And now, a short introduction from the producers' legal representative,
Mr Abe Appenheimer.
Hello, and welcome to this documentary
containing new and exclusive interviews
with the five surviving members of Monty Python.
The producers wish to make it clear that any opinions expressed herein
are those of the individuals speaking and hold no truth whatsoever.
Pursuant, therefore, to clause 4.6
of the Broadcasting, Video, Television Act, 1989,
subsection 4, 3 and 2, clause...
..subject to clause 4.123,
no viewer or watcher may copy, repeat, impersonate, mime,
either contextually or noncontextually,
any material whatsoever, in any public place
such as a street, pub, club, hotel, oil rig, Baptist church...
Python
l'm so fucking sick of Monty Python
And this damn documentary
lt just ain't what it's meant to be
And if you're still bloody watching
Why don't you get a life?
Six sodding hours of Python
l can't sing any more about Python
There must be life after Python
No more, no more
Monty, Monty, bloody, fucking, fucking...
And they weren't that funny anyway!
And the bezan shall be huge and black,
and the eyes thereof red with the blood of living creatures,
and the whore of Babylon shall ride forth on a three-headed serpent,
and throughout the lands, there'll be a great rubbing of parts.
lt was at the opening of Holy Grail in New York
and there was a question from a journalist, he said,
''So, what's your next movie?''
and l said, Jesus Christ - Lust for Glory.
And there was laughter.
And then, a few months later, we went off to open the movie in Amsterdam...
And we were all on a little pub crawl that evening,
all except for John, who scarpered off, l don't know what became of him.
But Eric was talking... Because Eric has always got...
Eric is a forward thinker,
and that's when he came up with Jesus Christ - Lust for Glory.
l fell off the stool l was on. lt was just brilliant.
So, you're astrologers, are you?
Well, what is he, then?
What star sign is he?
Capricorn.
Capricorn, eh? What are they like?
Well, he is the son of God, our Messiah.
King of the Jews.
And that's Capricorn, is it?
No, no, that's just him.
l was going to say, otherwise there'd be a lot of them.
We did a series of very blasphemous jokes about...
Loved the idea that Christ was a carpenter,
but it was very bad joinery and it kept falling over.
''No, you need to put a 2x4 divot... Just... No! Wedge it. Yeah.''
''Fuck! Just get this...''
That was a whole riff we did.
lt was like, ''Well, we can't... This can't possibly be it.''
We went back and there was a Chinese restaurant meeting
where l think people did then start to take the concept seriously, saying,
''Wait a minute. Nobody's ever done a comedy set in biblical times.''
lt really felt like we were a group again.
Everybody was there and ideas were flowing fast.
Everybody had done an incredible amount of research.
So we watched all these terrible biblical films with Charlton Heston,
''And surely this man is the Son of God.''
All these sort of things.
''Yonder lies the castle of my father.''
There were all these awful Hollywood films.
We realised, that's the target, really, the portrayal.
And so then we spent three weeks reading the Bible,
and reading the Dead Sea Scrolls, doing research into what people believe,
what really happened, what was history, what was made up in the 13th century.
And we began to write things like the stoning scene,
just to kind of get a feeling, to create an atmosphere.
We didn't know what the story was going to be.
And in all our reading, in all our thoughts
we read about the fact that at that period in Palestine,
there was a Messiah fever,
everyone was looking for the new Messiah.
We worship you, O Brian, who are Lord over us all.
Praise unto you, Brian, and to the Lord our Father.
Amen.
- Do you do a lot of this, then? - What?
- This praising. - No, no, no.
Well, if you're dropping by again, do pop in.
And thanks a lot for the gold and frankincense,
but don't worry too much about the myrrh next time. All right?
Thank you. Goodbye.
Well, weren't they nice? Out of their bloody minds, but still.
Look at that!
Here! Here! Here, that's...
that's mine, you gave me that!
Although we could never probably have agreed for a moment
on what religion was or should be,
we could certainly all agree on what it wasn't.
And because humour is basically always critical,
that was why there was a cohesion of viewpoint there.
And so once we had taken on religion and the Bible story as the subject,
l think we knew we were on delicate ground,
and certain people were going to get very offended if we didn't do it properly.
We went to Barbados
and spent two weeks together, working on the script.
l was on holiday in Barbados and they wanted to go back to London
and l thought, ''No, come to Barbados.''
And we rented this huge, brilliant mansion on the beach, and we wrote there.
lt was very efficient.
No wives, no Cleese answering the phone, ''l've got to do a commercial on Tuesday.''
None of that.
All l remember is, we were in the tree house, this great villa,
and l thought it was the height of luxury, and Python getting together...
Keith Moon came to play with us.
He was like a little boy, waiting for us to finish writing.
''You going to come and swim now?'' ''All right, we'll be with you in a minute.''
And then he'd play Scrabble with us in the evening.
Cleese and Chapman would put down words like ''abracadabra'' and ''sortifact''
and Keith would put ''cat'' and play happily along.
lt was really great.
l think early decisions were taken which were actually quite brave.
