Personal Interest

The group called Monty Python's Flying Circus consisting of John Cleese, Michael Palin,
Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Graham Chapman British actors-writers, and Terry Gilliam
American animator, broadcasted forty-five half-hour-long episodes of absurd humour on
BBC from 1969 until 1974. After their works they are very often mentioned in Hungary as
the "other" famous group of England besides the Beatles.

Despite their popularity in Hungary, their forty-episoded series was only shown on
Hungarian television in 1994, twenty years later then the British broadcast. Hungarian
audience had known this group previously only from their films, Monty Python and the
Holy Grail and Life of Brian. The works of Monty Python are more popular among the
younger generations and I also have become interested in their works because I found them
very interesting and amusing. Still, although I enjoyed their shows I could not really
explain for myself or to others what it was that made me laugh. I decided to examine their
works more deeply and thoroughly to find out what makes their sketches extraordinary and
funny and that is the question I am attempting to answer in my essay. To find an
explanation, firstly I am going to talk about English humour, then I would like to shift to
the point of analysing the sketches of Monty Python, first from the social, then from the
literary point of view. In my work I was helped by Miklós Galla, Hungarian comedian, who
wrote the Hungarian subtitles for the series. Wherever statement concerning the history of
Monty Python is found in my essay without a source indicated, the information was
provided by Miklós Galla.

So let me now interpret my line of analysis, or, by announcing with the words of the
Pythons: "It's...Monty Python's Flying Circus!"

A few words on English humour

First of all we should clarify what the term English humour means, because later we should
place Monty Python into its context. The expression "English humour" is widely accepted
and frequently used in most language to describe the humour of English comedians or the
works of humorous writers. On the other hand, if we look for a definition of English
humour, in most of the books trying to find an answer for this only the following
characteristics are listed, such as absurdity, irony, understatement, self-parody,
sophistication, morbidity and cruelty.(Bier:1968:420, Priestley: 1976:9, Mikes: 1967:73) In
my opinion, none of these descriptions seems to be an appropriate one, because these
characteristics are too general to be used only for English humour.

Since no definition could be found, the questioning of the existence of such a special type
of humour has certainly arisen. George Mikes, an analyst of the topic formulates this
problem wittily (Mikes 1967:9):

English humour resembles the Loch Ness Monster in that both are famous but there is a strong suspicion that
neither of them exists. Here the similarity ends: the Loch Ness Monster seems to be a gentle beast and harms
no one; English humour is cruel.
In spite of that no fulfilling description has been drafted for English humour, it might exist
and differ from other types of humour. This can be the product of the voluntary separation
of England from the "Continent", so humour could develop with less foreign influence,
than in the case of the countries of the Continent. For example the term "English humour"
also means in Hungarian a type of humour that is not funny at all, representing how far the
humour of the English developed from the European "norms", where different nations
influenced the humour of each other more strongly. From now on in my essay I am going
to consider the works of Monty Python as the representations of English humour.

Monty Python's Flying Circus

1. Its place in English humour
In 1969 five British writers-actors John Cleese, Michael Palin, Terry Jones, Graham
Chapman and Eric Idle accompanied with the American graphic-animator Terry Gilliam
formed the group called Monty Python's Flying Circus to make television shows. Their aim
was to create half-hour-long films, which are unordinary, extravagant and built up of
different sketches, which don't necessarily have a punch line, but rather flow into each
other with the help of animation. Almost every role in their episodes were played by the
five actors, even the screeching housewives. They shot forty-five episodes which were
shown on BBC from 1969 to 1974.

Monty Python served the "third" British class taste, that was described by Jesse Bier in
1968 as a recently forming one getting wedged between the traditional labours' and upper
class. As Bier described this "new interclass of the red- bricked universities" had just at the
late 60's started to straighten and develop its own sense of humour (Bier 1968427). This
educated class was forming between East End and Oxford, and the Pythons, whom actually
got to know each other from the Cambridge Footlights Theatre as students, were one of the
first representatives of this new, intellectual humour.

The "intellectual humour" expression is very appropriate to use for Monty Python's works,
since their sketches are permeated by the atmosphere of intellect. Jokes are very frequently
built upon the appearances of well-known historical or otherwise famous persons as for
example in the Cycling race of twentieth century painters (episode #1), Attila the Nun
(ep.#20) or the Housing project built by characters from nineteenth century English
literature. There are also plenty of references and allusions to different philosophical
schools, scientific theories and political issues which could be most entirely understood by
the educated people.

2. Analysis of sketches
The social point of view

The Pythons, as the pioneers of intellectual humour created revolution in television comedy
from different aspects. One aspect is that in opposition with traditional comedy, Monty
Python sketches are hardly ever built up to a punch line. Their humour is rather based upon
the differences between the appearing characters, that one of them is absolutely normal and
ordinary, while the other behaves in an absurd and idiotic way. It makes us laugh that we
realise the idiocy of the absurd person, while the normal one doesn't. From now on the
source of laughter can be the inflexibility of the normal person and the sharp difference
between the appearing characters. For example in the sketch Camel spotting (ep.#7), where
the contrast appears between an ordinary television interviewer and a camel spotter, who is
an entirely absurd figure. Their conversation runs on like a serious interview, only the
answers given are unexpected.

Interviewer :How many camels have you spotted so far?

Spotter : Oh, well so far, up to the present moment, I've spotted nearly...nearly one.
Interviewer : Nearly one?
Spotter : Well, call it none...
Interviewer : So in three years you've spotted no camels?
Spotter : Yes in only three years. Er, I tell a lie, four, be fair, five. I've been camel spotting for just the seven
years. Before that of course I was a Yeti spotter.
Interviewer : That must have been extremely interesting....
/and so on.../

In other cases, where comedy functions as a social instrument, the Bergsonian theory is
manifested, in which he states that one important role of satire is to make a corrective
against undesirable attitudes of the members of a society. (Bergson 1986:118.).These
sketches reflect on certain negative human characteristics. For example in the Mr. Hilter
sketch (ep.#12) the stereotyped and insipid conversational topics get caricatured through
the chatting of a middle-class couple with Hitler and his Nazi leaders, who are pretending
that they are English.

Landlady: Ooh planning a little excursion are we Mr Hilter?

Hitler: Ja! Ja! We make a little hike ...for Bideford.
Johnson: Oh well you'll be wanting the A39 then...no, no, you've got the wrong map there, this is Stalingrad.
You want the Ilfracombe and Barnstaple section.
Hitler: Ah Hein...Reginald you have the wrong map here you silly old leg-before-wicket English person.
Himmler: I'm sorry mein Führer... (Hitler slaps him) Mein Dickie old chum.
Landlady: Lucky Mr Johnson pointed that out, eh? You wouldn't have much fun in Stalingrad would you, ha,
ha, ha...

The overrated topics of this conversation are about the traffic, the weather, tea, very weak
jokes, etc. In this sense Monty Python's intellectual jokes become more than jokes, because
as soon as a member of the audience realise the target of the satire is himself, these sketches
will make him think a little bit more deeply and seriously about the message hidden in the
joke. This is the traditional attitude of the court jester, who has been telling the truth from
under the protection of his cap and bells since Shakespeare first portrayed him in King
Lear. In the case of Monty Python this could function much more effectively than in written
satire, because their episodes, by appearing on television, could reach every class of the
society. Actually, Monty Python parodied television, television programmes and BBC itself
with overwhelming impudence. That was another aspect of Monty Python's revolution,
because they used the publicity of television to attack its institute. For example their first
book, Monty Python's Big Red Book is dedicated "to the BBC Programme Planners,
without whom anything is possible." (Python 1971:7.).

On the other hand, human idiocy is not only offended by satire, it is very frequently
attacked by "real" weapons, as a 16 ton weight or a knight with a rubber chicken. These
acts clearly reflect on the society-forming role of humour, that in the imagined world of
Monty Python the ones with negative characteristics get simply liquidated.

Other source of comedy is the sudden clash of two most extreme approaches of the same
basic idea, where one extreme is the most serious, and pathetic aspect of the matter, while
the other is the most flippant one, as for example it happens in Court scene (ep.#3) :

Judge: Mr Larch, you heard the case for the prosecution. is there anything you wish to say before I pass
sentence?
Larch: Well I'd just like to say, m'lud, I've got a family... a wife and six kids... and I hope very much you don't
have to take away my freedom ...because....well, because m'lud freedom is a state much prized within the
realm of civilised society. It is a bond wherewith the savage man may soothe the troubled breast into a
magnitude of quiet. ... What frees the prisoner in his lonely cell, chained within the bondage of rude walls, far
from the owles of Thebes?...What goddess doth the storm toss'd mariner offer her most tempestuous prayers
to? Freedom! Freedom! Freedom!
Judge: It's only a bloody parking offence.

Or another example is the Superman sketch (ep.#3):

Superman film: shot from below of Superman striding along against the sky.
Commentator (American accent):This man is no ordinary man. This is Mr. F. G. Superman. To all
appearances no different from any other law-abiding citizen.
Pull back to reveal he is in a street full of Supermen walking, waiting at bus etc.
Commentator: But Mr. F. G. Superman has a secret identity...when trouble strikes at any time ...at any place...
he is ready to become...Bicycle Repair Man!

The flash of the new, unimportant aspect turns the serious into funny, and that is the way
how every task taken seriously by mankind (for example the idea of freedom or ideal
heroes) can become ridiculous. By this point we have arrived to the field of a more subtle
aspect of Pythonesque1 analysis, that is the literary aspect.

The literary point of view

"l'Humour noir"

It is a typical feature of Monty Python, that they turn the task taken most seriously by
mankind: the task of death into a joke by overwhelming morbidity. About 80% of the
characters are "killed" in the most varying ways from the falling of 16 tons to being eaten
by a Blancmange, and, furthermore, Monty Python may also lay claims for the most morbid
sketch ever written, the Undertaker's sketch (ep.#26):

ANIMATION: various really nasty cannibalistic scenes from Terry Gilliam. Cut to man.
Man: Stop it, stop it. Stop this cannibalism. Let's have a sketch about clean, decent human beings.
Cut to an undertaker's shop.
...
Man: My mother just died.
Undertaker: We can help you. We deal with stiffs... We can bury her, burn her or dump her.
Man (shocked): What? U.t.: Dump her in the Thames.
Man: What??!
U.t.: Oh, did you like her?...
U.t.: If we burn her she gets stuffed in the flames, crackle, crackle, which is a bit of a shock if she is not quite
dead....Or if we bury her she gets eaten up by lots of weevils, and nasty maggots, which is also a shock if she
is not quite dead.... Where is she?
Man: In this sack.
...
Man: Are you suggesting eating my mother?
U.t.: Er…yeah, not raw. Cooked.
Man: Well, I do feel a bit peckish...
U.t.: Tell you what, we'll eat her, if you feel a bit guilty about it after, we can dig a grave and you can throw
up in it.

This sketch was not accidentally put into the episode The Queen will be watching, that
shows that they consciously strived to shock the "ordinary law-abiding citizens". The
sketch is a perfect example for black humour, as it is described to reach the catharsis of
laughter through shocking and disguising, and to reject all kinds of moral codex which
regulate our lives on Earth. (Abádi 1982:369). Black humour makes fun of the horrible,
from violence and death by phlegmatically avoiding sentimentalism, with the tools of
shocking and dismaying. Its role is to reflect on the senselessness of universe and death,
which are unchangeable by anyone or any society. The fact of mortality faces humans
indifferently and it neglects all forms of unwritten moral laws, and so does black humour.
The undertaker talks indifferently the truth about what happens to a buried person,
reflecting on our fragility by shocking and astonishing us.

According to Bier (Bier 1968:420) the number of morbid sketches had increased in British
television comedy in the late sixties. He reasons this phenomenon as the steam let off from
the Victorian repression. During the reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901), the English were
proud of being the members of the greatest world power of their time, the values accepted
by the English middle class were sobriety, thrift, self control and strict sexual morality. As
a consequence of these, decadent humour reflecting on the frailty and mortality of man and
his unimportance in the Universe would have been censored sharply.

Monty Python also has sketches ridiculing this serious and proud era of the past, for
example the sketch Queen Victoria Handicap, that is a race hold not for horses but for
queens Victoria, or The wacky queen, that is a burlesque scene narrated by Alfred Lord
Tennyson with a jolly American accent showing the naughtiness of the Queen and
Gladstone throwing cakes at each other, etc. .

"And now for something completely different"-as it could have been said by John Cleese,
who created a catch phrase from this sentence by telling it lots of times throughout the
series. Now let us talk about absurd humour, nonsense and philosophical satire in the works
of Monty Python's Flying Circus.
Absurd

Absurd humour is an attack against rigid logic. Absurdity turns proper sequences of ideas
upside down and creates absurd logical connections with the only aim of causing catharsis
by laughter. (Balotá 1979:41) Absurd humour has a base of incongruity, that comedy in this
case is derived from the sensation of the opposition between the elements of a certain
situation. In this definition three types of incongruity are distinguishable, such as logical,
natural and social incongruity.

Incongruity of logical nature in the Python-sketches occurs mainly between what should
happen logically and what really happens. In the sketch Queen Victoria handicap comedy
lays in that we would expect the race of horses, but after all it is fairly logical to have racing
queens Victoria, since it was indicated by the name of the handicap.

In other cases, when the situation is realistic, the incongruity is natural occurring between
the action and the words describing it, as in sketch Flying sheep (ep.#2), when a rustic
narrates how his sheep are trying to fly:

Rustic:..It is my belief that these sheep are labouring under the misapprehension that they're birds. Observe
their behaviour. Take for a start the sheep' tendency to hop about the field on their back legs. Now witness
their attempts to fly from tree to tree...Notice they do not so much fly as plummet.

It is also a "fair" way of approach on the side of the rustic, since his description about the
sheep is very precise indeed. The incongruity is between that the phenomenon is at least
very strange, while the rustic takes it as a trivial one.

The third type of incongruity is the one with social nature, that appears between the natural
demands of a human and the conventions, schemes and banalities of the society. This is
represented by the institutions made up by the Pythons, such as the Ministry of Silly Walks
(ep#14), the Society for Putting Things on top of Other Things (ep#18), where they put
something absolutely useless in the framework of a socially respected idea such as politics,
television, etc.

