Monty Python

Monty Python, also known as the Pythons, were a British comedy troupe formed in 1969, comprising Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin. The group became known for the sketch comedy television series "Monty Python's Flying Circus", which aired on the BBC from 1969 to 1974. Their work subsequently expanded to include films, live performances, albums, books and musicals. Their influence on comedy has been compared to that of the Beatles on popular music, and "Monty Python's Flying Circus" has been described as an important development in television comedy.

"Monty Python's Flying Circus" combined sketch comedy with surrealism, stream-of-consciousness transitions and animated sequences created by Gilliam. The members maintained collective creative control, enabling them to experiment with conventional television formats and comedic structures. The troupe later produced the films "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" (1975), "Monty Python's Life of Brian" (1979) and "Monty Python's The Meaning of Life" (1983). Their work influenced British comedy and American television, including early editions of "Saturday Night Live", and contributed to the development of absurdist comedy.

In 1988, Monty Python received the BAFTA Award for Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema at the 41st British Academy Film Awards. In 1998, the group received the American Film Institute's AFI Star Award. "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" and "Monty Python's Life of Brian" have frequently appeared on lists of notable comedy films. In a 2005 poll of more than 300 comedians, comedy writers, producers and directors, three of the six members were ranked among the 50 greatest comedians.

Before the formation of Monty Python, the members had worked in university revues, radio programmes and television comedy. Jones and Palin met at the University of Oxford, where they performed with the Oxford Revue. Chapman and Cleese met at the University of Cambridge, where Idle also studied. Chapman, Cleese and Idle were members of the Cambridge University Footlights, a student theatrical society that also included future members of the comedy group the Goodies, Tim Brooke-Taylor, Bill Oddie and Graeme Garden, as well as writer Jonathan Lynn. During Idle's presidency of the Footlights, its members included writer Germaine Greer and broadcaster Clive James. Recordings of Footlights revues and performances by Cleese and Idle are held in the Pembroke Players archives at Pembroke College, Cambridge.

Before "Monty Python's Flying Circus", the members worked on several radio and television productions. These included the radio programme "I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again" (1964-1973), in which Cleese performed and wrote, while Chapman and Idle contributed as writers; "The Frost Report" (1966-1967), which involved Cleese as a performer and writer and Chapman, Idle, Jones and Palin as writers; "At Last the 1948 Show" (1967), featuring Chapman and Cleese as writers and performers and Idle as a guest performer and writer; and "Twice a Fortnight" (1967), featuring Jones and Palin as writers and performers.

Other projects included "Do Not Adjust Your Set" (1967-1969), which featured Idle, Jones and Palin as performers and writers, with Gilliam providing animation; "We Have Ways of Making You Laugh" (1968), featuring Idle as a performer and writer and Gilliam as animator; "How to Irritate People" (1968), featuring Cleese, Chapman and Palin; "The Complete and Utter History of Britain" (1969), featuring Jones and Palin; and the television series "Doctor in the House" (1969), for which Chapman and Cleese wrote scripts. "The Frost Report", broadcast from March 1966 to December 1967, brought several of the future Python members together and provided an opportunity to develop their comedic styles.

Following the success of "Do Not Adjust Your Set", Thames Television offered Gilliam, Idle, Jones and Palin the opportunity to develop a late-night comedy series. At around the same time, the BBC approached Chapman and Cleese, who had worked together on "The Frost Report" and "At Last the 1948 Show". Cleese was reluctant to form a two-person act with Chapman and invited Palin, with whom he had worked on "How to Irritate People", to join them. Palin subsequently suggested including his writing partner Jones and colleague Idle, who wanted Gilliam to provide animation.

Accounts of the group's formation differ in emphasis. According to Cleese's autobiography, he and Chapman admired the style of "Do Not Adjust Your Set" and initiated a meeting with Idle, Jones and Palin to discuss combining their writing and performing efforts. The group's official website identifies 11 May 1969, following a recording of "Do Not Adjust Your Set" attended by Cleese and Chapman, as the occasion when all six members first met. Subsequent meetings took place at Cleese's apartment in Basil Street, Knightsbridge, London.

The development of "Monty Python's Flying Circus" was influenced by the British satire boom of the 1960s and by performers including Peter Cook, Alan Bennett, Jonathan Miller and Dudley Moore, whose revue "Beyond the Fringe" had helped establish a new style of satirical comedy. The Pythons had also worked on productions associated with David Frost and admired the sketch programme "Not Only… But Also", featuring Cook and Moore.