There were some wonderful sketches.
John and Graham came up with something about the Last Supper
where Jesus is going in, trying to book the restaurant.
''You want to book for the Last Supper?
''Thirteen? No, we can do you one of six and one of seven.''
Perhaps put them round... ''We all need to be on the same side.''
''Well, that's going to make it very difficult.'' Great stuff.
l remember it didn't seem right at the time.
That it... The humour wasn't... it wasn't really about Jesus, really.
lt was all about pushing tables together.
l just remember us talking about it.
l don't think anybody ever sat down and wrote it.
Because what used to happen, at the beginning,
we always had a couple of days when we got together and had ideas.
And then people went off and never wrote those ideas
because they didn't feel fresh any more.
And then the other one was that JC has just given the Sermon on the Mount.
All the disciples have their notes,
''Keep the thing about the leper. That was very good.
''Lose the whole thing about the camel and the big head.''
Doing it like a Frost Report with notes from the writers.
l loved that concept, but that fell by the wayside.
We thought at the time, God, it made us laugh,
but we thought, ''Hang on, this is...
''We've got to decide how we deal with the character of Jesus.
''Do we make jokes about Jesus
''or do we have Jesus in the film
''but make the jokes somehow separate from him?''
The interesting thing was,
we found out that Jesus Christ was not pervious to comedy.
There's nothing he says that you can laugh at.
Look after the poor, the meek, the sick.
Well, that's not... ''He said, 'Look after the meek!'''
We got near it, but not...
Nobody ever mocks what's said in the Sermon on the Mount.
We wanted to focus on what was funny.
What is funny isn't what Jesus says,
it's about how people misinterpret that.
What was that?
l don't know. l was talking to Big Nose.
l think it was, ''Blessed are the cheese makers.''
What's so special about the cheese makers?
lt's not meant to be taken literally.
lt refers to any manufacturers of dairy products.
lts intention was kind. ln fact, it really was getting at the people
that we really thought must have bugged Christ.
People who constantly got the message wrong.
Hear that? ''Blessed are the Greek.''
The Greek?
Apparently, he's going to inherit the earth.
Did anyone catch his name?
The more blasphemous things got filtered out,
and rightly so, l think, and then it found its target.
l'm a great fan of Henri Bergson's theory of humour,
which is about inflexibility.
And the point about Jesus Christ, he would not have been inflexible,
he would have been infinitely flexible because he would have had no ego.
lt's the ego that makes us flexible,
and that's what we tend to laugh at in character comedy.
That is why some nice sketches about sort of Jesus sort of...
as l say, booking the restaurant, things like that, weren't suitable,
and we realised, well, you've got to make the comedy work besides Jesus.
Jesus has got to be there,
but he has got to be shown to be an historical figure,
not sent-up, not joked about,
he appears, as he does at the birth in the film
and on the Sermon on the Mount.
lt's the meek. Blessed are the meek.
Oh, that's nice, innit?
l'm glad they're getting something cos they have a hell of a time.
An idea that we had at the very start,
which l almost felt sad that we dropped, it didn't work,
was that Brian was the 13th disciple
but he was married to a slightly difficult woman
and could never get away at the crucial moment.
He was going to be at the Last Supper,
but his wife had friends coming, so he couldn't get away,
but he was going to go on to the Garden of Gethsemane
but he went to the nightclub called the Garden of Gethsemane,
he missed the actual garden.
So he kept missing what was going on in Christ's life.
l remember being very, very favourably disposed towards that idea.
But it didn't hold water.
So then, whoever it was or however it was,
the idea of having an alternative person
who lived exactly the same life at the same time, but wasn't Jesus,
but was this Messiah who got put upon all the time, came up,
and that was the key thing.
What is the secret of eternal life?
He won't say!
Course not. lf l knew the secret of eternal life, l wouldn't say.
- Leave me alone! - Just tell me, please!
Tell us, master. We were here first.
- Five! - Just go away!
l can't go above five.
- ls that his gourd? - Yeah, but it's under offer.
- This is his gourd. - Ten!
lt is his gourd. We will carry it for you, master.
Master?
He's gone! He's been taken up!
- He has been taken up! - Eighteen!
No, there he is!
lt was a very inspiring moment because you felt
the script was growing and blossoming into something that was real,
something that was talking about something.
We read out some very good material about what was going on at the time.
On the very last day of the month of writing that we'd all put aside,
Michael came and read out the Pontius Pilate talking to the crowd sketch.
To pwove our fwiendship,
it is customawy at this time to welease a wongdoer fwom our pwisons.
Whom would you have me welease?
Welease Woger!
Yes! Welease Woger! Welease Woger!
And, at that moment, l saw that we had a movie.
l suddenly began to see, ''That's a huge chunk in the jigsaw.
''Now l begin to get some idea of what the story might be like.''
- Let me thpeak to them, Pontiuth! - Oh, no. Oh.
Ah. Good idea, Biggus.
Thitizenth!
We have Thamthon the Thadduthee Thtrangler,
Thilath the Athyrian Athathin, theveral theditiouth thcribeth...
