Life of Python Page #4

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like run the titles

halfway through the show--

Everybody would leave the room

and then think, wait a moment--

Then pretend to go on

as if BBC news, picking up something.

We actually were very conscious

of not trying to be, uh...

satirical and-- and topical

other than using names

of funny politicians

or the funny names

of other politicians.

They didn't mean anything

other than politician,

and the politician

is always with us,

and they'll always be the same.

I think a silly election

will always be a silly election.

It's interesting looking back on it.

The stuff holds up because of that.

The other shows were more topical

and suffered because of that.

But we were rather

canny in those days.

Alan Jones...

On the left, sensible party.

9,112.

Kevin Phillips Bong...

On the right, slightly silly.

Naught.

Tarquin Fin-Tim-Lim-Bin-Whin-

Bim-Lim-Bus-Stop-F'tang-F'tang-

Ol-Biscuitbarrel...

Silly.

12,441.

And so the silly party

has taken Luton.

What was wonderful in the group

is everybody influenced

everybody else.

My cartoons were changing.

They were doing more things

that were more obviously visual.

It's still--

I mean, their strength still

is words and performing.

I mean, John, luckily, is

very visual as a human being.

It would be hard to draw

something as funny as that.

He was blessed.

Mike had to put wigs and mustaches on

to be as silly-looking as John.

And, uh...

But it got more like that.

At times we were almost

making the characters

more and more cartoonlike

as it went along.

Things got stranger and stranger.

And quite early on, I'd get into wigs

because I had blond

hair down to here,

and it took them years

before they realized.

And I found out

I was much more comfortable

wearing more disguises.

I could act better

if I was in mustaches

and make-up and costume.

I think Mike's like that, too.

We were kind of into the make-up jar.

John always hated make-up.

The most he'd do was

plaster his hair down

and wear a packer mac, really.

Although he was always

wonderful in drag.

Just occasionally John in drag--

He's just a crack-up.

Dinsdale was a gentleman.

What's more, he knew how to

treat a female impersonator.

The problem on Python about the women

was I don't think we

knew much about women,

And you can only write

what you know about,

so we'd write about show girls.

You can imagine the stereotype.

We used to write

about these ridiculous pepperpots

who made us laugh a lot.

I don't know who they were--

A cross between parrots

and our mothers.

Pepperpots were inventions

of John and Graham's,

but they were people--

They were ladies of sort

of late middle-age, I would say,

with a shopping basket,

Um, and usually a

rather heavy coat on

and a scarf

who would stand in small

groups in supermarkets

and talk very loudly

about things they didn't like.

It was always,

"I don't like him,

"I don't like him.

"Ooh, hate that. No, don't like it.

Ooh, not very nice, no.

Ooh, smells a bit."

They were all negative people,

but they were shaped

like pepper pots--

Probably what John and

Graham had in the house.

Oh, hello, mrs. Premise.

Hello, mrs. Conclusion.

Busy day?

Busy? I just spent four

hours burying the cat.

Four hours to bury a cat?

Yes, it wouldn't keep still.

Wriggling around.

Howled its head off.

Oh, it wasn't dead, then?

Well, no, but it's

not at all a well cat,

So as we were going away

for a fortnight,

I thought I'd better bury it.

What makes me squirm

about that first series,

I think, are some of the, uh,

Some of the camp

stereotypes, you know.

There's some very, you know,

limp-wristed, uh...

Camp stereotypes around,

which certainly we wouldn't do now.

Um...

And, uh, I-- certainly you can say

there's not an awful lot of depth

to Python's character of

female characterizations.

The fellas were always

apologizing to me

for not having more for me to do.

Michael was always coming up

and saying "I'm sorry, darling.

We don't have a lot for you."

But as he said,

"We're just not very good

at writing parts for women."

Um, and I suppose in that way

they were a bit chauvinistic

as far as their view of young women.

They did write very well

for the older women,

which they played

themselves so well,

far better than I could.

When it came to young women,

they couldn't write funny parts.

Oh, my god! What a mess!

Here, did you do this?

Uh, no. No. I didn't do all this.

Uh, it-- it did it all.

Oh.

Well...

Here. Hold this. I'll get started.

Huh. It's jolly nice. What is it?

Hmm?

Oh, it's a Brazilian dagger.

Whoop! Ooh!

Oh...

Oh! Oh!

I certainly think, uh,

One of the things

that Python introduced

or accentuated in comedy

was aggression, the

comedy of aggression.

I think that's so much

John's input there.

But I think the kind

of deaths we're having

are what I call cartoon deaths,

and I think the nearer

deaths get to cartoon,

the more people see it

the same way that they see

with Tom and Jerry,

when Jerry runs over tom

with a steam roller.

There's always two people who think,

"Oh, poor cat. That must have hurt.

I hope the cat's all right."

But they're in a minority.

Now stand aside, worthy adversary.

't Is but a scratch.

A scratch? Your arm's off.

No, it isn't.

Well, what's that, then?

I've had worse.

A lot of comedy seems

to be like poetry.

It's getting its kick

out of conflict,

out of contrast of ideas.

Um, in poetry, it's

what Browning said,

when you get two metaphors--

When you bring two ideas together--

They produce not

a third idea but a star.

That's kind of magic.

The same thing with comedy--

You bring two conflicting

ideas together,

And you produce a laugh

instead of a star.

Look!

It's just a flesh wound.

Look, stop that!

Chicken!

Chicken!

Look, I'll have your leg.

You'll what?

Come here!

What will you do, bleed on me?

I think with the

Black Knight sequence

in Holy Grail,

you're getting this horrible thing--

Somebody's having

his limbs chopped off,

but his total unconcern of this

and his total indominability

in the face of such odds

and such disaster.

All right. We'll call it a draw.

Come, Patsy.

Oh, well, I see.

Running away, eh?

You yellow bastards!

Come back and take

what's coming to you!

I'll bite your legs off!

I wouldn't say there was

any subject at all

that I would immediately think

of not making jokes about.

A lot of comedy

is about seeing deeply--

I mean, seeing actually

under the surface,

into sometimes the darker areas,

but being able to make a joke of it.

It's the only way you can cope

with something that's

very unpleasant,

all the nastiness in the world.

Sometimes joking is

the only way to cope.

Well, I remember the first time

that John read out the, uh...

The sketch about the undertaker,

about arriving with

his mother in a sack,

the undertaker proposing to eat her.

And he read this, and we all laughed.

And...

And then I thought, we can't do that.

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