Trivia
John Cleese tells an interesting story about the effect of the show on viewers: a friend sat down to watch
Monty Python's Flying Circus (1969) and saw a man giving a historical lecture while standing near a forest. After chuckling for a few minutes the friend thought to himself "this sketch is going on rather long, isn't it?" It was only then that he realized that his local BBC channel had exercised their option to preempt the show with another program and that he was in fact watching a legitimate historical documentary.
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Quotes
Milkman:
Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker's man. Good morning, madam, I'm a psychiatrist.
Mrs. Pim:
You look like a milkman to me.
Milkman:
[
ticks a box on his clipboard]
Good, I am in fact dressed as a milkman... you spotted that. Well done.
Mrs. Pim:
Go away.
Milkman:
Now then, madam, I'm going to show you three numbers and I want you to tell me if you notice any similarity between them.
[
holds up a card with the number "3' on it three times]
Mrs. Pim:
They're all number three.
Milkman:
No. Try again.
Mrs. Pim:
They're *all* number three?
Milkman:
No. They're *all* number three.
[...]
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Alternate Versions
The A&E home video VHS & DVD versions, while restoring some footage, have eliminated some as well, including:
- Graham Chapman's abbreviated rendition of "Tonight Tonight" from "West Side Story" in the "Funny Bus Conductor" sketch.
- The ending "Dad's Pooves" film from episode 38.
- Dialogue from "Biggles Dictates A Letter" sketch.
- A&E explains that: "All of the Monty Python[videos] available at the A&E online store were produced directly from masters that we received." And that some "rights issues" were involved in some of the cuts.
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A gentleman (John Cleese) enters a pet shop and wants to register a complaint that the parrot that he had bought from that very boutique just half an hour ago was in fact a 'dead parrot'. The owner (Michael Palin) tries to convince him that the Parrot, a Norwegian Blue, was not really dead and was just resting. The argument continues and gets sillier and sillier until an army colonel (Graham Chapman) pops out of nowhere and stops the sketch abruptly because it was getting very silly. If this kind of humor doesn't interest you, read no further and plan on watching something else. But if it does and if you have not seen Monty Pythons Flying Circus you haven't seen nothing yet.
Monty pythons pretty much invented and perfected their unique brand of humor which can be categorized as 'surreal'. One can argue that 'the Goon Show' was the archetype for Monty pythons, which is true, but then Monty Pythons took it to territories that had never been explored before. They created a world where you can get a government grant for silly walks or buy an argument in an argument clinic. A world in which a father and son could have the age old "romantic vs. a simple coal miner" argument, just that in this world the son is a regular coal miner whereas it's the father whose head is full of useless novels and poems. Just like the Beatles they took something and created something completely new out of it. The comparison is valid because Monty Pythons at their peak enjoyed the status of any of the rock stars in those days (including groupies) and the Beatles, George Harrison in particular, were their biggest promoters.
Terri Gillian's stream of consciousness art work is pretty bizarre and holds all the sketches together. John Cleese, Graham Chapman, Michael Palin, Eric Idle and Terry Jones play all the characters (including women's) themselves with dead seriousness. This is insane humor at it's brilliant best.