We wrote The Life Of Brian in Barbados,
and on the island also
was a guy who worked for EMl.
Barry Spikings, who was joint managing director of EMl at the time,
had a house in Barbados.
l kept saying, ''He won't like it. He won't like it.''
Finally l said, ''All right, l'll let you have a look at it.''
He read it and he fell out of bed laughing.
He called me two days later and he says,
''We've got to make this film. Meet with me on Saturday morning.''
And...
l went to his house on Saturday morning
and we made a deal.
lt was simple as that.
Probably too good to be true.
And then it went up the chain to Delfont.
Lord Delfont, who suddenly read the script...
And said, as he put the script down, the immortal words,
''What are they trying to do, crucify me?''
l mean, he actually said that, which is wonderful.
l had arranged to have a meeting
with Barry Spikings and his lawyer and our lawyer
to go through the fine points of the contract,
and he started trying to make
the fine points into major points,
and l suddenly thought, ''There's something wrong here.''
And l said, ''What's this all about, Barry?''
He was very sheepish about it. He says, ''l've been overruled.''
''EMl can't touch it. lt's disrespectful, it's rude, it's blasphemous.''
And we were just...
l mean, breath...
breathless, at this sort of lateness of this conclusion.
We had already begun to look for locations
and spend money on costumes, and that sort of thing,
so we were a little bit angry.
Well, when EMl pulled out on the Thursday
before the crew was leaving on the Saturday,
l said, ''lt's Holy Grail again. lt's the National Trust, once again.
''They're pulling the rug right from under our feet.''
We sued EMl,
and l think they eventually settled out of court,
because, fortunately, somebody leaked to us some internal memos
saying, ''As you know, we are lucky enough to have the new Python movie,''
and things like that.
So, we did have them over a barrel, l think.
And of course, they did pay us off to some extent,
they paid us some money, but there was a secrecy clause.
They settled with us and paid us a lump sum,
which carried us over and actually paid for what we'd spent,
but on the condition that we wouldn't reveal this to anybody.
So now l'll probably have to give them back the hundred thousand.
God, l shouldn't have said anything.
But l was able to use my legal training at Cambridge, just once in my life,
and l was able to point out
that there wasn't a secrecy clause about the secrecy clause.
You've got an infinite regression there.
So we got a little bit of fun out of that.
l don't think any of us, at that point, felt,
''This is it. We won't get to do the film.''
Almost as if that reaction had strengthened our resolve.
His disapproval strengthened our own feelings of approval
about what we were going to do.
But we were still screwed because we had no money.
So, John Goldstone and l set off for America
and we go round all these people in New York, we go to meetings.
They say, ''What's it about?''
''Well, it's a sort of...'' and they go, ''Out!''
lt was like selling Springtime For Hitler.
Well, thank God that George Harrison was a big Python fan,
that's really it, and that Eric had gotten quite close to George.
l met him out here at a screening of The Holy Grail.
Partied for days.
He was good fun.
So, we were getting nowhere
and l would be calling George, who was living out here,
and he would say, ''Don't worry, l'll get you the money.''
''George, it's four million dollars!'' ''Don't worry, don't worry.''
But only George had the amount of money to be able to say,
''George, why would you put five million in a movie like this?''
''Well, you know, because l want to see it.''
That's... He could afford to do that.
Basically, that's it, l suppose. l just wanted to see the film.
There wasn't too much... really wasn't that much thought...
lt was just George and Eric.
He and his business manager, Denis O'Brien, set up HandMade Films.
George just didn't think about it. He was really good in his instinct.
lf he wanted to do something, he just did it.
You know, it's a leap of faith, and l think that's what l loved about him.
He was always taking those leaps.
What we did was we pawned my house and the office in London
to get a bank loan.
And that was a bit nerve-racking.
lf l'd known that, l would have been terrified about doing the movie
thinking that George's house was on the line.
But fortunately l didn't know about it, so l was blissfully unaware.
l thought, ''Well, they can afford that, so that's fine.''
lt's still the most anybody has ever paid for a cinema ticket in history.
We didn't really know that much about the movie,
that much about what a big deal it was going to be
or what a big investment it was going to be and what a chance he was taking.
But he definitely wanted to see the movie made
and, you know, they just wanted to have some fun.
Come on, haggle.
- All right, l'll give you ten. - That's more like it.
Ten? Are you trying to insult me? Me, with a poor, dying grandmother?
- Ten? - All right, l'll give you eleven.
Now you're getting it. Eleven? Did l hear you right?
Eleven? This cost me twelve! You want to ruin me?
- Seventeen? - No, no, no. Seventeen.
- Eighteen? - No, no. You go to fourteen now.
- l'll give you fourteen. - Fourteen? Are you joking?
That's what you told me to say. Tell me what to say. Please!
- Offer me fourteen. - l'll give you fourteen.
- He's offering me fourteen for this. - Fifteen.
Seventeen. My last word. l won't take a penny less or strike me dead.
- Sixteen. - Done.