The word 'absurd' means senseless in Latin and its encyclopaedic definition is something
opposing the laws of logic, e.g. a quadrilateral triangle. Deducing a statement from here ad
absurdum is to show its contradiction, from which we may conclude that a statement
opposing it may be right.(Révai 1994:46). By this definition we arrived to the next genre of
humour we should examine if we are dealing with Monty Python, that is philosophical
satire or satiric absurd.

Philosophical satire

Satire is a genre ridiculing and criticising the absurdity of a society, or as derived from the
nature of absurd described above, satire is the deduction of a phenomenon occurring in
society, and by showing its contradictions, give a hint that an opposing opinion might be
the right one. In that case it can be a serious judgement of a certain task although it causes
laughter. Monty Python used this weapon most strongly to judge militarism and politics.
Anti-militarism is expressed in the sketch Trivialising the War (ep.#42), where a soldier's
case is on trial, who is accused of not taking the war seriously:

Soldier: How can I encapsulate in mere words my scorn for any military solution? The futility of modern
warfare? And the hypocrisy by which contemporary government applies one standard to violence within the
community and another to violence perpetrated by one community upon another?...
Presiding Counsel: Shut up!... (to the soldiers) Stand up! (everyone stands up) Sit down! (they sit down) Go
moo! (everyone goes moo) Right, now, on with the pixie hats! (everyone puts on pixie hats with large pointed
ears)...

This part reflects on the anti-humane features of the institute of the army, that people can
order others by the principle of rank and militaristic hierarchy.

Politicians are attacked by satire in e.g. The Apology from Politicians (ep.#32):

WE WOULD LIKE TO APOLOGISE FOR THE WAY IN WHICH POLITICIANS ARE REPRESENTED
IN THIS PROGRAMME. IT WAS NEVER OUR INTENTION TO IMPLY THAT POLITICIANS ARE
WEAK-KNEED, POLITICAL TIME-SERVERS WHO... SACRIFICE THEIR CREDIBILITY BY
DENYING FREE DEBATE... IN THE MISTAKEN IMPRESSION THAT PARTY UNITY COMES
BEFORE THE WELL-BEING OF THE PEOPLE... NOR INDEED DO WE INTEND THAT VIEWERS
SHOULD CONSIDER THEM AS CRABBY ULCEROUS... VERMIN WITH FURRY LEGS... WE ARE
SORRY IF THIS IMPRESSION HAS COME ACROSS.

Or in asking a conservative MP's opinion (ep.#12):

MP : Speaking as Conservative candidate I just drone on and on and on, never letting anyone else get a word
in edgeways until I start foaming at the mouth and falling over backwards. (foams at the mouth and falls over
backwards)

In the history of English humour there are such representatives of philosophical satire as
Swift , who chastised a whole society in his Guliver-trilogy.(Szerb 1941:361-5). Absurd
satire also appeared in comedia dell'arte in the Middle Ages, in the role of the clown, who
used to make fun of the self-confident logical world, and it is mainly represented in our age
by television comedy. (Esslin 1969: 21).

Monty Python actually uses the tools of comedia dell'arte in another respect, in the
appearance of reoccurring characters. Such reoccurring, simplified characters with one or
two exaggerated features are the Colonel, the representation of rank and power, the
Accountant, the representation of dullness, the "It's man" getting through all kinds of
vicissitudes to announce the beginnings of the shows, the knight with a rubber chicken, the
extremely primitive Gumbies, who wear the easily distinguishable handkerchief on their
heads, Luigi Vercotti, the typical Sicilian Mafioso, etc. The role of these reoccurring
characters is that to involve the audience into the game of the Pythons, to make the
audience accomplice with the writers, because the recognition of a character already
increases our attention to what will happen to him. The tradition of reoccurring characters
dates back to comedia dell'arte that worked with the permanent cast of simplified characters
as the bragging Capitano, the pedantic Dottore, the clown Arlecchino, etc. (Cambridge
Guide to Literature 1991:342).
Nonsense

Another aspect of absurd humour is the nonsense, where the logical connections are
entirely hold in respect and the chain of ideas is perfect. On the other hand, these ideas are
connected to each other arbitrarily, and their relationship towards reality or believability
don't hold any respect in the eyes of its writer. (Balotá 1979:42.). English literature has a
great tradition in nonsense represented by Edward Lear and Lewis Caroll. Nonsense
humour in opposition with the absurd doesn't mean an attack on the rationality and reality
of the world.

Following this tradition, the Pythons have used nonsense very frequently in their works.
One good example for this is the sketch Secret Service dentists (ep.#4) caricaturing spy
stories. In this nonsensical story dentists behaving like gangsters, they want to get "the
fillings" from each other with such weaponry like a machine gun or a bazooka, while at the
end the "Big Chief"-dentist arrives and dismisses the story because it's lunch-time.

Nonsense also occurs in the Pythons' anti-jokes, which are based on that the jokes are quite
weak, and instead of a punch line somebody stops the film and claims that the joke was
very lousy indeed and that the whole sketch would better be stopped. In these sketches the
Pythons parodied even themselves.

Conclusion
As we could see from the social and literary analyses of the Python-sketches, the group
often had deeper aims with their sketches than that to cause a chief laugh in the audience.
They meant something new and strange in the world of comedy because of their
astonishing absurdity, scandalous morbidity, but also because of their deeper philosophical
massages hidden behind the jokes, which either were with social or philosophical impact.

Monty Python's Flying Circus is among the most famous representatives of English humour
of the twentieth century and that is likely due to their revolutionary ideas in using and
considering humour, as it has been analysed in my essay. Considering this feature of them
we may also conclude that the six writer-comedians created something in humour that can
actually be compared to the Beatles, who meant a revolution in music in sixties' England.

There are also other aspects from which the Python-series could be analysed, such as the
role of animation or the role of Woman in the person of Carol Cleveland, (the seventh,
"honorary" member of the group)

Finally, I would also like to add that the popularity of the group do not mean that
everybody liked their shows. I have meant by this word that most members of the society of
seventies' England knew about the Python-phenomenon. On the other hand they have
received laugher as well as disapproval from their audience. In my case they have mainly
received laughter, and whenever I didn't understand their English humour, I admitted the
Hungarian meaning of this phrase.
Bibliography
Abádi-Nagy, Zoltán (1982), Válság és Komikum. (=Crisis and Comedy) Magvetõ,
Budapest.

Balotá, Nicolae (1979), Abszurd irodalom. (=Absurd Literature) Gondolat, Budapest.

Bergson, Henri (1986), A nevetés. (=Laughter) Gondolat, Budapest.

Bier, Jesse (1968),The Rise and Fall of American Humour. Holt and Rinehart, New York.

Cambridge Guide to Literature (1991). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Esslin, Martin (1969), The Theatre of the Absurd. Doubleday, Anchor Books, New York.

Johnson, Kim (1993), And Now for Something Completely Trivial. Plexus, London.

Mast, Gerald (1973), The Comic Mind: Comedy at the Movies. Chicago Press, Chicago.

Mikes, George (1967), English Humour for Beginners. Caldia House Ltd., London.

Monty Python (1971), The Big Red Book. Methuen, London.

Priestley, J.B. (1976), English Humour. Stein and Day, New York.

Révai Nagy Lexikon (=Révai Giant Lexicon) (1994), Babits Kiadó, Budapest.

Szerb, Antal (1941), A Világirodalom története. (=The Hisory of World Literature)

Magvetõ, Budapest.

Monty Python
De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre.

Monty Python era un grupo británico de humoristas que sintetizaron el humor de los años
60 y 70. Su creación fue la serie de televisión inglesa Monty Python's Flying Circus (El
circo ambulante de Monty Python), una serie basada en sketches breves.

Tambien fueron responsables en la prouccion de los siguientes largometrajes:

 Se armó la gorda (And Now for Something Completely

Different) (1971)
  Los caballeros de la Mesa Cuadrada y sus locos
seguidores (Monty Python and the Holy Grail) (1975)
 La vida de Brian (Monty Python's Life of Brian) (1979)
 El sentido de la vida (Monty Python's The Meaning of
Life) (1983)

Componentes del grupo fueron:

 Eric Idle
 Michael Palin
 John Cleese
 Terry Gilliam
 Terry Jones
 Graham Chapman

Algunos de sus componentes han alcanzado también la fama en solitario, como Terry Jones
y Terry Gilliam como directores y John Cleese como actor.

Monty Python dieron nombre (sin su conocimiento, al parecer) al lenguaje de programación

Python. Muchos de los ejemplos de uso de Python y nombres de sus componentes se basan
en obras de este grupo. Su influencia en el mundo de la informática también puede
encontrarse en la palabra spam, derivada de uno de sus sketchs.

Eric Idle
De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre.

Eric Idle (29 de marzo de 1943) es un musico y humorista britanico, miembro del grupo
humorístico Monty Python. Eric Idle nació en South Shields, en el condado de Durham y
frecuentó estudios de inglés en la Universidad de Cambridge.

Es el músico del grupo. Eric Idle es el autor de la mayor parte de tanto la canción de la serie
de televisión (Monty Python's Flying Circus), como de las películas. En La vida de Brian
canta la más popular canción de los Pyton, "Always Look On The Bride Side Of Life" y
también canta la canción de El sentido de la vida. Conocido por el uso pelucas ridículas,
(una de las raras ocasiones en que no usa peluca es en la escena final de "La Vida de
Brian") y por sus exasperantes papeles como el hombre invisible, el hombre de las fotos, el
hombre que quería una hormiga, etc.

Interpretó al valiente Sir Robin en Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada, entre otros papeles
en el cine.
Michael Palin
De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre.

Miembro del grupo humorístico Monty Python.

Michael Palin nació el 5 de Mayo de 1943 en Sheffield, en Yorkshire. Cursó estudios de

Historia en la Universidad de Oxford. Se casó con Helen Gibbins con quien tuvo a tres
hijos. Uno de ellos, Thomas, realizó el papel de Señor No-Aparece-En-Esta-Película en la
película Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada.

El "Pyton agradable", es, siguiendo a John Cleese y Eric Idle, el Pyton más conocido por su
trabajo como actor. Tomó parte en Un pez llamado Wanda al lado de Kevin Kline, Jamie
Lee Curtis y John Cleese. También presentó varias series acerca de viajes para la BBC.
Participó con John Cleese en un de los mejores sketches de Monty Python's Flying Circus:
los franceses de la oveja volante, o la "Consulta de Discusiones". Realizó los papeles de
Bevis, el barbero medio psicópata travestido que quería ser leñador en el sketch "La
Canción de Leñador" y de Sir Galahad en Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada. Aparecía al
principio de cada episodio de "Monty Python's Flying Circus" como el naufrago que decía
"It's...".

John Cleese
De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre.

John Cleese (27 de octubre de 1939) es un actor británico. Nació en Somerset, (Inglaterra),
como John Marwood Cleese. Su padre, un vendedor de seguros, cambió el apellido de la
familia de Cheese a Cleese debido al significado de la palabra cheese, que en inglés es
queso. Cleese estudió derecho en la universidad de Cambridge. Se casó varias veces, una de
ellas con la también actriz Connie Both, que participó en varios projectos del grupo
humorístico 'Monty Python del que formó parte Cleese.

Cleese, el más alto del grupo, se especializó en representar a personajes formales y graves.
Entre sus más populares creaciones se encuentran el especialista en discusiones, Sir
Lancelot, en Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada, el señor Teabags del Ministerio de
Andares Tontos y el arquitecto de mataderos que quería ser masón.

También llegó a ser famoso como el presentador de la BBC que aparecía sentado frente a
un escritorio en lugares tan extraños como una calle, una playa o un camión, y que decía la
frase "And now something completely different" (Y ahora algo totalmente diferente), que
convirtió en slogan de los Monty Python.

Cleese abandonó el grupo después de que finalizara la tercera parte de la serie de Monty
Python's Flying Circus en 1973, aunque volvió al año siguiente para tomar parte en la
película Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada. Es probablemente el miembro del grupo
Monte Python que más éxitos ha cosechado en el cine, donde ha trabajado en numerosas
películas, como Un pez llamado Wanda, Criaturas feroces, Harry Potter, y otras. Ha
participado también en series televisivas, de las que la más famosa es Fawlty Towers.

John Cleese
De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre.

John Cleese (27 de octubre de 1939) es un actor británico. Nació en Somerset, (Inglaterra),
como John Marwood Cleese. Su padre, un vendedor de seguros, cambió el apellido de la
familia de Cheese a Cleese debido al significado de la palabra cheese, que en inglés es
queso. Cleese estudió derecho en la universidad de Cambridge. Se casó varias veces, una de
ellas con la también actriz Connie Both, que participó en varios projectos del grupo
humorístico 'Monty Python del que formó parte Cleese.

Cleese, el más alto del grupo, se especializó en representar a personajes formales y graves.
Entre sus más populares creaciones se encuentran el especialista en discusiones, Sir
Lancelot, en Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada, el señor Teabags del Ministerio de
Andares Tontos y el arquitecto de mataderos que quería ser masón.

También llegó a ser famoso como el presentador de la BBC que aparecía sentado frente a
un escritorio en lugares tan extraños como una calle, una playa o un camión, y que decía la
frase "And now something completely different" (Y ahora algo totalmente diferente), que
convirtió en slogan de los Monty Python.

Cleese abandonó el grupo después de que finalizara la tercera parte de la serie de Monty
Python's Flying Circus en 1973, aunque volvió al año siguiente para tomar parte en la
película Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada. Es probablemente el miembro del grupo
Monte Python que más éxitos ha cosechado en el cine, donde ha trabajado en numerosas
películas, como Un pez llamado Wanda, Criaturas feroces, Harry Potter, y otras. Ha
participado también en series televisivas, de las que la más famosa es Fawlty Towers.

Terry Gilliam
De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre.

Miembro del grupo humorístico Monty Python. Terry Vance Gilliam nació el 22 de
noviembre de 1940 en Medicine Lake, Minesotta, en los Estados Unidos y estudió Ciencias
Políticas el Colegio Occidental de Califórnia. Más conocido por las animaciones, en las que
recortaba fotografías y las volvía surrealistas, que por los papeles raros que realizó (papeles
siempre secundarios). De entre sus personajes más conocidos destaca Patsy, el escudero del
rey Arturo en Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada, película que llevó a cabo con Terry
Jones, e interpretó también al cardinal Fang de los sketches de la temible Inquisición
Española. Realizó papeles siempre grotescos y enloquecidos. Como director ha deambulado
por los límites de la realidad, los sueños y el tiempo. Sus películas estan marcadas por los
viajes en el tiempo (Los héroes del tiempo y Doce monos) y la realidad confundida por los
sueños, la fantasía o la imaginación (Brazil, Las aventuras del Barón Munchhausen, El rey
pescador o Miedo y asco en las Vegas), siempre aderezado con mucho humor o ironía.

