It's easy to forget how much Monty Python reshaped the face of comedy. The six-man troupe solidified sketch comedy as arguably the most effective delivery method for laughs. They spread a distinctly British form of absurdity around the globe. They killed parrots. They made at least a couple of great movies. The Meaning of Life wasn't that great.
As the director of those movies (he co-directed Monty Python and the Holy Grail with that other Terry and did Life of Brian on his own. He also directed The Meaning of Life on his own, but don't worry too much about that one since it isn't that great. Well, Mr. Creosote is pretty funny. Feel free to think about Mr. Creosote), Terry Jones was a particularly important Python. He also co-wrote such classic sketches as "Spam", "The Spanish Inquisition", "The Ministry of Silly Walks", and "Fish Slapping Dance" with writing partner Michael Palin. He was also Mr. Creosote. Terry Jones's fascination with history that fueled the Holy Grail and sketches such as "The Spanish Inquisition" also resulted in more serious projects, specifically the books Chaucer's Knight: The Portrait of a Medieval Mercenary and Who Murdered Chaucer? both of which are apparently about Chaucer.
Sadly, Terry Jones was diagnosed with primary progressive aphasia in 2015, a form of dementia that affected his speech. On January 21, Jones died of complications from the syndrome. He was 77.
George Perry’s The
Life of Python first appeared in 1994 when that revolutionary comedy troupe
probably seemed deader than an ex-parrot. Of course, money has a way of
bringing dead things back to life, and the promise of a nice pay day has
recently reunited Michael Palin, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terrys Jones and
Gilliam, and even Graham Chapman (appearing from beyond the grave via archival
footage) for some live appearances. That means it’s a prime opportunity for
Perry to get in on the action with an all-new edition of his book. For fans
who’ve spent the last twenty years resisting The Life of Python, it’s a pretty straight piece of
journalism/biography with individual chapters on each Python and a final
extended one covering the guys’ collective career. There’s a great deal of informational overlap between the sections, and the bio chapters spend a lot
of time looking beyond the Flying Circus at Gilliam’s big screen triumphs and
failures (mostly failures), Cleese’s marital triumphs and failures (almost
exclusively failures), and so on. The absence of Carol Cleveland in this story
is glaring. Perry also makes no effort to tap into Monty Python’s insanity and
inanity, so his book is more drily informative than fun, though his paraphrasing of a
response Idle sent to some complete idiot who implied Chapman should be killed
because of his homosexuality made me laugh hard enough to almost make up for that.
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