When we were doing The Life Of Brian, which we shot in '78,
so l was nearly 40 years of age,
l was aware that, although l didn't think of myself as an actor,
l certainly acted some of the time and l thought to myself,
it would be really interesting
to play a character who went all the way through a movie.
l think John was rather keen to play Brian.
l thought that would be a thoroughly interesting experience.
l couldn't see John playing Brian. l really couldn't see it.
l kind of felt we needed Graham's integrity.
l didn't think there was anybody else in the Python group
who had that integrity that shows up on a big screen.
l'm of course biased.
Graham was the best actor of the crowd.
l'm not the Messiah!
l say you are, Lord, and l should know, l've followed a few.
Hail, Messiah!
l am not the Messiah! Will you please listen?
l am not the Messiah! Do you understand?
Honestly!
Only the true Messiah denies his divinity.
What? Well, what sort of chance does that give me?
All right! l am the Messiah!
He is! He is the Messiah!
Now fuck off!
All these things are happening around Graham
and he's sort of slightly puzzled by it all.
lt's a wonderful quality and it's something you can't act, l don't think.
The others, very kindly, made it clear to me
that they thought that was not a good idea
and that Gray was better at it and that l was more valuable doing the other parts.
You know the penalty laid down by Roman law
for harbouring a known criminal?
- No. - Crucifixion.
- Nasty, eh? - Could be worse.
What do you mean, ''could be worse''?
- Well, could be stabbed. - Stabbed? Takes a second.
Crucifixion lasts hours. lt's a slow, horrible death.
Well, at least it gets you out in the open air.
You're weird.
There's no question that they were right. l'm very glad that they got it right.
Ooh, you lucky bastard.
Before Graham started filming Brian,
he had been told that if he ever drank alcohol again,
probably he'd be dead within two years.
Once l decided to stop, it was easy,
except for the three days of unpleasantness.
Then, after that, a week in hospital
just cooling off on Valium, and l've been fine ever since.
He had been given a reprieve and a totally new life.
The reborn Graham
was part of the character he put into Brian.
Look! There he is! The Chosen One has woken!
What l love most about Life Of Brian
was the fact we were shooting in Tunisia,
and when you woke up in the morning, it was warm and the sun was out.
l remember the delight of sitting on the balcony
and having your orange juice,
and then going down and feeling good.
Yes, it's another edition of Graham Chapman Rests,
a series of 400 half-hour programmes
which look at the life of a man who rests a lot.
Playing Graham Chapman is Graham Chapman.
Last week he rested.
This week he starts off resting yet again.
l remember the first morning shooting was the stoning scene.
You have been found guilty by the elders of the town
of uttering the name of our Lord,
and so, as a blasphemer...
..you are to be stoned to death.
And l was wearing a beard, which l hate more than anything.
lt was extraordinary, by lunch time, the beard was off
and l was in the hotel swimming pool.
l'd had a lovely supper and all l said to my wife was,
''That piece of halibut was good enough for Jehovah.''
Blasphemy! He said it again!
Yes! Yes, he did! He did!
Did you hear him?
Yes! Yes, we did! We did!
Really!
Are there any women here today?
Very well.
By virtue of the authority vested in me...
Lay off! We haven't started yet!
Come on! Who threw that?
Who threw that stone? Come on.
She did! She did!
He did! He! Him!
Sorry. l thought we'd started.
- Go to the back. - All right, dear.
There's always one, isn't there?
The filming of Life Of Brian was a breeze, l really enjoyed that.
Terry Jones had taken it on himself to be the sole director,
but Terry Gilliam was heavily involved because he was designing it.
My feeling on the last film was that with two of us directing,
we were always shouting, we both of us run on adrenaline,
we were both shouting madly,
and l found it confusing for the crew
and l think the crew found it that way too.
lt wasn't really the best thing.
l think, fascism or whatever it is,
dictatorship is really important in film making.
lt needs one voice to hold it together.
- l can't see. - Where's he going?
Terry J was so well prepared.
We walked on set,
there wasn't the usual anxiety or getting to know each other.
lt all happened so flowingly.
And, from then on, l had the best time l think l've ever had.
ls there another way down?
ls there another path down to the river?
The hermit in the hole was a bit tricky,
because, of course, my costume was nothing.
l had beard.
The make-up girl had to attach it with a bit of Sellotape my willy.
Please! Please help me! l've got to get...
Master! Master!
My foot.
- Oh, damn! Damn! Damn! - l'm sorry!
- Oh, damn, damn and blast it! - l'm sorry.
To make it easier for the others and give them a later call,
l did all my close-ups first,
and then worked with Graham, when Graham came in,
and then the rest of the crowd arrived later.
And we were just sort of...
l was directing the crowd and Michael Palin came up behind me and said,
''Terry, you do realise you're stark naked, don't you?''
But by then it had just become my costume, so l hadn't noticed.
Tell them to stop it!
l hadn't said a word for eighteen years till he came along.
A miracle! He is the Messiah!
Well, he hurt my foot!