Filmografía
(como director)
 Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada (1974) Dirigida
junto a Terry Jones
 La bestia del reino (1977).
 Los héroes del tiempo (1981).
 Brazil (1985). Una versión satírica de la distopía 1984,
en donde un pobre hombrecillo se ve enfrentado a la
omnipotencia de una gigantesca corporación de corte
orwelliano.
 Las aventuras del Barón Munchhausen (1989). Con un
destacado elenco (Robin Williams, Uma Thurman,
etcétera) da vida a una alocada fantasía ligeramente
basada en las aventuras del barón del Siglo XVIII,
incluyendo algunos de sus tópicos malabarismos sobre
la realidad y la ilusión.
 El rey pescador (1991) (Pescador de ilusiones) . Un
locutor de radio en medio de una crisis existencial
descubre a un individuo medio desquiciado
(interpretado por Robin Williams) que le enseña un
nuevo sentido a su vida.
 Doce monos (1995). Un viajero del tiempo regresa a
nuestra época para estudiar una terrible epidemia que
barrerá a la Humanidad, sólo para descubrir con horror
que nada de lo que haga podrá impedir el desastre.
 Miedo y asco en las Vegas (1998) (Pánico y locura en
Las Vegas). [Johnny Deep]] interpreta a un periodista
que junto a un amigo (Benicio del Toro) no deja droga
por probar, en la ciudad de Las Vegas en la década de
los 60.

Terry Jones
De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre.

Miembro del grupo humorístico Monty Python. Terry Jones nació el 1 de febrero de 1942
en la Bahía de Colwyn, en el norte del País de Gales (uno de los dos Pyton no-inglés, junto
con Terry Gilliam). Realizó estudios de inglés en la Universidad de Oxford. Ha sido a lo
largo de su vida actor, director, guinista y compositor de lass películas del grupo y fuera de
él.

Recordado por sus papeles de mujer acompañado de la voz chillona que hacía. En la tercera
serie de "Monty Python's Flying Circus", interpretaba innumerables papeles, como juez,
masón, el hombre que hacía reir a todo el mundo, y las inovolvidables escenas de
milisegundos en las que aparecía tocando desnudo el piano. Fue la divertidísima madre de
Brian en La vida de Brian, film que dirigió él mismo. Llevó a cabo también Los caballeros
de la mesa cuadrada, éste último trabajando en cooperación con Terry Gilliam. Después de
la disolución del grupo principalmente se dedicó a la televisión como guionista y
presentador incluso llegó a dirigir un espisodio de la serie "Las aventuras del joven Indiana
Jones". También fue guionista de la película de Jim Henson, Dentro del laberinto.

Filmografía: (como director)

 Los caballeros de la mesa cuadrada (1974) Junto a

Terry Gilliam
 La vida de Brian (1979)
 El sentido de la vida (1983)
 Servicios muy personales (1987)
 Erik el vikingo (1989)
 Viento en los sauces (1996)

Graham Chapman
De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre.

Miembro del grupo humorístico Monty Python. Graham Chapman nació en 1941 en
Leicester, hijo de una policía. Abandonó sus estudios de medicina en la Universidad de
Cambridge.

Conocido por realizar a personajes autoritarios como el coronel famoso que interrumpía los
sketches. También realizó, varias veces, los papeles de doctor, para el que su formación
habrá contribuido mucho, entre otros tantísimos papeles. Realizó los papeles principales en
La vida de Brian, protagonizándola en el papel de Brian, y Los Caballeros de la Mesa
Cuadrada. Con el tiempo, el alcoholismo perturbó su desempeño como actor, lo que obligó
a los miembros restantes del grupo Monty Python a proceder a modificaciones forzadas.

Vivió durante veinte años con David Sherlock, con quien adoptó un hijo, John Tomiczeck
(se murió en 1991), un adolescente huido del hogar que Graham encontró en una calle de
Londres. Sus excesos, el alcohol y el tabaco le provocaron el cáncer en varios órganos.
Murió en el día 4 de octubre de 1989, pero no fue como, muchas vez se afirma, de cáncer
de laringe. En el elogio del funeral, Eric Idle cantó un fragmento de "Allways Look On The
Bright Side Of Life", la canción con la que termina La vida de Brian.
A Meaning of Life?
An analysis of the film The Meaning of Life

INTRODUCTION

The motion picture The Meaning of Life, the 3rd Monty Python screenplay, was
released in 1983. It was written by the Monty Python crew (i.e. Graham Chapman,
John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Terry Jones, Eric Idle, and Michael Palin) who also
play all the major roles; directed by Terry Jones; and produced by John Goldstone.
The book of the film was published in 1983 and reprinted in 1990.
The film followed the typical Monty Python recipe for satire and humour; but while it
was in many ways a logical extension of the line laid down in the Flying Circus TV
shows and the two previous screenplays Monty Python and the Holy Grail and Life
of Brian (1974 and 1979 respectively) it was also different. It presented a savage
satire of contemporary society, a no-holds-barred criticism of a previously unknown
sort. The following essay offers a detailed analysis of the film with special regard to
the points:
1) What do the Pythons "mean by" the film - is there any deeper meaning?
2) How much is the film a logical development of the traditional satire and carnival,
and where does it show?
In the analysis I shall also refer to other works by Monty Python.

SUMMARY OF THE PLOT

The plot of the film itself is divided into seven parts, each dealing with a new period
of life. Before the film itself, a little prelude is seen: the story of the Crimson
Permanent Assurance, an old and honourable English assurance company whose
venerable employees revolt against their American corporate management.
Transforming the office building into a pirate ship they roll through a bleak
landscape, see the towering skyscrapers of the huge, American corporations they
so despise and destroy them in traditional pirate fashion. When they have finally
obliterated all the huge corporations the story ends as surrealistically as it began:
the Crimson Permanent Assurance falls off the earth which turns out to be square.
The movie itself begins with a short scene in which six fish with the Pythons' faces
swim about discussing the meaning of life, leading to an opening song on the same
theme while an absurd bit of animation takes place.
Finally, the first part, "The Miracle of Birth", comes. A pregnant woman about to
give birth is wheeled into a "foetus frightening room" rather vehemently, slamming
through several doors. During the ensuing birth the doctors and nurses do
everything they can to unnerve the woman: she is surrounded by bulky and noisy
machinery that hides her for a while, the doctors do not seem to care very much for
her ("Leave it all to us, you'll never know what hit you."), and the father is denied
access to the delivery room whereas several non-medical persons with video
cameras come in to film it happening. When the baby is finally born its umbilical
cord is chopped over, it is treated very roughly and then it is isolated from the
mother who does not even know what sex it is.
The second part of this chapter is another birth taking place in a dreary Yorkshire
town. A stork drops a baby down the chimney of one of the houses which is
crammed with children. The father tells them that he has lost his job and that he
can therefore not afford to keep them all any more. Blaming it on the Roman
Catholic church for not letting him wear a condom, he sings the song "Every Sperm
is Sacred" which turns into a musical involving lots of Catholic characters singing
the theme. When it ends, the children walk out of the house, heads low, while from
the other side of the street a "fiercely proud" Protestant lectures his sexually
undernourished wife on the advantages of Protestantism, which turn out to be no
more than the right to wear a contraceptive.
Part two, "Growth and Learning", opens in a public school chapel. A mock-Bible
reading, a prayer flattering God, a notice from the headmaster reminding the boys
not to deface the "school cormorant", a notice for one boy in the crowd that his
mother has died, and finally a psalm imploring God not to cook believers make up
a strange service. The film then turns to a classroom where the headmaster gives
his sleepy and unconcerned pupils a lesson in sex after first having given them a
long-winded and incomprehensible message: "...will those of you who are playing
in the match this afternoon move your clothes down on the lower peg immediately
after lunch before you write your letter home, if you're not getting your hair cut,
unless you've got a younger brother who is going out this weekend as the guest of
another boy, in which case...". He then proceeds to discuss foreplay rather vividly
and then actually has sex with his wife on a pop-out bed. One of the pupils, Biggs,
is caught laughing at something and as punishment is selected to play a violent
game of rugby. The rugby scene leads directly on to part three: "Fighting Each
Other".
Biggs and five soldiers are in a trench, preparing to storm an enemy trench ahead.
Just as they are about to move out the soldiers decide to give Biggs presents and
a cake. They praise him to the skies while all the time ducking to avoid bullets and
shells overhead. As Biggs loses his temper they reproach him for being heartless.
Biggs gives in, and as machine gun fire gets the soldiers one by one they prepare
to eat the cake. This scene turns out to be a film, after the end of which a general
turns the projector off and explains that there will always be the need for an army;
otherwise, may God strike him down . Upon which a flash of lightning disintegrates
him. Outside the building where this happened an RSM is drilling a squad of
recruits, but as he sets out by asking them if they have anything better to do and
then sending them off as it turns out that they do he ends up marching on his own.
The next scene shows a frightful battle between Zulus and British soldiers, in the
middle of which the British officers calmly shave and file their nails (in tents
complete with pictures of Queen Victoria and bookshelves). One of them, Perkins,
has lost a leg in his sleep. They discuss what to do about it, go "jolly good" a lot,
and fail to take their surroundings seriously at all. As a sergeant gives officer
Ainsworth a casualty report he is dismissed with a "I've got a bit of a problem here.
One of the officers has lost a leg" - and reacts with appropriate horror, despite the
fact that roughly 150 men have been killed in the carnage outside the tent. Then
the officers set out to recapture Perkins' leg (calmly ignoring the inferno around
them) without tending to their troops at all. Upon entering a clearing they see a
tiger (even though this is Africa) and open fire, only to discover that the tiger is two
disguised men who tell a string of preposterous lies before the officers decide to
search the thicket they are in. As they do so, a Zulu walks in front of the camera,
pulls a zip down on his belly, and reveals himself to be a white TV announcer. He
announces the "Middle of the Film". It is a TV quiz, "Find The Fish" (introduced by
a female presenter), in which the audience is asked to spot a fish in a surrealistic
corridor - a row of handles and control meters reminiscent of a power plant control
room, rugs on the floor, an elaborate lamp and three strange characters capering
about repeating nonsensical phrases. This item is then hailed as excellent by the
Pythonized fish.
Part four takes place in a restaurant whose interior is a medieval English dungeon.
The middle-aged couple visiting the restaurant, Mr and Mrs Hendy, sits at a small
round table and gets all sorts of strange accessories from the waitress who is
dressed up in a sort of combination of a Beefeater's uniform and a minimalist
dress. Mr Hendy carries a large camera and before the waiter appears they are
entertained briefly by a Hawaiian band. The menu has conversation topics on it
instead of food; the couple choose philosophy and talk about various philosophers
for a while. They never get beyond considering whether all philosophers' names
are spelt with an s, and instead of this conversation they get live organ transplants.
"Live Organ Transplants" is the name of part five. Two surgeon-like men (who are
not doctors; "Blimey no!") arrive at the house of Mr Bloke and ask if they can have
his liver. He has got a donor card and without further ceremony they cut him open.
One of the men is offered a cup of tea by Mrs Bloke, and while they talk in the
kitchen the refrigerator opens and a singer in a pink suit climbs out and
disintegrates the kitchen wall to reveal a night sky outside. As he takes Mrs Bloke
for a walk among the stars of the night sky he sings to her a song about the sheer
size of the galaxy and the universe, dishing out impressive numbers to make his
points. The point being that we're all just very small; specks of dust in an infinite
universe, after which Mrs Bloke feels very insignificant and agrees to donating her
liver as well. Before part six there is a short scene in which an employee of the
Very Big Corporation of America comes up with a very high-brow theory on the
meaning of life: "...matter is energy; in the Universe there are many energy fields
which we cannot normally perceive. Some energies have a spiritual source which
act upon a person's soul. However, this soul does not exist ab initio, as orthodox
Christianity teaches; it has to be brought into existence by a process of guided self-
observation. However, this is rarely achieved owing to man's unique ability to be
distracted from spiritual matters by everyday trivia". Nobody seems to understand
it, and before the board can discuss it the Crimson Permanent Assurance attacks
the building.
"The Autumn Years" (part six) also takes place in a restaurant. After a short song
about the desirability of having a penis the hugely fat Mr Creosote enters, throws
up everywhere, orders the entire menu of the restaurant and an awful lot to drink,
eats it all and finally explodes, showering everything with vomit and intestines. In
the second part of part six (titled "The Meaning of Life") a waiter named Gaston
says that he knows what the meaning of life is. After walking out of the restaurant
and out into the countryside outside the city he indicates a little house, saying that
he was born there and that he became a waiter because his mother had once told
him to try and make everyone happy. Seeing that perhaps this doesn't constitute a
perfectly sensible meaning he becomes rude and stomps off.
Part seven, "Death", begins with the execution of Arthur Jarrett who has been
found guilty of uttering sexist jokes in a movie. His method of death is that he is
chased off a cliff by a dozen semi-naked women in plastic helmets and knee
guards. Where he falls a hole has already been dug and a vicar intones the burial
ritual. In the next scene, the Grim Reaper calls at a house in a bleak landscape to
fetch its inhabitants, an English couple and their American dinner guests, who have
died of food poisoning. It takes some time before he convinces them, and only then
do they leave, sailing through space to a heaven that is very much like a hotel.
Seated at a table in a hall the two couples and other deceased characters from the
film are entertained by a Tony Bennett-like entertainer and a choir of dancing
Santa "angels": it is Christmas in heaven.
The scene ends as the lady presenter from the "Middle of the Film" switches the
TV (on which the whole thing has been) off. She is given an envelope and reads
out the Meaning of Life, which turns out to be quite trivial: be nice to people, avoid
eating fat, read a good book now and then, get some walking in, and live in peace
and harmony with everybody everywhere. The presenter then finishes off being
rude and finally the opening titles from Monty Python's Flying Circus come up on
the TV screen before the film ends.

