Trivia for
The Meaning of Life (1983) More at IMDbPro »

• The names of companies owned by the Very Big Corporation of America (listed on the wall in the board room and being added to by the sign painter) are a repeating list, some of which are puns or in-jokes having to do with events in the rest of the movie. They are: - Acme Construction Company - Payne, Bickers and Dogood Ltd. - Stn. Pendons Ltd. - V. Rich and Son - Doneys (Florence) - Mirage Land Co. - Arctic Geo. Lab. Co. - Liver Donors Inc. - World Wide Wine Corp. - Universal Amalgamations Ltd. - Consolidated Steel Co. - Micro Computer Inc. - Moonscape Products Ltd. - Rubber Goods Incorporated - D.Odgey Enterprises Ltd. - Money Factor Printers Ltd. - Better Plastics Corps. - D. Crepid Holdings - Super Big Ltd. - Space Propulsion Lab - Interstellar Travel Corp. - Dawking's Mining Co. - Lange and Sons (International) - Cooper's (Purveyors) - Dickinson Kincain Association - The All Enveloping Co. Ltd. - O. Verpaid Associates Ltd. - E. Normons and Sons - A. Maze and Lee - Huge Horace Mann and Yure Ltd. - R. Devious Inc. - Wakefeld and Daughter - Vast Holdings (Europe) Ltd. - Phil Thevich Consortium - Fastness and Vast Co. Ltd - Star Bright Merchandise Org. - X. Tortion World Wide Ltd. - Cartwright Tutorials - Black and White Picture Co. Ltd. - R. J. McArthur Parks Ltd. - Walker, Walker and Jones Bros. - Data Travel and Experiments (list repeats)
  
  
• Originally called "Monty Python's Fish Film".
  
  
• Python refused to show Universal Studios a film script, figuring, as Eric Idle said, "If we couldn't work out how to make a Monty Python film, they couldn't tell us." Instead they showed them a poem, which was a summary of the film, and a budget projection. "And to their credit," says Idle, "they paid for the film on that." Idle recites the poem on the DVD version of the movie.
  
  
• According to Terry Gilliam, before the Pythons decided to make a sketch movie about the meaning of life, two ideas were considered for the movie. The first one was "Monty Python's World War III", where they would all be soldiers wearing military uniforms full of advertisements, and the Armies would be sponsored. Another idea that was under consideration was a trial movie, where the Pythons are judged to be making not a movie, but a tax dodge. They spend the entire movie trying to prove they're making a proper movie, trying to make an adaptation of "Hamlet" in the Caribbean. At the end, they're found guilty and sentenced to execution, and each one of them gets to decide how they're going to die. This idea was used in "The Meaning of Life" in the death sketch, where Arthur Jarrett (Graham Chapman) has chosen to die while pursued by naked girls.
  
  
• Michael Palin's line, "Hey, but I didn't eat the mousse," is a rare Python ad-lib and was not in the script.
  
  
• During an interview to promote the film when it was first released, one of the members of the team said the meaning of life concept was the only way they could think of to tie together a lot of unrelated sketch material.
  
  
• While writing this film, the Python troupe decided to take a break and put on some shows at the famous Hollywood Bowl, which were filmed and released as Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl (1982).
  
  
• Jane Leeves is one of the dancers in the "Christmas in Heaven" number. It was early in her career and her first film appearance.
  
  
• For "The Crimson Permanent Assurance" segment, the real building that was briefly used for the location shoot was The Lloyd's of London Maritime Insurance Building.
  
  
• The score for "The Crimson Permanent Assurance" segment was inspired by the works of Erich Wolfgang Korngold, especially his score for the pirate epic The Sea Hawk (1940).
  
  
• The only character to appear in all three Python films (Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975), this one, and Life of Brian (1979)) is God.
  
  
• The bizarre "Find The Fish" sketch was filmed in the main control hall of Battersea Power Station, London. It was supposed to represent the weird dreams that we all experience from time to time. Terry Gilliam later expressed his regret that this aspect wasn't given a little more explanation.
  
  
• Terry Jones wrote the "Mr Creosote" sketch with Terry Gilliam in mind to play the title character, but Gilliam then convinced Jones that he should do it himself.
  
  
• Sensitive to the young actors in the "Every Sperm is Sacred" scene, Michael Palin actually says "... those little rubber things on the end of my sock" - the word "cock" was dubbed on later.
  
  
• During the opening sequence, the title is struck by lightning on the bottom of the final "e". The resulting words, "The Meaning Of Liff", is also the title of a book written by Douglas Adams and John Lloyd, published in 1983. The coincidence was discovered shortly before either movie or book were released, but too late in production to change either.
  
  
• In the Find The Fish sketch, Terry Jones and Graham Chapman are joined by a green, elephant-like waiter creature that was a left over (unseen) costume from Terry Gilliam's Time Bandits (1981).
  
  
• "The Crimson Permanent Assurance" segment was filmed as if it were a completely separate project. Terry Gilliam got his own soundstage, crew and cast. This segment continued to expand because, according to Gilliam, nobody told him to stop.
  
  
• Written by Terry Jones, the "Mr. Creosote" scene was roundly rejected by the group on its initial read-through. It was saved from oblivion several weeks later by John Cleese, who, Jones said, "had realized the waiter was the funniest part."
  
  
• As Terry Gilliam was filming The Crimson Permanent Assurance (1983) with his own crew and sound stage, he enlarged the project and went way over budget, and what was supposed to be a 5 minute scene became a short movie between 20 and 30 minutes long. The group later decided that they couldn't use the sequence in chronological order as featured in the script, right after the staff meeting of the Very Big Corporation of America, because it would make the movie go slower. So they came up with the idea of using it at the beginning as a special presentation, and the scene as we see at the proper movie works sort of an alternative ending for that sequence. Even though they introduced the sequence as a special presentation, they edited it to be only 16 minutes long.
  
  
• After "Every Sperm Is Sacred", we cut to the Protestant neighbors, Harry and Mrs. Blackitt. Looking through the window, you can count sixty-three children leaving the house across the road during the course of the scene. Actually not this many children took part in this scene. So several children are walking out of the house more than once, after invisibly returning into it.
  
  
• The kids who sang in the "Every Sperm is Sacred" sketch later said they had no idea what they were singing about.
  
  
• Unknown to the rest of the team until later, director Terry Jones spent most of the budget for the film on the "Every Sperm Is Sacred" sequence.
  
  
• At the end of the "Mr. Creosote" scene, after he has exploded and everyone is running amok, an extra on the right side of the screen can be seen vomiting. This was not in the script. The extra became so nauseated from the mess and the stench (which was reportedly very foul) that he actually threw up during the filming.
  
  
• Graham Chapman, who was openly gay, played God in this film. He asked to play God in this movie because he was frustrated at the church for refusing to marry he and his partner, David Sherlock, because homosexuality is considered a sin.
  
  
• Graham Chapman opens the door to Death and is the first person to speak to him in one sketch. By eerie coincidence, Graham Chapman was the first of the Monty Python team to die.
  
  
• This movie won the Special Jury Grand prize at the Cannes film festival. In "Monty Python Live at Aspen", John Cleese speculates that it might have been because Orson Welles, who was on the judging panel, identified with Mr Creosote.
  
  

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