Hurt my foot, Lord! Hurt my foot. Hurt mine...
Hail Messiah!
The writing, l think, is the best writing in Python.
Particularly its political writing is what so brilliant about it,
because it's not about Jesus.
lt's about prejudices, unions, terrorists, it's all that nonsense.
ln those five minutes of the sandal, the shoe, the gourd,
it tells you everything about the history of religion.
Boom, it's the most concise, wonderful bit of prejudice,
heresy and everything and punishment.
He has given us a sign!
He has given us...his shoe!
The shoe is the sign. Let us follow his example.
What?
Let us, like him, hold up one shoe and let the other be upon our foot,
for this is his sign, that all who follow him shall do likewise.
No. The shoe is a sign that we must gather shoes together in abundance.
Cast off the shoes! Follow the Gourd!
No! Let us gather shoes together! Let me!
Oh, get off!
The Life Of Brian isn't blasphemous, because it doesn't touch on belief.
lt's heretical because it touches on dogma and it touches on the priesthood
and the interpretation of belief, rather than belief itself.
Follow the Gourd! The Holy Gourd of Jerusalem!
The Gourd!
Hold up the sandal as he has commanded us!
- lt is a shoe! - lt's a sandal!
No, it isn't!
Cast it away!
- Put it on! - And clear off!
lt became a classic film. l mean, you could see it...
When l was getting the material in for cutting it, it was just...
it was funny, but sustainable funny.
l could watch the scenes over and over again and they just made you laugh,
or there was something to enjoy in it all the time, and it was clever.
Don't pass judgment on other people,
or you might get judged yourself.
What?
l said, ''Don't pass judgment on other people,
''or else you might get judged too.''
- Who, me? - Yes.
Oh, thank you very much.
Well, not just you. All of you.
- That's a nice gourd. - What?
- How much do you want for the gourd? - You can have it.
- Have it? - Yes.
Consider the lilies...
- Don't you want to haggle? - No.
..in the field.
- What's wrong with it? - Nothing. Take it.
- Consider the lilies? - Well, the birds, then.
- What birds? - Any birds.
- Why? - Well, have they got jobs?
- Who? - The birds.
Have the birds got jobs?
- What's the matter with him? - Says the birds are scrounging.
l remember saying to the guys at the time,
''You know, we might get people, religious nutheads,
''sort of taking pot shots at us
''and, you know, it might be quite tricky, difficult when it comes out.''
Please, please, listen. l've got one or two things to say.
Tell us. Tell us both of them.
Look. You've got it all wrong.
You don't need to follow me. You don't need to follow anybody!
You've got to think for yourselves.
You're all individuals.
Yes, we're all individuals.
You're all different.
Yes, we are all different.
l'm not.
l was well aware of the storm that was coming and l loved that.
l loved the thought of what we were doing
that it would really open a hornets' nest.
We knew that there would be some trouble
but, you know, in a funny kind of way,
there wasn't that much in England.
l know that it passed the British censors, but the local Whitehouse...
whatever her name is, Grandma Blow Job,
gave them a hard time.
l always remember,
when we heard Mary Whitehouse was making a noise about it,
about Life Of Brian, thinking,
''That's going to be good publicity. lt can't be bad.''
Mary Whitehouse of course was an amazing figure at the time
and specialised in criticising things she hadn't seen.
l know she was making noise out there, but she was making noise about everything,
so it became background white noise.
Mary Whitehouse, she's always going to go off on something.
We kind of felt Mary Whitehouse was making the big faux pas -
in trying to stop people going to see it
she was actually encouraging people to go and see it.
The fact it was being banned in Britain, in Eastbourne, l couldn't see it.
But that just made it better, in a way,
because then you could go... because you had to go and see it at that point.
But we knew that in London, Oxford, Cambridge,
the usual sort of places, Manchester, Birmingham,
there was never any attempt to take it off there.
So, in a sense, the controversy added this sort of frisson
which l think probably helped the film.
The first time l was really aware of...
the greatness of the moment of what we'd done
was with Mike and John on the television show.
Our guest reviewers are Malcolm Muggeridge
and Mervyn Stockwood, the bishop of Southwark.
The great event was the interview on the Tim Rice show
where the bishop of Southwark and Malcolm Muggeridge
were brought in to attack the film with John and myself defending it.
My recollection was,
there was a programme that was done on Saturday night
that was directed or produced
by lain Johnstone, who was a friend of all of ours.
And he set this up and asked Sir Tim Rice to be the moderator.
With us tonight, another one third of Monty Python,
John Cleese and Michael Palin.
Tim created a pleasant atmosphere at the beginning,
but l don't remember his participating much
because l think it became rather gripping television.
l don't think we needed a great deal of help.
You keep making the basic assumption... Sorry, let me say this.
You keep making the basic assumption
that we are ridiculing Christ and Christ's teaching
and l say that we are not.
Do you imagine that your scene, for instance, of the Sermon on the Mount,
the scene in this, in your film, of the Sermon on the Mount,
is not ridiculing one of the most sublime utterances
that any human being has ever spoken on this earth? Of course it is.
lt's making fun of the guy who's remembered it wrong
and of the people who don't understand it.
