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| Eddie Izzard hails the surrealist, pioneering genius of Monty Python | Eddie Izzard hails the surrealist, pioneering genius of Monty Python |
| (3 days later) | |
| I can't remember a hard and fast date for the Pythons invading my brain. I have this sense of my father being happy to watch it with me and my brother – that was cool. But I can't picture us all sitting in front of the telly. I can, however, distinctly remember listening to the albums, playing Matching Tie and Handkerchief and Holy Grail over and over until I could repeat: "Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses not some farcical aquatic ceremony!" | I can't remember a hard and fast date for the Pythons invading my brain. I have this sense of my father being happy to watch it with me and my brother – that was cool. But I can't picture us all sitting in front of the telly. I can, however, distinctly remember listening to the albums, playing Matching Tie and Handkerchief and Holy Grail over and over until I could repeat: "Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses not some farcical aquatic ceremony!" |
| Listening to the sanity of their insanity again and again was very reassuring when one was dealing with the rigid nature of a boarding school (no training shoes to be worn on a Sunday, when other casual clothes were allowed because – obviously – the world would explode). I remember, too, sitting with Johnny Payne in chemistry at the age of 16, reciting The Four Yorkshiremen sketch endlessly, which was actually a pre-Python Python sketch from At Last The 1948 Show. | Listening to the sanity of their insanity again and again was very reassuring when one was dealing with the rigid nature of a boarding school (no training shoes to be worn on a Sunday, when other casual clothes were allowed because – obviously – the world would explode). I remember, too, sitting with Johnny Payne in chemistry at the age of 16, reciting The Four Yorkshiremen sketch endlessly, which was actually a pre-Python Python sketch from At Last The 1948 Show. |
| By this time, I was becoming somewhat encyclopedic. It was illegal to watch TV at my school so I missed a lot of the shows and had to catch up later. Bizarrely, this didn't happen until the early 2000s, when I was in Los Angeles and could afford to buy all the videos. | By this time, I was becoming somewhat encyclopedic. It was illegal to watch TV at my school so I missed a lot of the shows and had to catch up later. Bizarrely, this didn't happen until the early 2000s, when I was in Los Angeles and could afford to buy all the videos. |
| They are the most influential comedy group in the entire history of the world, but Monty Python's Flying Circus didn't just do comedy – they changed the nature of comedy by making it an art form, something that worked on many levels. They proved, without knowing it, that humour is international and not national. | They are the most influential comedy group in the entire history of the world, but Monty Python's Flying Circus didn't just do comedy – they changed the nature of comedy by making it an art form, something that worked on many levels. They proved, without knowing it, that humour is international and not national. |
| There is no British sense of humour, no American sense of humour, no Australian, Irish or Russian sense of humour. There is only humour that is produced by a British person, an American, a Russian, and so on. This is why their sense of humour has spread so well around the world. But not to everyone – just to the people who are smart enough to realise that being able to think like a child is an important attribute of being an adult. When you lose that ability, you start to die. | There is no British sense of humour, no American sense of humour, no Australian, Irish or Russian sense of humour. There is only humour that is produced by a British person, an American, a Russian, and so on. This is why their sense of humour has spread so well around the world. But not to everyone – just to the people who are smart enough to realise that being able to think like a child is an important attribute of being an adult. When you lose that ability, you start to die. |
| They also had a huge effect on my standup. I tried desperately to become a sketch comedian and get on to TV in the early 80s. That didn't work. So in 1985, I decided to become a street performer. That didn't work either, but it did take me away from playing characters and I learned to develop my own voice, talking directly to the audience, which I felt was really important. You couldn't do sketches on the streets: street audiences didn't have the attention span for that. | They also had a huge effect on my standup. I tried desperately to become a sketch comedian and get on to TV in the early 80s. That didn't work. So in 1985, I decided to become a street performer. That didn't work either, but it did take me away from playing characters and I learned to develop my own voice, talking directly to the audience, which I felt was really important. You couldn't do sketches on the streets: street audiences didn't have the attention span for that. |
| Then, in 1988, I went into standup, the obvious new hot medium. I found that incredibly hard: it was my third medium of comedy and I'd had a lot of failure. But slowly the two halves came together. The street narrator was talking about comic ideas – and the Python-influenced comedy performer started acting them out in sketch form, but with me playing all the character roles and not having to change into costumes or build sets. By the early 1990s, it was finally working. | Then, in 1988, I went into standup, the obvious new hot medium. I found that incredibly hard: it was my third medium of comedy and I'd had a lot of failure. But slowly the two halves came together. The street narrator was talking about comic ideas – and the Python-influenced comedy performer started acting them out in sketch form, but with me playing all the character roles and not having to change into costumes or build sets. By the early 1990s, it was finally working. |
| I think of Monty Python as the comedic offspring of Spike Milligan and The Goon Show, who were the godfathers of surreal comedy. Its essence is intelligence and silliness. The more intellectual the context, the more silly the scene must be. I believe surreal comedy could have developed as a spinoff from Dadaism, the avant-garde movement that swept Europe in the early 1900s. I don't know if it affected Spike Milligan but, (though it seems likely – his poems and cartoons were pretty Dadaist) but I do think he was the one who really started surreal comedy. | |