THE SATIRE AND ITS VICTIMS: A BRIEF ANALYSIS

The film is reminiscent of the Flying Circus television series in that it takes a
number of contemporary issues up for debate, or rather, comment. Each issue is
treated with the special Monty Python humour which does not prevent the satire
from shining through.
The story of the Crimson Permanent Assurance is the story about ruthless
twentieth-century capitalism. The 80'es saw the rise of a new type of manager: the
cold, impersonal, clean-shaved man with a clipboard, a briefcase, and a stopwatch.
Unscrupulous hard-driving social climbers took over from human beings (to put it
very bluntly), and it must have been a great pleasure for the Pythons to direct this
reversal of roles. The "desperate and reasonably violent" men of the Crimson
Permanent Assurance rebel successfully against their masters, sailing their old-
fashioned office building between the glass-and-steel giants of high finance,
fighting with filing cabinets, rubber stamps, and umbrellas against the enemy's
metal blades, wearing cosy, old-fashioned clothes versus the yuppies' suits and
briefcases. The irony becomes even greater as the narrator uses traditional high-
finance terms for the piratical exploits of the CPA: "unsuspected Take-Over Bid",
"bold business venture" and stripping their opponents' "assets". But the tale ends
on a somewhat hopeless note: the CPA falls off the edge of the world; the dream of
the survival of old-fashioned values in modern society is proved impossible -
reflecting the grim circumstances of British industry and finance in the 70'es and
early 80'es. The modern financial world (in the shape of "multinational", but very
obviously American, companies) takes over the reins of/from the once-great British
firms.
The decline of public services is the next issue up for debate, exemplified by the
National Health Service. The first childbirth is worlds apart from the traditional
picture of what is usually supposed to be a happy event: far from generating an air
of professional security the hospital employees do everything they can to scare the
mother. The doctors stroll around and generate an air of playful detachment from
what is going on; the nurse is cold and impersonal ("contractions are becoming
more frequent"; "the vulva is dilating" - "okay, show's over"); and the administrator
is a genial, well-dressed gent, strolling around casually to see what can possibly be
going on in this exciting hospital of his.
The satire in this scene would be funny in any country, but in England in the 80'es
it bites very deeply. During the Thatcher years the hospital sector faced (and still
faces) a serious crisis. Because of low pay, many nurses left the NHS in favour of
private clinics. The NHS then had to hire more expensive replacements from
agencies. With an increasing number of OAPs the pressure on the hospital beds
(and hence on the economy) increases. Add to this the increasing cost of financing
sophisticated equipment and deterioration of quality looks inevitable, resulting in
public outrage when it became apparent that one thing the administrators cut down
was the cleaning, resulting in grimy wards and cockroaches in the kitchens. The
actors in the scene represent a decaying system: unqualified leadership (the
administrator not even knowing what a birth is) and impersonal treatment (the
mother is not allowed to hold the baby and the father is denied access to the
delivery room).
The second birth is entirely different: Yorkshire is seen throughout as a hopelessly
backward society where the stork still delivers the children and everybody is grimy
and old-fashioned (a representation that provoked some mirth among the audience
when I saw the film in London). It is apparent that the great north/south divide that
has been inherent in English society for centuries still exists in full, whatever the
Conservatives may say about classless societies.
The social conditions, however, only provide the background for a discussion on
religion which extends well into the next part. It is boiled down to a very simple
question: prophylactics or not prophylactics? Being a Roman Catholic means that
you cannot wear a condom; and conversely being a Protestant means that you
can. That is all there is to it. The deeper difference ("the might and majesty, ... the
mystery of the Church of Rome" vs. "the church for anyone who respects the
individual") is in the background. In seizing the question of contraceptive devices
as exponent for the differences the Monty Python team consciously provoke
outrage, but behind the revulsion lies the nagging question: What is the difference?
The Catholics are poor, dirty, and common; the Protestant condemns all that the
Catholic church stands for, yet evidently not wanting to go the distance and
purchase a condom as his wife would like him to. Who is better? And how, if the
difference is as small as the Pythons indicate, do you justify condemning other
religions?
The ensuing service in the (public) school chapel reveals what religion, in the
Pythons' view, is all about. It is, basically, a system of hypocritical nonsense. Its
perpetuation serves mainly to maintain traditions, in this case school traditions,
because the English seem to be so fond of them. The sense is gone. the service is
a vulgar demonstration of what religion has come to signify: no more a serious,
deeply felt relationship with your creator it is now a grotesque anachronism
concerned only with staying on good terms with the Lord and imploring him not to
do away with you. The reading from the Bible sounds like any other piece from the
Old Testament , read to inspire and teach the believer, but is actually pure
gibberish. Such an absurd parody of the Bible is very thought-provoking: is it so
very different from the real Old Testament? What is the point of hearing about (in
this case) a group of people with unpronounceable names seeing camels and then
going to another grotesquely named person, killing goats and placing them in little
pots? Is there any lesson to be learned from this reading, and if so, can you leave
the chapel and use it for anything? The linkage between religion and (imperial)
English tradition is stressed as the headmaster goes on directly from the Amen to
reproach the boys for having rubbed linseed oil into the school cormorant. Again,
the question is: what use is a cormorant as a memorial for anything at all, and what
use is it to remember soldiers killed in a remote war decades and thousands of
miles away "to keep China British"? Religion, it seems, belongs with the traditions:
in a past that has now served its purpose and ought to be toned down a bit. And
whatever illusions one might have suffered about tact and the kind humanism of
religion are dispelled as the headmaster rounds off by bluntly informing one boy, in
the presence of everybody, that his mother is dead.
Religion then smoothly gives way to education without a pause, suggesting yet
again that we are in for some peculiar traditions. As the headmaster goes on to
teach his pupils the absurdity is complete. It is so far out that it is even credible. By
distorting everyday events almost (but not quite) out of recognition the Pythons ram
home their points, in this case about the time-honoured English public school
education. Through the service and the lesson we are presented with the absurdity
of this sort of education: the ridiculous reverence of old traditions, dates, and relics
(the cormorant); the confusing rules and regulations; and finally the relevance of
the teaching itself: by exaggerating the teaching situation to such an extent the
Pythons call for a more relevant education - one that gets to grips with some useful
subjects ... like, for instance, sex (a traditional taboo subject which liberal people
like the Pythons would no doubt like to see on their children's curriculum). Finally,
we see another aspect of public school life treated by the Pythons: rugby. This
short scene demonstrates the Pythons' view of the salient facts of the game: its
violence and the unfairness with which it is played: the schoolboys play against
colossal professionals who not only grind them into the turf but also win by
cheating; as one boy races unnoticed towards their goal with the ball he is tripped
up by the headmaster from the sideline. A massive attack on the English notion of
fair play, which turns out not to be fair after all. Here, perhaps, is one tradition that
the Pythons would quite like to introduce.
The link between school rugby and warfare is no doubt intended: the picture of
Biggs' despairing grimy face on the rugby pitch cuts directly to adult officer Biggs in
uniform in a barren no man's land. The next scenes display a typically Pythons'
view of the British in arms against Germans, Zulus, or whoever. As the platoon
prepares to attack its opponents the initially sombre scene suddenly disintegrates
into farce. And as the general in the barracks explains why there will always be the
need for an army God strikes him down immediately. Is there a need for an army,
then? It would appear not to be so. And as the RSM "drills" his recruits and the
officers in Natal calmly shave and inspect Perkins' leg stump in the middle of a
bloody battle one tends to agree, at least, that the army in this guise is a joke. With
the Falklands conflict not a year away by the time the film appeared, this subject
has not lost any of its relevance.
The following part, "The Middle of the Film", is my favourite. Apparently it has got
nothing whatsoever to do with the rest of The Meaning of Life. If one is to see any
sort of meaning in it it must be that the scene is thought as a commentary on the
increasing popularity of television quiz shows. "Find The Fish" might indeed have
appeared in a more conventional programme - but in its present guise it looks more
like the insane ravings of a surrealist painter, fusing elements of many different
kinds into a picture that does not make much sense. The six fish hail this as the
best part of the film. Its very lack of meaning might, of course, be seen as another
attempt to find the meaning of life; and the remaining half of the film is largely
about this only, with peripheral issues surrounding it.
It is first presented on a menu of conversation topics. The two diners, Mr and Mrs
Hendy then try to discuss the subject. Their feeble attempts to discuss the subject
can be taken as the Pythons' view of the stupidity of the couple, but it might also be
read otherwise: is any definition of the meaning of life better than the others? The
final meaning of life read aloud at the end of the film is not very satisfactory, either.
And part five, apart from displaying the more sanguinary facet of the Pythons'
humour, offers yet another approach to the big question: look at the universe.
Mankind, according to the song, is not "intelligent life", we are not worth bothering
that much about, on the cosmic scale of things. That, anyway, is the point Mrs
Bloke takes - she lets the two men take her liver as well since she is so
insignificant anyway. Then, at a board meeting of the Very Big Corporation of
America, one of the employees delivers a very high-brow interpretation, but nobody
gets it; all he receives by way of a reaction is "What was that about hats again?".
And then the Crimson Permanent Assurance storms the building they are in and
everything dissolves. Three consecutive attempts to explain the meaning of life;
three failures.
The satire of the dinner scene is aimed at Mr and Mrs Bland English Holiday Maker
(a favourite victim of Monty Python's) on vacation in a Super Inn hotel: Charter
tourism and its obsession with "authentic atmospheres" takes a Monty Python
battering here. Instead of creating real representations of the milieux they pretend
to emulate they make a confusing, shallow mess of styles and trends that simply
do not go along together. Hawaiian food in an English dungeon brought by a
Beefeater and a large man with a heavy American accent, eaten at small French
cafe tables by bland English holidaymakers... it's a misfit. And it is a misfit not too
far removed from the truth. Part six once again displays the Python liking for
everything outrageous and disgusting. The entire scene is constructed around the
vomiting and belching Mr Creosote who destroys the relaxed elegant atmosphere
of the restaurant very profoundly. Again, the characters try to come up with some
sort of explanation but fail although one had the feeling that Gaston was on to
something.
The last part is about death and one's attitude to it. Seeing the "execution" scene
one can divine the Pythons' attitude to capital punishment: Arthur Jarrett's crime
would hardly suffice for a harsh penalty like that, indicating that maybe no crime
does. The Pythons' attitude seems to be that while they do not take it entirely
seriously (as one might expect) they disapprove of capital punishment, a stance
that has not lost its importance in a society that did not get rid of the death penalty
until 1965 and has debated it seriously in the House of Commons five times over
since then (the majority for not reintroducing it at the 1983 vote was only 145).
Then Death makes his appearance and dishes out some final truths for the
incredulous diners: Americans always talk and talk, and Englishmen are pompous
and have no balls, but nothing matters anymore, they are all dead. After all the
trials and tribulations of life the characters enter Paradise. But the sombre moment
passes into farce again as the dead couples arrive at heaven. Like the rest of the
film's scenes: what starts out as pompous, exalted or extreme in any way swings
back towards a bland in-between; heaven, traditionally exalted and holy, is no
more than a tasteless, glittering holiday club. The other-worldly and exalted is
trivialized and becomes, with the rest, mediocre. And finally, the Meaning of Life is
read out and what one has been feeling all the way through the film is confirmed:
there is no meaning of life, according to the makers of the film. Consecutive
attempts to explain what it is have failed; all stop just short of a viable
interpretation. Throughout the film the Pythons represent life as a stupid, absurd,
dangerous, and complicated affair in which no single meaning is to be found. What
seems to the General of part three to be the meaning of life would seem
preposterous to the pink vocalist of part five, whose outlook in turn would be
rejected by The Grim Reaper. In this sense the film is a thick parody on all films,
books and other media who, through a series of events and arguments, reach a
conclusion and a nice, workable theory on which they can then rely for ever after in
the tradition of the Danish "Udviklingsroman" , like for instance Robinson Crusoe.
The only truth is that there is no single truth to be had: the heritage of a secular
age.