That's unfair, because a lot of people looking in
will think we have actually ridiculed Christ, physically.
Christ is played by an actor, Ken Colley,
he speaks the words from the Sermon on the Mount.
He's treated respectfully.
The camera pans away, we go to the back of the crowd,
to someone who shouts, ''Speak up!'' because they cannot hear him.
Now, if that utterly undermines one's faith in Christ...
No, it doesn't undermine...
That was kind of fun.
What was particularly funny, it was the crossest l've ever seen Michael Palin.
Not a man who's easily upset. He was almost apoplectic.
l started off by saying that this is such a tenth-rate film
that l don't believe that it would disturb anybody's faith.
You started with an open mind, l realise that.
That was fun, but disappointing cos it was so funny.
And l remember Mervyn Stockwood, the pompous twerp,
you know, an alcoholic and gay, l mean...
The hypocrisy of it.
Ah, yes, fingering the cross, that was it.
The way people react to the cross,
and after all, l am not ashamed to wear the cross here,
which is the sign of a bishop.
When l look at that figure,
l know you're going to say Brian isn't Jesus, but that's just rubbish.
Muggeridge is such a twerp and he makes a fool of himself.
Remember that that story of the incarnation
was what our whole civilisation began with.
Remember that it has inspired every great artist,
every great writer, every great composer,
every great builder, every great architect.
That's to celebrate, that marvellous thing.
The Thirty Years' War in Germany, the lnquisition and so forth.
Yes, the lnquisition is there...
Muggeridge and the bishop
tended to assume that they were more popular than we were,
which was a fatal, fatal mistake they'd made.
The bishop was able to say,
''l hope you'll make your 30 pieces of silver,''
which was a pretty awful thing to say, but he was saying it...
cos he was getting a great reaction from the audience.
When we finished the whole thing, shock, horror,
we're all backstage and the bishop says, ''That seemed to go well.''
What are you really trying to say? l wasn't in the least bit horrified.
People said, ''Bishop, when you go there, you'll be absolutely horrified.''
l wasn't at all. l wasn't vicar of the university church for nothing.
l'm familiar with undergraduate humour.
They were using every old man trick in the book,
every headmaster trick in the book.
l know people of Clifton College of exactly your own period
who are now priests in my diocese.
- l remember the sermons. - You don't remember mine.
- Tell me what l preached on. - No idea.
l only remember the bad ones.
l remember a gentleman coming and telling us
how very difficult it had proved to get the Bible into Tibet.
Seven occasions. The first time there were landslides,
the second time, rains and the pages got stuck together,
the third time... No, this is true.
The third time the mules had fallen off the mountain,
the fourth time, there were thunderbolts, and the seventh time, he said,
''God helped us and we got the Bibles into Tibet.''
The obvious conclusion was that he was trying to stop them getting the Bibles.
Mike and John were just fantastic on that show.
And l thought, ''OK, this is good. We've started the controversy.''
And then l loved, in New York is where it really got interesting.
Life Of Brian was in perfect territory for humour, as far as l'm concerned.
Now, there were many groups in the United States that objected to it.
We were about to go to New York for the opening of The Life Of Brian,
and one forgets the fanaticism in America.
l suppose with all things it was more extreme here,
because you do have very deep religious factions, and many of them,
and ones that are much more likely to demonstrate and get cross about things.
A group of rabbis and priests held demonstrations over this past weekend
and they were demonstrating against a movie called The Life Of Brian.
A thousand rabbis came out in New York protesting about The Life Of Brian.
And we went, ''What? Why?''
Evidently the rabbis were complaining about the headdress
that John wears in the stoning sequence.
They said that was a religious garment or something.
We just thought it was a piece of costume.
We didn't know it had any religious significance.
The new Monty Python film is entitled The Life Of Brian.
lt is a spoof of the life of Christ
and has managed to offend just about every religious group in this city.
Once it's picked up by the networks and it's on the news,
you don't have to publicise it,
it's already wider than you can possibly imagine.
Monty Python's Life Of Brian, a film attracting much attention today
outside the Warner Brothers building in Rockefeller Center.
Demonstrators gathered to call the film blasphemous.
Catholic, Jewish, Greek Orthodox and Protestant religious leaders
have all condemned the film,
the New York Archdiocese officially on record against it.
And people were walking up and down with billboards outside the cinema,
which of course did us tremendous good,
and got millions of people to watch it who wouldn't otherwise.
One billboard said, ''Monty Python is an agent of the devil.''
l remember thinking, ''God, l'd like to be getting 10 of what he makes.''
Very early days of Life Of Brian,
it was banned in North Carolina, and we said, ''How is it banned?''
They said, Senator Strom Thurmond's wife
had a friend who'd heard it was very antireligious,
and because of that it was banned.
About 150 demonstrators
say their right to freedom of expression has been violated.
Theatre owners quit showing The Life Of Brian
after Senator Strom Thurmond told them it offended religious leaders.