| The Goons influenced Monty Python and Monty Python influenced the world. From my own study of comedy history, there wasn't a whole load of surreal comedy in America until the Pythons arrived on the Public Broadcasting Service channel in 1974. And they must have had an influence on Saturday Night Live, which started in America the following year. So it was the Pythons who spread surreal comedy around the English-speaking world. | The Goons influenced Monty Python and Monty Python influenced the world. From my own study of comedy history, there wasn't a whole load of surreal comedy in America until the Pythons arrived on the Public Broadcasting Service channel in 1974. And they must have had an influence on Saturday Night Live, which started in America the following year. So it was the Pythons who spread surreal comedy around the English-speaking world. |
| As I have toured overseas, I've found that mentioning Monty Python gets a huge response from audiences. I don't think they created their comedy to get well known globally, but that is what has happened. They kicked the door open for other British (and Irish) comedians to play wherever they want. | As I have toured overseas, I've found that mentioning Monty Python gets a huge response from audiences. I don't think they created their comedy to get well known globally, but that is what has happened. They kicked the door open for other British (and Irish) comedians to play wherever they want. |
| The Pythons were all proven TV writers and performers before they became Monty Python – writing some brilliantly insane sketches and playing some wonderfully inspired characters. But the touch of genius might have been when Eric Idle brought Terry Gilliam in to do animations for Do Not Adjust Your Set, the pre-Python children's show he made in the late 1960s with Michael Palin and Terry Jones. I think Gilliam being an artist and cartoonist gave them a visual dimension no other comedy series has ever matched. The fact that he was an American in an all-British group also helped stir the creative pot. For in life, it is the blend of your genes that makes you strong and not their purity (which leads to congenital defects). I feel the same is true of creative partnerships and Monty Python had – and have – immense strength in the blend of its genes. | The Pythons were all proven TV writers and performers before they became Monty Python – writing some brilliantly insane sketches and playing some wonderfully inspired characters. But the touch of genius might have been when Eric Idle brought Terry Gilliam in to do animations for Do Not Adjust Your Set, the pre-Python children's show he made in the late 1960s with Michael Palin and Terry Jones. I think Gilliam being an artist and cartoonist gave them a visual dimension no other comedy series has ever matched. The fact that he was an American in an all-British group also helped stir the creative pot. For in life, it is the blend of your genes that makes you strong and not their purity (which leads to congenital defects). I feel the same is true of creative partnerships and Monty Python had – and have – immense strength in the blend of its genes. |
| While early Python was a wonderful mix of intelligence and silliness, later Python – their Brian period – became more layered. Take Life of Brian. When he is hiding from Roman soldiers and pretending to be a prophet, you start with the silliness of him trying to make up cod sermons to a sceptical audience. Then, by running off in mid-sentence, he causes the cynical group to become intrigued. | While early Python was a wonderful mix of intelligence and silliness, later Python – their Brian period – became more layered. Take Life of Brian. When he is hiding from Roman soldiers and pretending to be a prophet, you start with the silliness of him trying to make up cod sermons to a sceptical audience. Then, by running off in mid-sentence, he causes the cynical group to become intrigued. |
| They start following Brian to hear what he was going to say (which wasn't anything) and become obsessed with the "secret" he has withheld. He's still running from the Romans, so he keeps moving but the crowd grows and he gains more and more followers. He drops a shoe since he is running too fast, and gives away a gourd that he didn't want, and suddenly these things become important to these "followers". But the followers start arguing about the meaning of the shoe and the gourd and so we get schisms among the believers. | They start following Brian to hear what he was going to say (which wasn't anything) and become obsessed with the "secret" he has withheld. He's still running from the Romans, so he keeps moving but the crowd grows and he gains more and more followers. He drops a shoe since he is running too fast, and gives away a gourd that he didn't want, and suddenly these things become important to these "followers". But the followers start arguing about the meaning of the shoe and the gourd and so we get schisms among the believers. |
| There, in the space of just 10 minutes, you have a complete breakdown of how religions have developed and fragmented over the centuries – right up to the big scene where John Cleese ends up demanding: "Kill the unbeliever!" | There, in the space of just 10 minutes, you have a complete breakdown of how religions have developed and fragmented over the centuries – right up to the big scene where John Cleese ends up demanding: "Kill the unbeliever!" |
| It will be wonderful to see them on stage. Their last performance was at the Hollywood Bowl in 1980. Some people will wonder how the shows will play out but, as long as the Pythons are having fun, the audience will be behind them. I'll be on tour for the first three shows, but I will be there for the final seven. Monty Python are a living legend – and how often to you get to see a legend? | It will be wonderful to see them on stage. Their last performance was at the Hollywood Bowl in 1980. Some people will wonder how the shows will play out but, as long as the Pythons are having fun, the audience will be behind them. I'll be on tour for the first three shows, but I will be there for the final seven. Monty Python are a living legend – and how often to you get to see a legend? |
| • This article was amended on 30 June 2014 to correct the spelling of Dadaism. |
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