping this one, and when they started selling records, they had to pay a ton of money to the studio that made "The Sound of Music." Not so silly now, is he? They finish the sketch with everybody walking off, saying "I'm bored, I don't want to do this anymore..."

Cue Idle and the Lumberjack Song, which earns a big burst of applause at the mention of the mighty Scots Pine. The Monty Python theme plays them all out, to the raucous in-time clapping of the audience.

But wait! There's more! The Parrot Sketch, with the audience laughing at almost every line. Seriously. Every line. They love this sketch. It's hard to imagine the sheer infectiousness of the Lumberjack Song could be overwhelmed, but it happened that night in London. You can hear Cleese trying hard not to crack up. Palin throws in a "pecker" joke, and Cleese responds in a "he's fuckin' sloughed it!" Finally, at the end, when Cleese asks of the slug "Does it talk?" Palin replies "Yes." "I'll have that one then,"

A voice over sends us home, and stuff happens on stage that we can't see but is apparently funny. A great show, a great celebration.

How could Cleese be a part of this, and still not want to continue the TV show? It beggars the imagination. But one thing seems clear-- these guys love and are completely comfortable with each other. The CD exudes a joy that you rarely get from the best stand-up acts. Everyone gets their moment, although Chapman and Jones seem to be a bit lost in the shuffle, and Idle and Cleese in particular seem to really step up a few million rungs. The live show-- all the live shows-- are a testament not only to the great material, but to the fellowship of the creators. Bravo, the six of you, and thanks, Neil, for letting them breath during the costume changes.

Next week; The Golden Age of Ballooning.