Tonight I went to see Eric Idle, one of the members of the Monty Python group. I only found out it was on last night because he is on Twitter and mentioned he was having fun in Canberra and was doing a show in Melbourne tonight. The tickets were sold out except some in the choir seats, on the sides. I knew it would be fine, having seen Henry Winkler earlier this year, also from last minute choir seats, so I booked on line. It was not cheap, even in those seats, but well worth it.
Mr Idle was very funny, but the show was mainly about how the Pythons got together (university) and how they made their shows and their films, even some of the TV shows on which they appeared, with clips. There was a Virtual Band playing every now and then, sometimes with Eric on the video.
He wrote the songs, including, of course, “Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life” from Life Of Brian. In fact, his show ended with him leading the audience in a sing-along of it, and quite a few people whistled during the chorus(good on them, I can’t whistle these days). I did sing along.
He said he wrote it when they were trying to think of an ending for the film - in his hotel room!
He had a story to tell about the help they got from the Beatle George Harrison in making Life Of Brian. They were in the middle of building sets in Tunisia when Lew Grade cancelled their budget, after reading the script. With no money they had to go to the US to see if they could somehow raise the money, but no one was interested. Then Eric got a call from George, saying he had the money. To get it, he had to mortgage his home and his business. When Eric asked him why he did it, George said, “I wanted to see the film.”
Fortunately it became a classic, so he got his money back, but I remember the fuss made by Christians who hadn’t even seen it. A friend of mine who was religious said she had heard bad things, but I assured her it wasn’t making fun of Jesus - far from it! - so she went to see it and loved it.
I had heard that George Harrison had helped, but not that he risked losing his home to do it.
He told stories about his other friends, including Robin Williams, who was disappointed that no one recognised him in France when they went out to a club - after saying he didn’t want to go out because people in the US always made a fuss.
That reminded me of a friend of mine who hosted Leonard Nimoy when he was here(she knew all the Trek folk). He said he didn’t want a fuss made of him, then was disappointed that nobody recognised him when he went out for a walk. Well, it was the suburbs. You don’t expect to meet Mr Spock in Mordialloc, do you?
He also talked about the sadness of losing friends as the years go by. He was asked to speak at Robin Williams’ funeral - and George Harrison’s. Both times he wrote a song, which he sang for us.
He spoke about the death of Python Graham Chapman, then showed a clip of a show they were on. They brought on an urn, supposedly with Chapman’s ashes in it, and a picture of him hanging on the side… then the urn was knocked over when John Cleese was in the middle of a sentence. They all got up and frantically started brushing up the ashes. I suspect Graham would have enjoyed the joke.
I really enjoyed the show and am glad I was able to catch it. It was fascinating to look at the jam packed auditorium and think, everyone in the audience is a Monty Python fan.
Good night!