These protestors say the film should not be censored,
no matter what the subject is.
And they say the senator abused his power
by asking General Cinema Corporation to quit showing the film.
He has censored a movie, it doesn't matter what the movie is,
it's censorship and that's bad news.
This is America, that's not supposed to happen.
l remember Life Of Brian was controversial at the time.
There was a lot of hue and cry about where you're coming from,
but again, you think, ''Wait, it's the Pythons, it's a comedy.''
And after all the Christ did exist as a real figure, he is public domain,
and it is said that he did have quite a sense of humour himself.
l'm from a Catholic household,
because we were a bit liberal too,
there were just murmurs of disapproval,
rather than, you know...
My mother is the kind of person who would laugh at that kind of thing
and then shake her head and tut at herself for having laughed at it.
l think it's...
A proper Christian seeing that film would get it.
My sister was quite religious,
didn't want to go and see it, and l said,
''You must. lt's actually, in a way, quite a religious film
''in that it takes away the mystique.''
She saw it eventually about six times.
l think they got that balance of
showing up the worst sides of religion
but not attacking the good sides.
With Life Of Brian, they have got nearly the greatest story ever told,
and it's all laid out for them, but it's done absolutely beautifully.
Both it's terrifically funny and says something terribly profound
about the nature of belief and religion,
and that's why it offended so many people.
Life Of Brian is almost, dare l say it, almost Shakespearean.
l think it was voted
best British comedy of all time,
which... l felt it should have been higher.
Life Of Brian, that got in my head.
That and Elephant Man and One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest,
are my favourite films, full stop, across all genres.
There are certain bits in it which one will always remember.
''lf it wasn't for the Romans'', things like that.
They've bled us white, the bastards.
They've taken everything we had, and not just from us,
from our fathers, and from our fathers' fathers.
And from our fathers' fathers' fathers.
And from our fathers' fathers' fathers' fathers.
All right. Don't labour the point.
And what have they ever given us in return?
The aqueduct?
- What? - The aqueduct.
Oh. Yeah, yeah. They did give us that. That's true.
And there's sanitation.
The sanitation, Reg. Remember what the city used to be like?
l'll grant you the aqueduct and the sanitation
are two things the Romans have done.
And the roads.
Obviously the roads. The roads go without saying.
Apart from the sanitation, the aqueduct and the roads...
- lrrigation. - Medicine.
- Education. - All right. Fair enough.
- And the wine. - Oh, yes.
That's something we'd really miss, Reg, if the Romans left.
Public baths.
And it's safe to walk in the streets at night now.
They know how to keep order.
Let's face it. They're the only ones who could in a place like this.
l do love the notion that there was a ton of these Christs about,
but one of them got the good... he was in... he was on the inside track.
But over there there's a ton of them and they all missed.
Which he will wield on all wretched sinners.
Sinners just like you, sir, there. And the horns shall be on the head...
..Obadiah, his servants.
There shall, in that time, be rumours of things going astray,
and there shall be a great confusion as to where things really are,
and nobody will really know where lieth those little things
with the sort of raffia-work base that has an attachment.
l often wonder how they... how it played with American audiences
who had never actually done Latin,
who never had been taken and put up against the wall
with having their ear tweaked by a Latin teacher going,
''Motion towards!'' ''Dative! Dative!''
What's this, then? ''Romanes Eunt Domus''?
''People called Romanes they go the house''?
lt... lt says, ''Romans, go home''.
No, it doesn't.
What's Latin for ''Roman''?
- Come on! Come on! - ''Romanus''?
- Goes like...? - ''Annus''?
- Vocative plural of ''annus'' is...? - ''Anni''?
''Romani''.
You go, ''Oh, my God! Declines with... Oh, shit!''
Conjugate the verb ''to go''.
lre. Eo, is, it, imus, itis, eunt.
So ''eunt'' is...?
Third person plural, present indicative - ''they go''.
But ''Romans, go home'' is an order, so you must use the...?
The imperative!
- Which is...? - Oh, ''i'', ''i''!
- How many Romans? - Plural, plural - ''ite'', ''ite''.
That's a peculiar public-school phenomenon
and it always gets a laugh.
How does it get a laugh if nobody...
How does anybody know that this really went on?
lt's just so absurd, it's funny. lt's funny in its own right.
- Understand? - Yes, sir.
- Write it out 100 times. - Thank you, sir.
- Hail Caesar, sir. - Hail Caesar.
lf it's not done by sunrise, l'll cut your balls off.
To somebody like me who went to boarding school,
and had to suffer all these iniquities,
it's a stroke of genius.
Finished!
Right. Now don't do it again.
Bloody Romans.
That's speaking as an ex-communist,
the scene with the People's Popular Front of Judea.
The only people we hate more than the Romans
are the fucking Judean People's Front.
Splitters.
And the Judean Popular People's Front.
Yeah. Splitters.
And the People's Front of Judea.
- Yeah. Splitters. - What?
The People's Front of Judea. Splitters.