THE PYTHON HUMOUR: SATIRE AND SURREALISM

The film is a fairly typical example of the special Monty Python humour although it
goes further in its attempts to cause outrage than any previous production. The
following is an attempt to sketch the basics of it with reference to the film and
occasionally to other works.
The humour is very largely English in character in that it deals mainly with
English/British issues and also in that it carries on the long English satiric tradition.
Throughout the film the scenes touch upon issues of English everyday life and
exposes the absurdity of it.
One "victim" of the Pythons' is the English national character in all its guises. Its
self-complacency, pomposity, and snobbishness, its mores and taboos, its often
absurdly cheery out-of-place humour - all are treated to a great extent. The central
line in this respect is Death's remark at the end of the film: "Be quiet! You
Englishmen...You're all so fucking pompous and none of you have got any balls."
The stiff upper lip of the English is also seen in a number of grotesque scenes,
most notably during the Zulu battle. The proud Protestant, the headmaster, Biggs'
underlings, the officers, Mr and Mrs Hendy, the waiters, the men of the Crimson
Permanent Assurance, Mr Creosote, and finally Geoffrey, the host of the dinner
party called at by Death all represent different, and grotesque, faces of the English
national character. They appear in absurd situations that parody one or several
facets of English society and are often opposed to sensible, straightforward people
who invariably lose out in the ensuing madness - Mrs Moore is left alone without
her child, Biggs' attempt to storm the enemy collapses into a cake-eating party.
Another event that occurs quite often is that the absurd Englishmen run into people
and situations who are even further out, downright mad; and their education and
codes of behaviour completely fail them when they are dealing with this sort of
thing: the General is struck down by the Hand of God, the officers in Natal fail
entirely to comprehend what the two tiger impersonators are up to and resort to
action/violence, Mr Bloke gets cut open while his wife receives a musical briefing
on the universe and its size, the Crimson Permanent Assurance falls off the earth
and so forth. The English national character is thus neatly placed between the
perfectly sensible and the totally absurd; the reasoned Englishman is not sensible,
his very calm pomposity is based on a string of obsolete customs and a curious
cultural heritage, but on the other hand he is left aghast when the really
iconoclastically absurd makes its appearance: he falls back on his mores and
insists that he is "sensible". Whether the Pythons want him to change in any of
those directions is hard to tell.
The Pythons can be seen as the natural extension of the long British satiric
tradition that produced such notable authors as e.g. Pope and Swift. They use a lot
of satire in their scenes, satire that would not appear to be very different from that
of previous authors. As Claude Rawson remarks in his introduction to English
Satire and the Satiric Tradition: "Elliott reaffirmed the primacy of the hurtful and
punitive core ... It was precisely because the essential purpose was aggressive
that the poet needed to convince himself and others that he was not personally
vindictive or anti-social". This tendency goes for much of classical and more
modern satiric texts, and for Monty Python as well. In being rude and hurtful to their
society the Pythons are not being destructive; they point out things that they feel to
be absurd, wrong, or laughable in their sketches and films - not unlike the way
Swift in "A Modest Proposal" pointed out how miserable the food situation in
Ireland was by suggesting that the Irish should eat their children. Another aspect of
traditional Augustan satire is that it is not in favour of a new order, although it often
seems incompatible with and outside of established society: it calls for a return to
old-fashioned values, it advocates the preservation of old ideals whose existence is
under threat in a bad, new world. This was certainly an appropriate sentiment in
England during the late 17th century after an exhausting civil war, but it is equally
appropriate from the mouth of a late-twentieth century Python: decaying public
services, growing class consciousness, the dehumanization of society and its
institutions, the Thatcherite notion of "equal opportunities" which in reality becomes
a Jungle Law "every man for himself" ... all these call for an alarmed, satiric outcry
from the comedians; and the film certainly achieves that, although the Pythons also
lash out at many curious British traditions.
The surrealistic "reality" of The Meaning of Life adds to the sense of disillusion and
danger. Almost every scene in the film takes place in an unstable, postmodern
environment. The boundaries are not safe, you can never feel quite secure. There
does not seem to be any stability left. The animation fuses elements of widely
different backgrounds to form scenes that are most unpredictable, and yet we
recognize the implications: a row of semi-detached houses fall down on a field,
pour out human beings who then get swallowed by a train with a huge mouth which
then rolls directly into a huge, black filing cabinet and disappears. God sits with two
prospective Earths in his hands, one round and one square, unable to make up his
mind. And several scenes incorporate elements of the grotesquely absurd: storks
dropping babies in Yorkshire, the Hand of God killing a general, Mrs Bloke's
kitchen wall disintegrating on cue ... stability is nowhere to be found. Whether one
can talk about a single reality of the film is highly doubtful: the scenes often turn out
to be "scenes within scenes": Biggs and his mates in the trench turn out to be on
film as the General turns it off, as the officers search the thicket behind the
preposterous "tiger" an announcer steps out of a Zulu and heralds the Middle of
the Film, Gaston in the restaurant beckons the camera crew with him, not just
someone watching, indicating that the barrier between film and reality is passable
or maybe isn't there at all . At the end of the film it turns out that the whole thing
has been on the lady presenter's TV set. The front page of the book of the film also
suggests instability and decay. The film title is inscribed on a tablet-like tombstone
which is slowly disintegrating and covered with a criss-cross of cracks. Instead of
descending to mankind from above (a flash of lightning descends; but only to
correct a spelling error) it rises out of the depths of the sea in which the Pythonized
fish swim about. The background (an overcast sky and an erupting volcano)
suggest decay and disaster - is the meaning of life death? On the backside of the
stone a humanitarian message aimed at all fish (in particular the big ones) is
printed, which is rather more sensible than the Meaning of Life read out at the end
of the film.
The Pythons play all the major roles, often dressed up so cleverly that it is hard to
tell who is who. None of them have any permanent identity; and not only do the
identities change, they also seem to be metamorphs: Perkins in Natal sits quietly
reading with his right leg bitten off just above the knee, Mr Bloke is disembowelled,
Mr Creosote explodes, and the tiger and the Zulu evolve into ordinary white men.
No fixed forms exist any more; it is like a puzzle where you can arrange the pieces
on the surface at your leisure, take them apart or join them up for a while. It also
implies that any sublime or exalted state of affairs is impossible. Whatever the
intentions or conditions from the outset of a scene, the Pythons succeed in bringing
them all to a common level - an uncertain entity floating between postmodern
chaos and an abolished order.

DRAMA AND CARNIVAL

The construction of the film is reminiscent of several plays: the seven parts of the
film remind one of the seven ages of man in Shakespeare's As You Like It; or the
whole plot may be seen as a secularized morality play. In the Shakespeare play,
the ages of man are infancy, schoolboy, lover, soldier, justice, pantaloon, and
finally second childhood/childishness. The corresponding ages of the Monty
Python film are birth/childhood, schoolboy, soldier, middle age, live organ
transplants (an extension of middle age?), the autumn years, and death. The order
is not quite the same but the analogy is evident, even though the Python pantaloon
is not lean and slipper'd, and second childishness is substituted by death (this,
then, is more reminiscent of Everyman, where Death is sent to summon Everyman
to stand before God). But if there are similarities there are also differences: Jaques'
soliloquy describes the career of one man, the film deals with several characters.
As You Like It suggests a normal and respectable career made by a normal and
respectable person; the film is an absurd parody of life and those living it.
The medieval mystery plays were small plays performed annually by the local
guilds. Like the miracle plays they dealt with Biblical topics but unlike the miracle
plays they all conformed around a central theme: the struggle of Good and Evil in
the soul of man. The characters in the play (like in Everyman) were rather two-
dimensional allegorical representations of faculties and attributes, like Beauty,
Five-Wits, Strength, or Good Deeds and thus the play came to be an
exteriorization of the inward spiritual conflict of mankind. In Everyman the main
character who is summoned before God by Death to account for his deeds finds
out that the only thing he can take with him from mortal life is Good Deeds, and
that only when he has revived this character by giving his Goods to charity and
making amends to the priest. The film does not deal with the central theme of good
versus evil (at least not directly), but the construction is much the same: the
characters of the film in their various guises represent the different facets and
ingredients of life - stupidity, sangfroid, humour, fear, courage, and so forth. Like
Everyman they must undergo a series of trials and tribulations before they are
finally ready to go to heaven. In this respect the film may be labelled a secularized
morality play.
It is at this point that it might be opportune to draw the classic fool into the analysis
(see Johansen). The fool dates back from medieval times. He was the on the
absolutely lowest rung of the hierarchical ladder, but at the same time he had some
privileges: he could say unwanted and compromising truths without fear of
persecution, provided he did it with the appropriate circumlocutions - a rare
privilege indeed in medieval times. His place was usually within the walls of the
royal or ecclesiastical households, to amuse his betters with his antics. This
position was occupied by both "natural" fools, that is to say, retarded persons of
both sexes; and "artificial" or "professional" fools, perfectly sensible people who
played their roles as prescribed by tradition. This sort of fool was, like any medieval
servant, bound to his master's service for life and could only get away if he was
permitted to. Nevertheless, the fool is also associated with the carnival, with
popular culture outside the palace walls. In medieval times a people's culture
existed that was the exact opposite of the high-minded culture so favoured by the
ruling class and its clergy: it concentrated on material things, on the body, on food,
laughter, excess, and sexuality. It was a subversive culture, entirely opposed to
established society, its universe was a universe turned upside down where all
traditional values either perished or were transformed. Its ethos was one of fun and
the satisfaction of one's lusts as opposed to religious restraint, its vocabulary and
iconography dealt with food and the human body. The festivals that took place
during the winter were showcases of this culture: several "fool societies" performed
"sotties" (small plays around the central theme of the eternal sway of Mother Folly)
in the streets, and the celebrations often got rather riotous. They often included
priests, which, added to the general feeling of boundless enjoyment, was the
reason why the religious institutions were so anxious to get rid of the fools and this
subversive culture. The harsh criticism proffered in the plays finally got too much to
swallow for the rulers, and during the 16th and 17th centuries the role of the fool
changed: rather than an exponent of a vital popular culture he was now
increasingly associated with the madman, and consequently either locked up in
asylums or condemned to a life on the road among other drop-outs. But the
tradition of the carnival remained, a time where reality is briefly turned upside down
and exposed for what it is with that special fool's insight that stems from his unique
position between the people and the rulers.
The traditional medieval fool is omnipresent in the film. Its very fragmentary and
upside-down feel reminds us of the carnival; in the Yorkshire birth scene there is
even a huge musical that reminds us of a carnival: flags, costumes, music, singing
- and the undertone of sex in "Every Sperm Is Sacred". Also, there is in fact a
clown at a piano in the scene. The Pythons may all be said to be clowns/fools in
the film (but with the special modification that they are postmodern clowns). There
is elements of the animalistic turned upside down (the tiger which is not a tiger
after all), and a heavy lacing of "kitchen humour" (or just humour that deals with the
bodily lower strata): the copulation in part two, Not Noël Coward's song about the
penis, Mr Creosote's appalling manners and subsequent explosion, and finally the
dinner party which Death calls at. Other elements of the carnivalesque is the lack
of a permanent identity that I have mentioned above: the Pythons jump in and out
of roles, and tell tall tales all the time (most memorably in part five when the tiger
impersonators try to explain what they are doing). The story about Perkins' leg is
also carnivalesque: it reminds one of the clowns' dinner in Angela Carter's Nights
at the Circus where one of the dancing, drunk clowns cuts off the huge, multi-
coloured penis of another, only to watch it grow back in a new decor. What would
normally be harmful and terrible is strangely common in this world turned upside-
down, and hence carnivalesque. Anything is possible.
But whereas this absurd reversal of roles lasted only for the duration of the festival
in medieval times, the state of affairs in The Meaning of Life is permanent: it is not
a welcome opportunity to slip out of everyday life and have some metamorphous
fun, it is everyday life. What is absurd here is not the carnival; it is society itself.
The mirth of many of the scenes mirror the fundamental basics of postmodern
laughter: it is to be found anywhere, even if there is no immediate reason. The fool
of history is no more just a part of the world; he may be said to be the world. His
antics are not a parody of an established order; there is no such thing. His antics,
the absurdity and carnivalistic role-swapping, are the only established truth and
order, which is, once again, the deeper meaning of the film - and of life.

CONCLUSION

The Meaning of Life, according to Whitaker's Almanack for 1984, was generally
held to be in "appalling taste" at the Cannes Festival, but nevertheless it has
become rather popular. Its ironic treatment of contemporary society was bound to
create some outrage, like Life of Brian from 1979 did (it was promptly banned in
Norway and Scotland when it was released).
It has now been demonstrated how the film, in all its apparent meaningless chaos
of "bad taste" (as some critics would have it), is no more than the natural
conclusion of a long satiric and carnivalistic development. Its elements of traditional
satire and the medieval carnival make it a film that will probably survive for long:
the people who now acknowledge Pope's rhymes as true classics even if they
dislike the poetry itself are probably the very same people who, had they been born
in his day, would have found them awful. Likewise it is probable that the film will
survive and gradually gain the respectability it has not had the good fortune to
enjoy so far. As a document of life in the 1980'es it is also valuable now, and will
probably be so even more as time goes by. But its main achievement is its
accurate representation of an absurd society. It is, in my opinion, a landmark in
surrealist art: one of those very few truly surrealistic films.

WORKS CITED
Chapman, Graham, et al., Monty Python's The Meaning of Life, London: Methuen
1983 & 1990 Tilbage/back

Chapman, Graham, et al., Monty Python's Flying Circus: Just the Words, London:
Mandarin 1990 Tilbage/back

Johansen, Ib, "Narren og den Gale. To Renæssancefigurer", Den Jyske Historiker

26, Århus 1983 Tilbage/back

Rawson, Claude (ed.), English Satire and the Satiric Tradition, London: Blackwell
1984 Tilbage/back

Tilbage/back

MONTY PYTHON'S

THE MEANING OF LIFE

written by and starring

GRAHAM CHAPMAN * JOHN CLEESE

TERRY GILLIAM * TERRY JONES
ERIC IDLE * MICHAEL PALIN

directed by TERRY JONES

animation & special sequences by TERRY GILLIAM
produced by JOHN GOLDSTONE

First Fish: Morning.

Second Fish: Morning.

Third Fish: Morning.

 Fourth Fish: Morning.

Third Fish: Morning.

First Fish: Morning.

Second Fish: Morning.

Fourth Fish: What's new?

First Fish: Not much.

Fifth and Sixth Fish:

Morning.

The Others: Morning, morning, morning.

First Fish: Frank was just asking what's new.

Fifth Fish: Was he?

First Fish: Yeah. Uh huh...

Third Fish: Hey, look. Howard's being eaten.

Second Fish: Is he?

[They move forward to watch a waiter serving a large grilled fish

to a large man.]

Second Fish: Makes you think doesn't it?

Fourth Fish: I mean... what's it all about?

Fifth Fish: Beats me.

Why are we here, what is life all about?

Is God really real, or is there some doubt?
Well tonight we're going to sort it all out,
For tonight it's the Meaning of Life.

What's the point of all these hoax?

Is it the chicken and egg time, are we all just yolks?
Or perhaps, we're just one of God's little jokes,
Well ca c'est the Meaning of Life.

Is life just a game where we make up the rules

While we're searching for something to say
Or are we just simple spiralling coils
Of self-replicating DNA?

What is life? What is our fate?

Is there Heaven and Hell? Do we reincarnate?
Is mankind evolving or is it too late?
Well tonight here's the Meaning of Life.
For millions this life is a sad vale of tears
Sitting round with really nothing to say
While scientists say we're just simply spiralling coils
Of self-replicating DNA.

So just why, why are we here?

And just what, what, what, what do we fear?
Well ce soir, for a change, it will all be made clear,
For this is the Meaning of Life - c'est le sens de la vie -
This is the Meaning of Life.

THE MEANING OF LIFE

-------------------

PART I

THE MIRACLE OF BIRTH

[Hospital corridor. A mother-to-be is being wheeled very fast down

the corridor on a trolley, which crashes through several sets of
doors. A nurse with her slips into a consultant's room, where one
doctor is throwing beer mats through the crooked arm of another.]

First Doctor: One thousand and eight!

Nurse: Mrs Moore's contractions are more frequent, doctor.

First Doctor: Good. Take her into the foetus-frightening room.

Nurse: Right.

[They pass through the delivery room.]

First Doctor: Bit bare in here today. isn't it?

Second Doctor: Yeees.

First Doctor: More apparatus please, nurse.

Nurse: Yes doctor.

First Doctor: Yes, the EEG, the BP monitor and the AVV, please.

Second Doctor: And get the machine that goes 'Ping'!

First Doctor: And get the most expensive machines in case the
administrator comes.