According to director Ian MacNaughton, early discussions about "Monty Python's Flying Circus" took place at the BBC Television Centre after comedy adviser Barry Took brought together MacNaughton, the six performers and John Howard Davies, who directed the first four episodes. The programme premiered on the BBC on 5 October 1969, with studio recordings at the Television Centre in west London and location filming elsewhere in the United Kingdom.

The Pythons initially sought to avoid the conventional punchlines used to conclude sketches. They often ended scenes abruptly, transitioned into unrelated material or left sketches unresolved. Their approach was influenced by the work of Spike Milligan, particularly his radio series "The Goon Show" and television programme "Q…" (1969), which frequently abandoned conventional sketch structures. Palin and Jones admired Milligan's willingness to experiment with television conventions.

Jones and Palin also drew inspiration from Gilliam's animations for "Do Not Adjust Your Set", including "Beware of the Elephants" and "Christmas Cards". They proposed using similar stream-of-consciousness transitions to connect otherwise unrelated sketches. This approach became a defining feature of "Monty Python's Flying Circus", with animations often linking the end of one scene to the beginning of another.

The group typically wrote between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. Cleese and Chapman generally worked together, as did Jones and Palin, while Idle usually wrote independently. They later assembled to review and revise their material, with Gilliam developing animations to connect the sketches. Decisions about which material to include were made collectively, and the members generally approached their work as writers rather than competing for acting roles.

Although the troupe collaborated on its material, different members often contributed distinct styles. Jones and Palin tended to favour visual comedy and elaborate, surreal situations, while Cleese and Chapman frequently developed confrontational dialogue and verbal aggression. Idle's sketches often relied on unusual verbal habits and wordplay. Gilliam's animations ranged from whimsical imagery to violent or grotesque sequences, using the freedom of animation to depict material that might have been difficult to present in live action.

The group considered several names before settling on "Monty Python's Flying Circus". Suggestions included "Owl Stretching Time", "The Toad Elevating Moment", "A Horse, a Spoon and a Basin", "Vaseline Review" and "Bun, Wackett, Buzzard, Stubble and Boot". Other proposals included "Gwen Dibley's Flying Circus", named after a woman Palin had encountered in a newspaper, and "Baron Von Took's Flying Circus", a reference to Barry Took. The BBC had already included "Monty Python's Flying Circus" in its schedules and declined to change it.

The members have given differing explanations for the name "Monty Python". One account suggests that Idle proposed "Monty" as a humorous reference to British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, while "Python" was chosen because it sounded slippery. Idle has also said that "Monty" was the name of a man who frequented his local pub, whose name would be asked for by patrons. The BBC later described the name as one the troupe considered suitable for a disreputable entertainment agent.

"Monty Python's Flying Circus" employed several formal techniques that differed from conventional television comedy. Episodes sometimes began with a cold open, preceding the opening titles and theme music. One recurring example featured Palin dressed as Robinson Crusoe travelling through various landscapes before approaching the camera and beginning to say "It's…". The opening sequence then interrupted him. On other occasions, the opening credits were delayed until the middle of an episode, while closing credits sometimes appeared unexpectedly during the programme. Cleese also parodied BBC continuity announcers, and the troupe frequently disrupted the expected structure of television broadcasts.

The Pythons often ended sketches by cutting to a different scene or animation, having the performers leave the set or introducing an unrelated character. Chapman played a recurring military figure known as the Colonel, who interrupted sketches when he judged them to have become too silly. Other recurring devices included a large weight falling onto a character and a knight in armour, played by Gilliam, striking characters with a rubber chicken. Cleese frequently appeared in a dinner suit as a commentator who announced, "And now for something completely different", a phrase that became the title of the troupe's first film.

The programme's theme music was the Band of the Grenadier Guards' recording of John Philip Sousa's march "The Liberty Bell", first published in 1893. Because the composition was in the public domain under the applicable copyright rules, it could be used without royalty payments. Gilliam's stop-motion collage animations were another characteristic feature of the programme. He assembled imagery from works of art, Victorian illustrations and engravings. The giant foot that crushes the programme's title during the opening credits was taken from a reproduction of Bronzino's Renaissance painting "Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time".