We're the People's Front of Judea!
l thought we were the Popular Front.
People's Front.
Whatever happened to the Popular Front, Reg?
He's over there.
Splitter!
That was so brilliantly observed.
That alone is worth the ticket price
and should have ended communism right there and then.
Next.
- Crucifixion? - Yes.
Good. Out of the door. Line on the left. One cross each.
Next.
Crucifixion was, at that time, a very common punishment.
Jesus wasn't the first person to be crucified,
there were thousands more crucified.
The Roman Empire was an imperial power and they could send people off.
So, you think about all the people you might find in that world,
so, hence, you would find the centurion l played,
this earnest, liberal man from a nice farm up near Rome
who'd got stuck up here in the Eastern Mediterranean
and was having to send people off to their deaths and crucifixion.
So he's so pleased when someone comes through and says,
''No, l've been told l can live on a desert island and go free.''
- No. Freedom. - What?
Freedom for me.
They said l hadn't done anything
so l can go free and live on an island somewhere.
That's wonderful.
He feels this is the way it should be in the ideal world.
Then this wonderful character, ''No, it's crucifixion, really.''
l see. Very good. Very good. Well, out of the door...
l know the way. Out the door, one cross each, line on the left.
So, you've got the idealised centurion figure, you've also got the cheeky Cockney
who's always having a joke about anything, played by Eric...
Miserable bloody Romans. No sense of humour.
..and the guy who says,
''Would you carry my cross?'' ''Oh, yes, let me.''
No, Terry says, ''Let me carry your cross.''
Let me shoulder your burden, brother.
Thank you.
Then he just buggers off.
Terry says, ''Excuse me, it's not my cross! lt's not my cross.''
- lt's not my cross. - Shut up and get on with it!
lt's all characters you've seen in modern Britain,
the sort of idealists and the naive people and all that sort of thing,
and the chancers and the opportunists.
The big thing is what happens when you're on the crosses.
Up you go, Big Nose!
l'll get you for this, you bastard.
- Oh, yeah? - Oh, yeah.
- Don't worry. l never forget a face. - No?
l warned you. l'm going to punch you so hard, you Roman git!
- Shut up, you Jewish turd! - Who are you calling Jewish?
l'm not Jewish! l'm a Samaritan!
A Samaritan? This is supposed to be a Jewish section.
lt doesn't matter! You're all going to die in a day or two.
lt may not matter to you, Roman, but it certainly matters to us.
- Doesn't it, darling? - Oh, rather.
Under the terms of the Roman occupancy,
we're entitled to be crucified in a purely Jewish area.
Pharisees separate from Sadducees.
And Swedish separate from Welsh!
All right, all right, all right! We'll soon settle this!
Hands up, all those who don't want to be crucified here.
Right. Next!
Now we come to, how to end a movie where all of the characters
have been arrested and are about to be crucified.
Because, anyone on a cross, it's a significant figure,
that's the symbol of Christianity.
That's when Eric came up with Always Look On The Bright Side.
l said, ''What they should do is we should have a song, end with a song.''
Everybody said, ''Then we can have the feet kicking and all of that.''
l said, ''lt should be cheery, like a Disney song, a whistly song.''
When you're chewing on life's gristle
Don't grumble, give a whistle
And this'll help things turn out for the best
And...
Always look on the bright side of life
l went straight home when l wrote it. l got my guitar out.
l had these jazz guitar chords, and l did the little whistle song.
lf life seems jolly rotten
There's something you've forgotten
And that's to laugh and smile and dance and sing
When you're feeling in the dumps
Don't be silly, chumps
Just purse your lips and whistle, that's the thing
That song didn't really come to life until we got to Tunisia,
because when l did the demo
it was like, it was sung very straight.
But when we got to Tunisia
l suddenly realised it should be in Cheeky's voice, Mr Cheeky.
And so we got the sound recordist and John Goldstone and me,
we went into our hotel room.
We put mattresses on the walls, had a bottle of boukha,
and they lay on the floor and l sang.
Some things in life are bad
They can really make you mad
And so that track is recorded live in the hotel room in Tunisia.
Always look on the bright side of death
Just before you draw your terminal breath
Life's a piece of shit when you look at it
l remember looking in Michael Palin's diary recently, he said,
''Eric hasn't written very much,
''but he has written a song, not a very good one.''
That's Always Look On The Bright Of Life.
And always look on the bright side of life
Always look on the right side of life
Come on, Brian. Cheer up.
Always look on the bright side of life
Always look on the right side of life
Worse things happen at sea, you know.
What you got to lose?
You come from nothing. You're going back to nothing.
What have you lost? Nothing!
''Nothing will come from nothing,'' you know what they say?
Cheer up, you old bugger. Come on. Give us a grin.
There you are. See? lt's the end of the film.
lncidentally, this record's available in the foyer.
Some of us have got to live as well, you know.
All right, that's the lot.
Who do you think pays for all this rubbish?
They'll never make their money back, you know.
l told him. l said to him, ''Bernie,'' l said, ''they'll never make their money back.''