[Apparatus starts pouring into the room. The mother is

lost behind various bits of equipment.]

First Doctor: That's better, that's much better.

Second Doctor: Yeeees. More like it.

First Doctor: Still something missing, though. [They think hard for
a few moments.]
First and Second Doctors: Patient?

Second Doctor: Where's the patient?

First Doctor: Anyone seen the patient?

Second Doctor: Patient!

Nurse: Ah, here she is.

First Doctor: Bring her round.

Second Doctor: Mind the machine!

First Doctor: Come along!

Second Doctor: Jump up there. Hup!

First Doctor: Hallo! Now, don't you worry.

Second Doctor: We'll soon have you cured.

First Doctor: Leave it all to us, you'll never know what hit you.

First and Second Doctors: Goodbye, goodbye! Drips up! Injections.

Second Doctor: Can I put the tube in the baby's head?

First Doctor: Only if I can do the epesiotomy.

Second Doctor: Okay.

First Doctor: Now, legs up.

[The legs are put in the stirrups, while the Doctors open
the doors opposite.]

First and Second Doctors: Come on. Come on, all of you. That's it,
jolly good. Come on. Come on. Spread round there.

[A small horde enters, largely medical but with two

Japanese with cameras and video equipment. The first
doctor bumps into a man.]

First Doctor: Who are you?

Man: I'm the husband.

First Doctor: I'm sorry. only people involved are allowed in here.

[The husband leaves.]

Mrs Moore: What do I do?

Second Doctor: Yes?

Mrs Moore: What's that for?

[She points to a machine.]

First Doctor: That's the machine that goes 'Ping'!

[It goes 'Ping'.]

First Doctor: You see. It means that your baby is still alive.

Second Doctor: And that's the most expensive machine in the whole
hospital.

First Doctor: Yes, it cost over three quarters of a million pounds.

Second Doctor: Aren't you lucky!

Nurse: The administrator's here, doctor.

First Doctor: Switch everything on!

[They do so. Everything flashes and beeps and thuds.

Enter the administrator...]

Administrator: Morning, gentlemen.

First and Second Doctors: Morning Mr Pycroft.

Administrator: Very impressive. What are you doing this morning?

First Doctor: It's a birth.

Administrator: And what sort of thing is that?

Second Doctor: Well, that's when we take a new baby out of a lady's
tummy.

Administrator: Wonderful what we can do nowadays. Ah! I see you

have the machine that goes 'Ping'. This is my favourite. You
see we lease this back to the company we sold it to. That
way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the
capital account. [They all applaud.] Thank you, thank you. We
try to do our best. Well, do carry on.

[He leaves.]

Nurse: Oh, the vulva's dilating, doctor.

First Doctor: Yes, there's the head. Yes, four centimetres, five,
six centimetres...

First and Second Doctors: Lights! Amplify the ping machine. Masks
up! Suction! Eyes down for a full house! Here it comes!

[The baby arrives.]

First Doctor: And frighten it!

 [They grab the baby, hold it upside down, slap it, poke
tubes up its nose, hose it with cold water. Then the baby
is placed on a wooden chopping block and the umbilicus
severed with a chopper.]

And the rough towels!

[It is dried with rough towels.]

Show it to the mother.

[It is shown to the mother.]

First and Second Doctors: That's enough! Right. Sedate her, number
the child. Measure it, blood type it and... *isolate* it.

Nurse: OK, show's over.

Mrs Moore: Is it a boy or a girl?

First Doctor: Now I think it's a little early to start imposing

roles on it, don't you? Now a world of advice. You may find
that you suffer for some time a totally irrational feeling of
depression. PND is what we doctors call it. So it's lots of
happy pills for you, and you can find out all about the birth
when you get home. It's available on Betamax, VHS and Super 8.

THE MEANING OF LIFE

-------------------

THE MIRACLE OF BIRTH

PART 2

THE THIRD WORLD

Yorkshire

[A northern street. Dad is marching home. We see his house. A stork

flies above it, and drops a baby down the chimney.]

Dad: Oh bloody hell.

[Inside the house. A pregnant woman is at the sink. With

a cry a new-born baby, complete with umbilical cord,
drops from between her legs onto the floor.]

Mother: Get that would you, Deirdre...

Girl: All right, Mum.

[The girl takes the baby. Mum carries on.]

[Dad comes up to the door and pushes it open sadly.

Inside there are at least forty children, of various
ages, packed into the living room.]
Mum: [with tray] Whose teatime is it?

Scores of Voices: Me, mum...

Mum: Vincent, Tessa, Valerie, Janine, Martha, Andrew, Thomas,

Walter, Pat, Linda, Michael, Evadne, Alice, Dominique, and
Sasha... it's your bedtime!

Children: [all together] Oh, Mum!

Mum: Don't argue... Laura, Alfred, Nigel, Annie, Simon, Amanda...

Dad: Wait...

[They all listen.]

I've got something to tell the whole family.

[All stop... A buzz of excitement.]

Mum: [to her nearest son] Quick... go and get the others in,
Gordon!

[Gordon goes out. Another twenty or so children enter

the room. They squash in at the back as best they can.]

Dad: The mill's closed. There's no more work, we're destitute.

[Lots of cries of 'Oh no!'... 'Cripes'... 'Heck'... from

around the room.]

I've got no option but to sell you all for scientific

experiments. [The children protest with heart-rending pleas.]
No no, that's the way it is my loves... Blame the Catholic
church for not letting me wear one of those little rubber
things... Oh they've done some wonderful things in their time,
they preserved the might and majesty, even the mystery of the
Church of Rome, the sanctity of the sacrament and the
indivisible oneness of the Trinity, but if they'd let me wear
one of the little rubber things on the end of my cock we
wouldn't be in the mess we are now.

Little Boy: Couldn't Mummy have worn some sort of pessary?

Dad: Not if we're going to remain members of the fastest growing

religion in the world, my boy... You see, we believe... well,
let me put it like this...
[sings]

There are Jews in the world,

There are Buddhists,
There are Hindus and Mormons and then,
There are those that follow Mohammed,
But I've never been one of them...

I'm a Roman Catholic,

 And have been since before I was born,
And the one thing they say about Catholics,
Is they'll take you as soon as you're warm...

You don't have to be a six-footer,

You don't have to have a great brain,
You don't have to have any clothes on -
You're a Catholic the minute Dad came...

Because...

Every sperm is sacred,

Every sperm is great,
If a sperm is wasted,
God gets quite irate.

Children: Every sperm is sacred,

Every sperm is great,
If a sperm is wasted,
God gets quite irate.

Child: [solo] Let the heathen spill theirs,

On the dusty ground,
God shall make them pay for,
Each sperm that can't be found.

Children: Every sperm is wanted,

Every sperm is good,
Every sperm is needed,
In your neighbourhood.

Mum: [solo] Hindu, Taoist, Mormon,

Spill theirs just anywhere,
But God loves those who treat their
Semen with more care.

Men neighbours: [peering out of toilets]

Every sperm is sacred,
Every sperm is great,

Women neighbours: [on wall]

If a sperm is wasted,

Children: God get quite irate.

Priest: [in church] Every sperm is sacred,

Bride and Groom: Every sperm is good.

Nannies: Every sperm is needed.

Cardinals: [in prams] In your neighbourhood!

Children: Every sperm is useful,

Every sperm is fine,

Funeral Cortege: God needs everybody's,

First Mourner: Mine!

Lady Mourner: And mine!

Corpse: And mine!

Nun: [solo] Though the pagans spill theirs,

O'er mountain, hill and plain,

Various artefacts in a Roman Catholic Souvenir Shop:

God shall strike them down for
Each sperm that's spilt in vain.

Everybody: Every sperm is sacred,

Every sperm is good,
Every sperm is needed,
In your neighbourhood.

Even more than everybody, including two fire-eaters, a juggler, a

clown at a piano and a stilt-walker riding a bicycle:
Every sperm is sacred,
Every sperm is great,
If a sperm is wasted,
God gets quite irate.

[Everybody cheers (including the fire-eaters, the

juggler, the clown at the piano and the stilt-walker
riding the bicycle). Fireworks go off, a Chinese dragon
is brought on and flags of all nations are unfurled
overhead.]

[Back inside.]

Dad: So you see my problem, little ones... I can't keep you here
any longer.

Shout from the back: Speak up!

Dad: [raising his voice] I can't keep you here any longer... God
has blessed us so much that I can't afford to feed you
anymore.

Boy: Couldn't you have your balls cut off...?

Dad: It's not as simple as that Nigel... God knows all... He would
see through such a cheap trick. What we do to ourselves, we do
to Him...

Voice: You could have them pulled off in an accident?

[Other voices suggest ways his balls can be removed.]

Dad: No... no... children... I know you're trying to help but

believe me, my mind's made up. I've given this long and
careful thought. And it's medical experiments for the lot of
you...
 [The children emerge singing a melancholy reprise of
'Every Sperm is Sacred.']

[They are being watched from another Northern house.]

Mr Blackitt: Look at them, bloody Catholics. Filling the bloody

world up with bloody people they can't afford to bloody feed.

Mrs Blackitt: What are we dear?

Mr Blackitt: Protestant, and fiercely proud of it...

Mrs Blackitt: Why do they have so many children...?

Mr Blackitt: Because every time they have sexual intercourse they

have to have a baby.

Mrs Blackitt: But it's the same with us, Harry.

Mr Blackitt: What d'you mean...?

Mrs Blackitt: Well I mean we've got two children and we've had
sexual intercourse twice.

Mr Blackitt: That's not the point... We *could* have it any time we

wanted.

Mrs Blackitt: Really?

Mr Blackitt: Oh yes. And, what's more, because we don't believe in

all that Papist claptrap we can take precautions.

Mrs Blackitt: What, you mean lock the door...?

Mr Blackitt: No no, I mean, because we are members of the

Protestant Reformed Church which successfully challenged the
autocratic power of the Papacy in the mid-sixteenth century,
we can wear little rubber devices to prevent issue.

Mrs Blackitt: What do you mean?

Mr Blackitt: I could, if I wanted, have sexual intercourse with

you...

Mrs Blackitt: Oh, yes... Harry...

Mr Blackitt: And by wearing a rubber sheath over my old feller I

could ensure that when I came off... you would not be
impregnated.

Mrs Blackitt: Ooh!

Mr Blackitt: That's what being a Protestant's all about. That's

why it's the church for me. That's why it's the church for
anyone who respects the individual and the individual's right
to decide for him or herself. When Martin Luther nailed his
 protest up to the church door in 1517, he may not have
realised the full significance of what he was doing. But four
hundred years later, thanks to him, my dear, I can wear
whatever I want on my John Thomas. And Protestantism doesn't
stop at the simple condom. Oh no! I can wear French Ticklers
if I want.

Mrs Blackitt: You what?

Mr Blackitt: French Ticklers... Black Mambos... Crocodile Ribs...

Sheaths that are designed not only to protect but also to
enhance the stimulation of sexual congress...

Mrs Blackitt: Have you got one?

Mr Blackitt: Have I got one? Well no... But I can go down the road
any time I want and walk into Harry's and hold my head up
high, and say in a loud steady voice: 'Harry I want you to
sell me a *condom*. In fact today I think I'll have a French
Tickler, for I am a Protestant...'

Mrs Blackitt: Well why don't you?

Mr Blackitt: But they... [He points at the stream of children still

pouring past the house.]... they cannot. Because their church
never made the great leap out of the Middle Ages, and the
domination of alien episcopal supremacy!

the Adventures of

MARTIN
LUTHER
in

Reform-O-Scope

presented by
The Protestant Film Marketing Board
in association with
Sol. C. Ziegler, Andy Rotbeiner
and the people of Beirut

GERMANY
in the grip of the 16th century

An exciting and controversial examination of the Protestant

reformer whose re-assessment of the role of the individual in
Christian belief shook the foundations of a post-feudal Germany in
the grip of the sixteenth century.

It was a day much like any other in the quiet little town of
Wittenberg. Mamie Meyer was preparing fat for the evening meal when
the full force of the Reformation struck.

[A woman and two rather plain daughters are sitting

outside their house with bowls. A man arrives
breathless.]
Hymie: Mamie! Martin Luther's out!

[Consternation amongst the womenfolk.]

Mamie: Oh! Martin Luther!

[She hurries her daughters inside.]

Did you get the suet, Hymie?

Hymie: Oy vay - the suet I clean forgot!

Mamie: The suet you forgot!

Hymie: The lard, the fish oil, the butter fat, the dripping, the
wool grease I remember... [Hands over the shopping]... but the
suet... oy vay...

Mamie: [pointing to his head] So what'd keep up there? Adipose

tissue?

Hymie: Look out! Here he comes.

[Mamie goes inside shouting.]

Mamie: Girls, girls! Your father forgot the suet!

[Groans from the girls inside.]

[Martin Luther is at the gate. His ears prick up at the

female voices. His eyes flick from side to side.]

Hymie: Hallo Martin.

Martin Luther: Where's the john?

Hymie: We don't have one.

Martin Luther: No john? What d'you do?

Hymie: We eat fat.

Martin Luther: And that stops you going to the john?

Hymie: It's a theory.

Martin Luther: Yeah, but does it work?

Hymie: We ain't got no john.

Martin Luther: Yeah, but d'you need to go?

Hymie: You know how it is with theories - some days it's fine...
maybe one, two... three days... and then just when it looks
like you're ready for to publish... [Expression of resignation
and disgust.]... Whoosh! You need a new kitchen floor.
Martin Luther: Oh you should be so lucky!

[A girl's laugh from inside. Martin Luther looks up -

alert.]

Martin Luther: D'you need any cleaning inside?

Hymie: Oh no... today it's all going fine.

Martin Luther: Oh well, how's about showing me the cutlery?

Hymie: Martin - I got a woman and children in there.

Martin Luther: So there's no problem... I just look at a few

spoons... and...

[Martin Luther starts to go in. Hymie stops him.]

Hymie: I got two girls in there, Martin... you know what I mean.

Martin Luther: Honest! I don't look at your girls! I don't even

think about them! There! I put them out of my mind! Their
arms, their necks... their little legs... and bosoms... I
*wipe* from my mind.

Hymie: You just want to see spoons?

Martin Luther: My life! That's what I want to see.

Hymie: I know I'm going to regret this.

