Best. Python. Skits. Ever.

Monty Python played my hometown of Winnipeg, MB in 1973 on their Monty Python Farewell Tour. My older brother went to the show. He still has the tour book which folded out into a large poster that he has hanging in his home. All cast memeber were in Winnipeg including Carol Cleveland and Neil Innis. By all accounts the show was brilliant. In the Travel Agent sketch, Eric Idle as Mr. Smoketoomuch left the stage at the Centennial Concert Hall and walked down into the audience during his tirade about the horrors of the English abroad. When he returned to the stage at the end of the long monologue he received a standing ovation.

Canada was the only place Python ever actually toured. The 1973 tour started in Southampton, U.K. and then went to Canada, stopping in Montreal, Ottawa, Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver. Monty Python would play live three more times, but only in one place; Drury Lane in 1974, NYC in 1976, and Hollywood in 1980.
____________________________________

Favourite sketch. Too many... Here's one that may not have been mentioned yet.

3RD INTERVIEWER (Eric Idle): Last week The Royal Festival Hall saw the first performance of a new symphony by one of the world's leading modern composers, Arthur "Two-Sheds" Jackson. Mr. Jackson.
JACKSON (Terry Jones): Good evening.
INT: May I just sidetrack you for one moment. Mr. Jackson, this, what should I call it, nickname of yours.
JAC: Oh yes.
INT: "Two-Sheds." How did you come by it?
JAC: Well I don't use it myself, it's just a few of my friends call me "Two-Sheds."
INT: I see, and do you in fact have two sheds?
JAC: No. No, I've only one shed. I've had one for some time, but a few years ago I said I was thinking of getting another one and since then some people have called me "Two-Sheds."
INT: In spite of the fact that you have only one.
JAC: Yes.
INT: I see, and are you thinking of purchasing a second shed?
JAC: No.
INT: To bring you in line with your epithet.
JAC: No.
INT: I see, I see. Well let's return to your symphony. Ah, now then, did you write this symphony... in the shed?
JAC: ... No.
INT: Have you written any of your recent works in this shed of yours?
JAC: No it's just a perfectly ordinary garden shed.

A picture of a shed appears on the screen behind them.

INT: I see. And you're thinking of buying this second shed to write in.
JAC: No, no. Look, this shed business, it doesn't really matter at all, the sheds aren't important. It's just a few friends call me "Two-Sheds," and that's all there is to it. I wish you'd ask me about my music. I'm a composer. People always ask me about the sheds, they've got it out of proportion, I'm fed up with the sheds, I wish I'd never got it in the first place.
INT: I expect you're probably thinking of selling one.
JAC: I will sell one.
INT: Then you'd be Arthur "No-Sheds" Jackson.
JAC: Look forget about the sheds. They don't matter.
INT: Mr. Jackson I think with respect, we ought to talk about your symphony.
JAC: What?
INT: Apparently your symphony was written for organ and tympani.
JAC: (Catches sight of the picture of the shed behind him.) What's that?
INT: What's what?
JAC: It's a shed. Get it off.

He points to BP screen shed. The picture of the shed disappears and is replaced by a picture of Jackson. Jackson looks at it carefully.

JAC: Right.
INT: Now then Mr. Jackson... your symphony.

Caption appears: "ARTHUR "TWO-SHEDS" JACKSON.

The picture of jackson is replaced by a picture of two sheds, one with a question mark over it.

INT: I understand that you used to be interested in train spotting.
JAC: What?
INT: I understand that about thirty years ago you were extremely interested in train spotting.
JAC: What's this got to do with my bloody music?

Enter SECOND INTERVIEWER from earlier sketch.

2INT (John Cleese): Are you having any trouble from him?
INT: Yes, a little.
JAC: Good Lord! You're the man who interviewed Sir Edward Ross earlier.
2INT: Well we interviewers are more than a match for the likes of you, "Two-Sheds."
INT: Yes make yourself scarce "Two-Sheds." This studio isn't big enough for the three of us.

They push him away and propel him out.

JAC: What are you doing? (He is pushed out of vision with a crash.)
2INT: Get your own Arts programme you fairy!
INT: (To camera) Arthur "Two-Sheds" Jackson.

INT:Never mind Timmy.
2INT: Oh Mike, you're such a comfort.


I know a lot of folks have memories of seeing Monty Python on PBS in the late 1970s. Monty Python's Flying Circus aired in Canada on the CBC, late night, starting in 1969, same time as it was on in the U.K. We used to watch it after the 11PM news on Thursdays.

 

1)Argument Clinic
2)Lumberjack Song
3)Parrot Shop
4)Twit Of The Year Contest
5)Cheese Shop
6)Arthur "Two Sheds" Jackson
7)The Spanish Inquisition
8)Death Of Mary, Queen Of Scots/Penguin Explodes On The Telly
9)Confuse-A-Cat
10)entire "Monty Python & The Holy Grail" movie

Eric Idle, BTW, is going to be in Burlington, Vermont in October on a solo tour. You just KNOW the MatrixMan will be there!

Evan

 

I saw Eric Idle a couple years ago when he played Carnegie Hall (how do you get to Carnegie Hall, anyway? ) The show is a lot of fun--and we had the added attraction of Terry Jones joining him onstage for "The Lumberjack Song," and no less than Art Garfunkel chipping in on "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" (Artie covered the song for the soundtrack of As Good As It Gets).

When you see the show, treat yourself to a program--it's a keeper!

 

And now, for something completely different.

A man with three buttocks.

 

At least I didn't tell them about the dirty knife!

 

Cheese Shop!

Hands down!

 

"I don't care how fu**ing runny it is, hand it over with all speed!"

 

"It's not really much of a cheese shop, is it?"

"Finest in the district, sir."

"And what leads you to that conclusion?"

"It's so clean."

"Well, it's certainly uncontaminated by cheese."

 

"Yes! We are all individuals!"

 

The Eric Idle tour is called, BTW, "The Greedy Bastard Tour: Another Stupid Evening". Sounds like a riot!

Evan

 

Doug and Dinsy!

 

I'm not.

 

The "Summarize Proust" finals in 1972, where the chorus gets as far as their 10th recitation of "Proust in his first book/wrote about/wrote about" (after having built it up from one voice to about twenty on each succeeding repeat of that phrase) and they run out of their allotted time of 30 seconds and get gonged off the stage!

Also, the intro to the "Watney's Red Barrel" sketch-a close-up of Mt. Everest, with an off-screen Michael Palin intoning "Mt. Everest....vast....forbidding...." (a running joke in the episode) then a quick pan down to Palin sitting in front of a Mt. Everest poster behind his travel agency desk. Palin (cheerfully): "Nope, sorry, we don't go there!"