The troupe also drew on British traditions of cross-dressing comedy, with male members wearing dresses and makeup to portray female characters, often speaking in falsetto. Jones frequently played working-class housewives, while Palin and Idle tended to portray more socially polished women. Cleese performed female roles less frequently, and Chapman often appeared alongside Jones as a housewife or with Idle in scenes featuring middle-class women. Female characters were also played by women when required by the script. From 1970, Carol Cleveland appeared in numerous episodes and became closely associated with the troupe. In some sketches, including the stoning scene in "Monty Python's Life of Brian", the members portrayed women impersonating men.

Several sketches from "Monty Python's Flying Circus" became widely recognised, including "Dead Parrot", "The Lumberjack Song", "Spam", "Nudge Nudge", "The Spanish Inquisition", "Upper Class Twit of the Year", "Cheese Shop", "The Ministry of Silly Walks", "Argument Clinic", "The Funniest Joke in the World" and "Four Yorkshiremen". The sketches frequently satirised aspects of public life and social behaviour. "Dead Parrot" focused on poor customer service, "The Ministry of Silly Walks" portrayed bureaucratic inefficiency, and "Spam" drew on the prevalence of the canned meat product in post-war Britain. "Four Yorkshiremen" parodied nostalgic accounts of difficult childhoods. The Gumbys, recurring characters characterised by limited intelligence and vocabulary, formed part of the group's satire of television portrayals of ordinary people.

"Monty Python's Flying Circus" began reaching audiences outside the United Kingdom in 1970. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation added the programme to its autumn schedule that year, initially broadcasting the 13 episodes of the first series and the first six episodes of the second. After the CBC removed the programme from its schedule following the Christmas break, it received hundreds of complaints, and more than 100 people demonstrated outside the broadcaster's Montreal studios. The series later returned to the CBC schedule and remained part of its programming during the first half of the 1970s.

American audiences were introduced to sketches from "Monty Python's Flying Circus" through the 1972 film "And Now for Something Completely Different", which compiled material from the first two television series. The film initially achieved limited box-office success in the United States. In 1974, American television producer Greg Garrison included Python sketches in the NBC programme "The Dean Martin Comedy World", which presented comedy clips from different countries.

During the summer of 1974, Ron Devillier, programming director at the public television station KERA in Dallas, Texas, began broadcasting episodes of "Monty Python's Flying Circus". The programme attracted substantial audiences, prompting other PBS stations to acquire it. FM radio stations also helped introduce American listeners to the troupe through broadcasts of tracks from its albums. The television programme's popularity contributed to a successful re-release of "And Now for Something Completely Different" in 1974. In March 1975, The New York Times published an article about the group's growing popularity in the United States.

In 1975, the American network ABC broadcast two 90-minute Monty Python specials, each comprising three episodes. The network removed a total of 24 minutes from each special, including material it considered unsuitable for American television, and replaced the deleted sections with commercials. The troupe sued the network over the edited broadcasts in the case Gilliam v. American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. The court ruled in favour of Monty Python.

The programme's popularity in the United States encouraged PBS stations to acquire other British comedy series. By the late 1970s and into the 1980s, many stations had established programming blocks devoted to British comedy, featuring shows such as "Are You Being Served?". In 1976, "Monty Python's Flying Circus" became the highest-rated television programme in Japan. In 2018, the Dutch town of Spijkenisse introduced a pedestrian crossing inspired by the "Ministry of Silly Walks" sketch, with a sign encouraging pedestrians to cross in an exaggerated manner.

Cleese left "Monty Python's Flying Circus" at the end of its third series. He later explained that he felt he had exhausted his supply of original material for the programme. He argued that many sketches in the third series reused elements of earlier work, although he identified "Dennis Moore" and "Cheese Shop" as exceptions. He also found it increasingly difficult to work with Chapman, who was experiencing problems with alcoholism. Idle later recalled that Cleese announced his intention to leave during a flight to Toronto.

The remaining members continued for a fourth series, which ended in 1974 after six episodes, compared with 13 episodes in each of the first three series. Although the opening animation retained the title "Monty Python's Flying Circus", the fourth series was credited simply as "Monty Python" at the end of each episode. Cleese received writing credits on three episodes, including "Michael Ellis". Some material developed for the film "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" had originated in earlier drafts involving King Arthur and his knights wandering through a modern department store before being adapted for the television episode. Musician Neil Innes also contributed to several sketches, including "Appeal on Behalf of Very Rich People".