Martin Luther: No, listen! Cutlery is really my thing now. Girls

with round breasts is over for me.

Hymie: What am I doing? I know what's going to happen.

Martin Luther: I'll crouch behind you.

[He goes in. Martin Luther follows, crouching.]

Hymie: Mamie! Guess who's come to see us!

Mamie: Hymie! Are you out of your mind already? You know how old
your daughters are?

Hymie: He only wants to see the spoons.

Mamie: What you have to bring him into my house for?

Hymie: Mamie, he doesn't even think about girls any more.

Martin Luther: Mrs Meyer - as far as girls is concerned, I shot my

wad!

Mamie: You shot your *wad*?

Martin Luther: Def - in - ately...

[Pause.]

Mamie: Which spoons you wanna view?

Martin Luther: Eh... [shrugs]... I guess the soup spoons...

Mamie: [suddenly interested] Ah! Now they're good spoons.

Martin Luther: You got them arranged?

Mamie: No, but I could arrange them for you.

Martin Luther: Don't put yourself to no bother, Mrs Meyer.

Mamie: It's no bother... I want for you to see those spoons like I
would want to see them myself.

Martin Luther: Oh you're too kind, Mrs Meyer... You could get your
daughters to show me them...

Mamie: Hymie get him out of here.

Hymie: Mamie, he only said for Myrtle and Audrey to show him the
*spoons*.

Mamie: Like you think I run some kind of bordello here...

Martin Luther: Mrs Meyer! How can you say such a thing?

Mamie: Listen Martin Luther! I know what you want to do with my

girls!

Martin Luther: Show me the spoons...

Mamie: You want for them to pull up their shirts and then lean over
the chair with their legs apart...

Hymie: Mamie don't get excited...

Mamie: I'm getting excited? It's him that's getting excited!

Martin Luther: My mind is on the spoons.

Mamie: But you can't stop thinking of those little girls over the
chairs.

[Luther is struggling with himself.]

Hymie: I got to go to the bathroom.

Mamie: [grabs him] Hymie! I'm a married woman!

Hymie: So... just show him the spoons.

[Hymie goes.]
Mamie: And you don't want to put nothing up me?

Martin Luther: Mrs Meyer - you read my mind.

Mamie: Oh...

[They go out discreetly.]

But despite the efforts of Protestants to promote the idea of sex

for pleasure, children continued to multiply everywhere.

THE MEANING OF LIFE

-------------------

PART II

GROWTH AND LEARNING

[A school chapel.]

Headmaster: And spotteth twice they the camels before the third
hour. And so the Midianites went forth to Ram Gilead in Kadesh
Bilgemath by Shor Ethra Regalion, to the house of
Gash-Bil-Betheul-Bazda, he who brought the butter dish to
Balshazar and the tent peg to the house of Rashomon, and there
slew they the goats, yea, and placed they the bits in little
pots. Here endeth the lesson.

[The Headmaster closes the Bible. the Chaplain rises.]

Chaplain: Let us praise God. Oh Lord...

Congregation: Oh Lord...

Chaplain: Oooh you are so big...

Congregation: Oooh you are so big...

Chaplain: So absolutely huge.

Congregation: So ab - solutely huge.

Chaplain: Gosh, we're all really impressed down here I can tell
you.

Congregation: Gosh, we're all really impressed down here I can tell
you.

Chaplain: Forgive Us, O Lord, for this dreadful toadying.

Congregation: And barefaced flattery.

Chaplain: But you are so strong and, well, just so super.

Congregation: Fan - tastic.

Headmaster: Amen. Now two boys have been found rubbing linseed oil
into the school cormorant. Now some of you may feel that the
cormorant does not play an important part in the life of the
school but I remind you that it was presented to us by the
Corporation of the town of Sudbury to commemorate Empire Day,
when we try to remember the names of all those from the
Sudbury area so gallantly gave their lives to keep China
British. So from now on the cormorant is strictly out of
bounds. Oh... and Jenkins... apparently your mother died this
morning. [He turns to the Chaplain.] Chaplain.

[The congregation rises and the Chaplain leads them in

singing.]

Chaplain and Congregation:

Oh Lord, please don't burn us,
Don't grill or toast your flock,
Don't put us on the barbecue,
Or simmer us in stock,
Don't braise or bake or boil us,
Or stir-fry us in a wok...

Oh please don't lightly poach us,

Or baste us with hot fat,
Don't fricassee or roast us,
Or boil us in a vat,
And please don't stick thy servants Lord,
In a Rotissomat...

[A classroom. The boys are sitting quietly studying.]

Boy: He's coming!

[Pandemonium breaks out. The Headmaster walks in.]

Headmaster: All right, settle down, settle down. [He puts his
papers down.] Now before I begin the lesson will those of you
who are playing in the match this afternoon move your clothes
down on to the lower peg immediately after lunch before you
write your letter home, if you're not getting your hair cut,
unless you've got a younger brother who is going out this
weekend as the guest of another boy, in which case collect his
note before lunch, put it in your letter after you've had your
hair cut, and make sure he moves your clothes down onto the
lower peg for you. Now...

Wymer: Sir?

Headmaster: Yes, Wymer?

Wymer: My younger brother's going out with Dibble this weekend,

sir, but I'm not having my hair cut today sir, so do I move my
clothes down or...

Headmaster: I do wish you'd listen, Wymer, it's perfectly simple.

If you're not getting your hair cut, you don't have to move
your brother's clothes down to the lower peg, you simply
 collect his note before lunch after you've done your scripture
prep when you've written your letter home before rest, move
your own clothes on to the lower peg, greet the visitors, and
report to Mr Viney that you've had your chit signed. Now,
sex... sex, sex, sex, where were we?

[Silence from form. A lot of hard thinking of the type

indulged by schoolboys who know they don't know the
answer.]

Well, had I got as far as the penis entering the vagina?

Pupils: Er... er... no sir. No we didn't, sir.

Headmaster: Well had I done foreplay?

Pupils: ...Yes sir.

Headmaster: Well, as we all know about foreplay no doubt you can

tell me what the purpose of foreplay is... Biggs.

Biggs: Don't know, sorry sir.

Headmaster: Carter.

Carter: Er... was it taking your clothes off, sir?

Headmaster: And after that?

Wymer: Putting them on the lower peg sir?

[Headmaster throws a board duster at him and hits him.]

Headmaster: The purpose of foreplay is to cause the vagina to

lubricate so that the penis can penetrate more easily.

Watson: Could we have a window open please sir?

Headmaster: Yes... Harris will you?... And, of course, to cause the

man's penis to erect and har...den. Now, did I do vaginal
juices last week oh do pay attention Wadsworth, I know it's
Friday afternoon oh watching the football are you boy - right
move over there. I'm warning you I may decide to set an
exam this term.

Pupils: Oh sir...

Headmaster: So just listen... now did I or did I not do vaginal

juices?

Pupils: Yes sir.

Headmaster: Name two ways of getting them flowing, Watson.

Watson: Rubbing the clitoris, sir.

Headmaster: What's wrong with a kiss, boy? Hm? Why not start her
 off with a nice kiss? You don't have to go leaping straight
for the clitoris like a bull at a gate. Give her a kiss, boy.

Wymer: Suck the nipple, sir.

Headmaster: Good. Good. Good, well done, Wymer.

Duckworth: Stroking the thighs, sir.

Headmaster: Yes, I suppose so.

Another: Bite the neck.

Headmaster: Good. Nibbling the ear. Kneading the buttocks, and so

on and so forth. So we have all these possibilities before we
stampede towards the clitoris, Watson.

Watson: Yes sir. Sorry sir.

Headmaster: All these form of stimulation can now take place.

[The Headmaster pulls the bed down.]

... And of course tongueing will give you the best idea of how
the juices are coming along. [Calls.] Helen... Now penetration
and coitus, that is to say intercourse up to and including
orgasm.

[Mrs Williams has entered.]

Ah hallo, dear.

[The pupils have shuffled more or less to their feet.]

*Do* stand up when my wife enters the room, Carter.

Carter: Oh sorry, sir. Sorry.

Mrs Williams: Humphrey, I hope you don't mind, but I told the
Garfields we *would* dine with them tonight.

Headmaster: [starting to disrobe] Yes, yes, I suppose we must...

Mrs Williams: [taking off her clothes] I said we'd be there by

eight.

Headmaster: Well at least it'll give me a reason to wind up the

staff meeting.

Mrs Williams: Well I know you don't like them but I couldn't make
another excuse.

Headmaster: [he's got his shirt off] Well it's just that I felt -
Wymer. This is for your benefit. Will you kindly wake up. I've
no intention of going through this all again. [The boys are no
more interested than they were in the last lesson on the
Binomial Theorem, though they pretend, as usual.] Now we'll
 take the foreplay as read, if you don't mind, dear.

Mrs Williams: No of course not, Humphrey.

Headmaster: So the man starts by entering, or mounting his good

lady wife in the standard way. The penis is now as you will
observe more or less fully erect. There we are. Ah that's
better. Now... Carter.

Carter: Yes sir.

Headmaster: What is it?

Carter: It's an ocarina... sir.

Headmaster: Bring it up here. The man now starts making thrusting

movements with his pelvic area, moving the penis up and down
inside the vagina so... put it there boy, put it there... on
the table... while the wife maximizes her clitoral stimulation
by the shaft of the penis by pushing forward, thank you
dear... now as sexual excitement mounts... what's funny Biggs?

Biggs: Oh, nothing sir.

Headmaster: Oh do please share your little joke with the rest of

us... I mean, obviously something frightfully funny's going
on...

Biggs: No, honestly, sir.

Headmaster: Well as it's so funny I think you'd better be selected

to play for the boys' team in the rugby match against the
masters this afternoon.

Biggs: [looks horrified] Oh no, sir.

THE MEANING OF LIFE

-------------------

PART III

FIGHTING EACH OTHER

Biggs: [now a soldiers-in-arms] O.K. Blackitt, Sturridge and

Walters you take the buggers on the left flank. Hordern,
Spadger and I will go for the gunpost.

Blackitt: [a Deptford Cockney] Hang on, you'll never make it,

sir... Let us come with you...

Biggs: Do as you're told man.

Blackitt: Righto, skipper. [He starts to go, then stops.] Oh, sir,
sir... if we... if we don't meet again... sir, I'd just like
to say it's been a real privilege fighting alongside you,
sir...
 [They are continually ducking as bullets fly past them
and shells burst overhead.]

Biggs: Yes, well I think this is hardly the time or place for a
goodbye speech... eh...

[Biggs is clearly anxious to go.]

Blackitt: No, me, and the lads realise that but... well... we may
never meet again, sir, so...

Biggs: All right, Blackitt, thanks a lot.

Blackitt: No just a mo, sir! You see me and the lads had a little
whip-round, sir, and we bought you something, sir... we bought
you this, sir...

[He produces a handsome ormolu clock from his pack. Biggs

is at a loss for words. He is continually ducking.]

Biggs: Well, I don't know what to say... It's a lovely thought...

thank you... thank you *all*... but I think we'd better... get
to cover now...

[He starts to go.]

Blackitt: Hang on a tick, sir, we got something else for you as

well, sir.

[Two of the others emerge from some bushes with a

grandfather clock.]

Sorry it's another clock, sir... only there was a bit of a

mix-up... Walters thought *he* was buying the present, and
Spadger and I had already got the other one.

Biggs: Well it's beautiful... they're both beau -

[A bullet suddenly shatters the face of the grandfather

clock.]

... But I think we'd better get to cover now, and I'll thank
you properly later...

[Biggs starts to go again but Blackitt hasn't finished.]

Blackitt: And Corporal Sturridge got this for you as well, sir. He
didn't know about the others, sir - it's Swiss.

[He hands over a wristwatch.]

Biggs: Well now that is thoughtful, Sturridge. Good man.

[A shell bursts right overhead. Biggs flings himself down

into the mud.]

Blackitt: And there's a card, sir... from all of us... [He produces
 a blood-splattered envelope.]... Sorry about the blood, sir.

Biggs: Thank you all.

[He pockets it and tries to go on.]

Blackitt: Squad, three cheers for Captain Biggs. Hip Hip -

All: Hooray!

Blackitt: Hip Hip -

All: Hoor...

[An almighty burst of machine-gun fire silences most of

them... Blackitt is hit.]

Biggs: Blackitt! Blackitt!

Blackitt: [hurt] Ah! I'll be all right, sir... Oh there's just one
other thing, sir. Spadge, give him the cheque...

Spadger: Oh yeah...

Biggs: Oh now this is really going to far...

Spadger: I don't seem to be able to find it, sir... [Explosion.]

Er, it'll be in Number Four trench... I'll go and get it. [He
starts to crawl off.]

Biggs: [losing his cool] Oh! For Christ's sake forget it, man.

[The others all look at Biggs after this outburst, as if

they can't believe this ingratitude.]

Blackitt: Oh! Ah!

Spadger: You shouldn't have said that, sir. You've hurt his
feelings now...

Blackitt: Don't mind me, Spadge... Toffs is all the same... One
minute it's all 'please' and 'thank you', the next they'll
kick you in the teeth...

Walters: Let's not give him the cake...

Biggs: I don't want *any* cake...

Spadger: Look, Blackitt cooked it specially for you, you bastard.

[They all look at Blackitt rolling in the mud.]

Sturridge: Yeah, he saved his rations for six weeks.

Biggs: I'm sorry, I don't mean to be ungrateful...

Blackitt: I'll be all right.

 [Shell crashes. Blackitt dies.]

Spadger: Blackie! Blackie! [He turns to Biggs with tears in his

eyes.] Look at him... [He pulls up the supine form of
Blackitt.] He worked on that cake like no-one else I've ever
known. [He props him in the mud again.] Some nights it was so
cold we could hardly move, but Blackie'd de out there -
slicing lemons, mixing the sugar and the almonds... I mean you
try getting butter melted at fifteen below zero! There's love
in that cake... [He picks up Blackitt again.] This man's love
and this man's care and this man's - Aarggh!
[He gets shot.]

[Biggs runs over to them in horror.]

Biggs: Oh my Christ!

Sturridge: You bastard.

Biggs: All right! All right! We will eat the cake. They're right...
it's too good a cake not to eat. get the plates and knives,
Walters...

Walters: Yes, sir... how many plates?

Biggs: Six.

[A shot rings out. Walters drops dead.]

Biggs: Er... no... better make it five.

Sturridge: Tablecloth, sir...?

Biggs: Yes, get the tablecloth...!

[Explosion. Sturridge gets shot.]

Biggs: No no no, I'll get the tablecloth and you'd better get the
gate-leg table, Hordern.

[Hordern is shot in the leg.]

Hordern: I'll bring two sir, in case one gets scrumpled...

[Suddenly we find this has all been a film, which a

General now stops.]

General: Well, of course, warfare isn't all fun. Right, stop that.
It's all very well to laugh at the Military, but when one
considers the meaning of life it is a struggle between
alternative viewpoints of life itself. And without the
ability to defend one's own viewpoint against other perhaps
more aggressive ideologies then reasonableness and moderation
could quite simply disappear. That is why we'll always need an
army and may God strike me down were it to be otherwise.
 [The Hand of god descends and vaporizes him.]

[The audience of two old ladies and two kids applauds

hesitantly.]

[Outside the hut RSM Whateverhisnameis is drilling a

small squad of recruits.]

RSM: Don't stand there gawping like you've never seen the Hand of
God before. Now! Today we're going to do marching up and down
the square. That is unless any of you got anything better to
do? Well, anyone got anything they'd rather be doing than
marching up and down the square?

[Atkinson puts his hand up.]

Yes? Atkinson? What would you rather be doing, Atkinson?

Atkinson: Well to be quite honest, Sarge, I'd rather be at home

with the wife and kids.

RSM: Would you now?

Atkinson: Yes, sarge.

RSM: Right off you go. [Atkinson goes.] Now, everybody else happy
with my little plan of marching up and down the square a bit?

Coles: Sarge...

RSM: Yes?

Coles: I've got a book I'd quite like to read...

RSM: Right! You go read your book then! [Coles runs off.] Now
everybody else quite content to join in with my little scheme
of marching hup and down the square?

Wycliff: Sarge?

RSM: Yes, Wycliff, what is it?

Wycliff: [tentatively] Well... I'm... er... learning the piano...

RSM: [with contempt] 'Learning the piano'?

Wycliff: Yes, sarge...

RSM: And I suppose you want to go and practise eh? Marching up and
down the square not good enough for you, eh?

Wycliff: Well...

RSM: Right! Off you go! [Turns to the rest.] Now what about the
rest of you? Rather be at the pictures I suppose.

Squad: Ooh, yes, ooh rather.

RSM: All right off you go. [They go.] Bloody army! I don't know
what it's coming to... Right, Sgt Major, marching up and down
the square... Left-right-left... left... left...
left-right-left...

[The RSM marches himself off into the distance of the

barracks square.]

Democracy and humanitarianism have always been tarde marks of the

British Army and have stamped its triumph throughout history, in
the furthest-flung corners of the Empire. But no matter where or
when there was fighting to be done, it has always been the calm
leadership of the officer class that has made the British Army what
it is.

The First Zulu War.

Natal 1879 (not Glasgow)

[Inside a tent.]

Pakenham-Walsh: Morning Ainsworth.

Ainsworth: Morning Pakenham-Walsh.

Pakenham-Walsh: Sleep well?

Ainsworth: Not bad. Bitten to shreds though. Must be a hole in the

bloody mosquito net.

Pakenham-Walsh: Yes, savage little blighters aren't they?

First Lieut Chadwick: [arriving] Excuse me, sir.

Ainsworth: Yes Chadwick?

Chadwick: I'm afraid Perkins got rather badly bitten during the
night.

Ainsworth: Well so did we. Huh.

Chadwick: Yes, but I do think the doctor ought to see him.

Ainsworth: Well go and fetch him, then.

Chadwick: Right you are, sir.

Ainsworth: Suppose I'd better go along. Coming, Pakenham?

Pakenham-Walsh: Yes I suppose so.

[Chadwick leaves. Ainsworth and Pakenham-Walsh thread

their leisurely way through the line of assegais.
Pakenham-Walsh's valet is speared by a Zulu warrior but
Pakenham-Walsh valiantly saves his jacket from the mud.
They enter Perkins's tent. Perkins is on his camp bed.]
Ainsworth: Ah! Morning Perkins.

Perkins: Morning sir.

Ainsworth: What's all the trouble then?

Perkins: Bitten sir. During the night.

Ainsworth: Hm. Whole leg gone eh?

Perkins: Yes.

[As they talk, the din of battle continues outside.

Screams of dying men, crackling of tents set on fire.]

Ainsworth: How's it feel?

Perkins: Stings a bit.

Ainsworth: Mmm. Well it would, wouldn't it. That's quite a bite

you've got there you know.

Perkins: Yes, real beauty isn't it?

All: Yes.

Ainsworth: Any idea how it happened?

Perkins: None at all. Complete mystery to me. Woke up just now...

one sock too many.

Pakenham-Walsh: You must have a hell of a hole in your net.

Ainsworth: Hm. We've sent for the doctor.

Perkins: Ooh, hardly worth it, is it?

Ainsworth: Oh yes... better safe than sorry.

Pakenham-Walsh: Yes, good Lord, look at this.

[He indicates a gigantic hole in the mosquito net.]

Ainsworth: By jove, that's enormous.

Pakenham-Walsh: You don't think it'll come back, do you?

Ainsworth: For more, you mean?

Pakenham-Walsh: Yes.

Ainsworth: You're right. We'd better get this stitched.

Pakenham-Walsh: Right.

Ainsworth: Hallo Doc.

Livingstone: [entering the tent with Chadwick] Morning. I came as
fast as I could. Is something up?

Ainsworth: Yes, during the night old Perkins had his leg bitten
sort of... off.

Livingstone: Ah hah!? Been in the wars have we?

Perkins: Yes.

Livingstone: Any headache, bowels all right? Well, let's have a

look at this one leg of yours then. [Looks around under sheet]
Yes... yes... yes... yes... yes... yes... well, this is
nothing to worry about.

Perkins: Oh good.

Livingstone: There's a lot of it about, probably a virus, keep

warm, plenty of rest, and if you're playing football or
anything try and favour the other leg.

Perkins: Oh right ho.

Livingstone: Be as right as rain in a couple of days.

Perkins: Thanks for the reassurance, doc.

Livingstone: Not at all, that's what I'm here for. Any other
problems I can reassure you about?

Perkins: No I'm fine.

Livingstone: Jolly good. Well, must be off.

Perkins: So it'll just grow back then, will it?

Livingstone: Er... I think I'd better come clean with you about
this... it's... um it's not a virus, I'm afraid. You see, a
virus is what we doctors call very very small. So small it
could not possibly have made off with a whole leg. What we're
looking for here is I think, and this is no more than an
educated guess, I'd like to make that clear, is some
multi-cellular life form with stripes, huge razor-sharp teeth,
about eleven foot long and of the genu *felis horribilis*.
What we doctors, in fact, call a tiger.

All in tent: A tiger...!!

[Outside, everyone engaged in battle, including the

Zulus, breaks off and shouts in horror:]

All: A tiger!

[The Zulus run off.]

Pakenham-Walsh: A tiger - in Africa?

Ainsworth: Hm...

Pakenham-Walsh: A tiger in Africa...?

Ainsworth: Ah... well it's probably escaped from a zoo.

Pakenham-Walsh: Well it doesn't sound very likely.

Ainsworth: [quietly] Stumm, stumm...

[A severely-wounded Sergeant staggers into the tent.]

Sergeant: Sir, sir, the attack's over, sir! the Zulus are
retreating.

Ainsworth: [dismissively] Oh jolly good. [He turns his back to the

group around Perkins.]

Sergeant: Quite a lot of casualties though, sir. C Division wiped

out. Signals gone. Thirty men killed in F Section. I should
think about a hundred - a hundred and fifty men altogether.

Ainsworth: [not very interested] Yes, yes I see, yes... Jolly good.

Sergeant: I haven't got the final figures, sir. There's a lot of

seriously wounded in the compound...

Ainsworth: [interrupting] Yes... well, the thing is, Sergeant, I've

got a bit of a problem here. [With gravity.] One of the
officers has lost a leg.

Sergeant: [stunned by the news] Oh *no*, sir!

Ainsworth: [gravely] I'm afraid so. Probably a tiger.

Sergeant: In Africa?

Ainsworth and Pakenham-Walsh: Stumm, stumm...

Ainsworth: The M.O. says we can stitch it back on if we find it

immediately.

Sergeant: Right sir! I'll organise a party right away, sir!

Ainsworth: Well it's hardly time for that, is it Sergeant...?

Sergeant: A search party...

Ainsworth: Ah! *Much* better idea. I'll tell you what, organise one
straight away.

Sergeant: Yes sir!

[Outside dead British bodies (of the other ranks) are

everywhere.]
Sergeant: [apologetically] Sorry about the mess, sir. We'll try and
get it cleared up, by the time you get back.

[They walk through the carnage. Orderlies are cheerfully

attending to the equally cheery wounded and the only
slightly less cheery dead.]

A dying man: [covered in blood] We showed 'em, didn't we, sir?

Ainsworth: Yes.

[He gives a thumbs up and dies.]

Sergeant: [addressing a soldier who is giving water to a dying man]

We've got to get a search party, leave that alone.

Another cheery cockney: [with an assegai sticking out of his chest]

This is fun, sir, init... all this killing... bloodshed...
bloody good fun sir, init?

Ainsworth: [abstracted] Yes... very good.

[He waves and moves on.]

A severed head: Morning, sir!

Ainsworth: Nasty wound you've got there, Potter.

Severed head: [cheerily] Thank you very much sir!

Ainsworth: Come on private - we're making up a search party.

Another terrible casualty: Better than staying at home, eh sir! At

home if you kill someone they arrest you. Here they give you
a gun, and show you what to do, sir. I mean, I killed fifteen
of those buggers sir! Now at home they'd hang me. *Here* they
give me a fucking medal sir!

[The search party for Perkins's leg is passing through

thick jungle. As they emerge into a clearing they suddenly see
a tiger's head sticking out of some bushes.]

Ainsworth: Look!

[Their eyes follow along the bushes to where the tiger's

tail is sticking out several yards away. For a moment it looks
like a very long tiger.]

My God, it's *huge*!

[The tiger's head rises up out of the thicket with its

paws up. The tiger's rear end backs out of the thicket
further down.]

Rear end: Don't shoot... don't shoot. We're not a tiger. [Takes off
head.] We were just... um...
Ainsworth: Why are you dressed as a tiger?

Rear end: Hmmm... oh... why! Why why... isn't it a lovely day
today...?

Ainsworth: Answer the question.

Rear end: Oh we were just er...

Front end: Actually! We're dressed like this because... oh no

that's not it.

Rear end: We did it for a lark. Part of a spree. High spirits you
know. Simple as that.

Front end: Nothing more to it...

[All stare.]

Well *actually*... we're on a mission for British

Intellingence, there's a pro-Tsarist Ashanti Chief...

Rear end: No, no.

Front end: No, no, no.

Rear end: No, no we're doing it for an advertisement...

Front end: Ah that's it, forget about the Russians. We're doing an
advert for Tiger Brand Coffee.

Rear end: 'Tiger Brand Coffee is a real treat

Even tigers prefer a cup of it to real meat'.

[Pause.]

Ainsworth: Now look...

Rear end: All right, all right. we are dressed as a tiger because
he had an auntie who did it in 1839 and this is the fiftieth
anniversary.

Front end: No. We're doing it for a bet.

Rear end: God told us to do it.

Front end: To tell the truth, we are completely mad. we are inmates
of a Bengali psychiatric institution and we escaped by making
this skin out of old cereal packets...

Perkins: It doesn't matter.

Ainsworth: What?

Perkins: It doesn't matter why they're dressed as a tiger, have

they got my leg?
Ainsworth: Good thinking. Well have you?

Rear end: Actually!

Ainsworth: Yes.

Rear end: It's because we were thinking of training as taxidermists

and we wanted to get a feel of it from the animal's point of
view.

Ainsworth: Be quiet. Now, look we're just asking you if you have
got this man's leg...

Front end: A wooden leg?

Ainsworth: No, no, a proper leg. Look he was fast asleep and
someone or something came in and removed it.

Front end: Without waking him up?

Ainsworth: Yes.

Front end: I don't believe you.

Rear end: We found the tiger skin in a bicycle shop in Cairo, and
the owner wanted to take it down to Dar Es Salaam.

Ainsworth: Shut up. Now look, have you or have you not got his leg?

Rear end: Yes.

Front end: No. No no no.

Both: No no no no no no. Nope. No.

Ainsworth: Why did you say 'yes'?

Front end: I didn't.

Ainsworth: I'm not talking to you...

Rear end: Er... er...

Ainsworth: Right! Search the thicket.

Front end: Oh come on, I mean do we look like the sort of chaps
who'd creep into a camp at... night, steal into someone's
tent, anaesthetise them, tissue-type them, amputate a leg and
run away with it?

Ainsworth: Search the thicket!

Front end: Oh *leg*! You're looking for a *leg*. Actually I think

there is one in there somewhere. Somebody must have abandoned
it here, knowing you were coming after it, and we stumbled
across it actually and wondered what it was... They'll be
miles away by now and I expect we'll have to take all the
 blame.

[During the last exchange a native turns and leers at the

camera, while the dialogue continues behind him. Then he
unzips his body to reveal a fully dressed white announcer
in dinner jacket and bow tie underneath.]

Zulu announcer: Hallo, good evening and welcome to the Middle of

the Film.

Lady TV presenter: Hallo and welcome to the Middle of the Film. The
moment where we take a break and invite you, the audience, to
join us, the film-makers, in 'Find the Fish'. We're going to
show you a scene from another film and ask you to guess where
the fish is. But if you think you know, don't keep it to
yourselves - YELL OUT - so that all the cinema can hear you.
So here we are with 'Find the Fish'.

THE
MIDDLE
OF THE FILM

FIND THE FISH

Man: I wonder where that fish has gone.

Woman: You did love it so.

You looked after it like a son.

Man: [strangely] And it went wherever I did go.

Woman: Is it in the cupboard?

Audience: Yes! No!

Woman: Wouldn't you like to know.

It was a lovely little fish.

Man: [strangely] And it went wherever I did go.

Man in audience: It's behind the sofa!

[An elephant joins the man and woman.]

Woman: Where can the fish be?

Man in audience: Have you thought of the drawers in the bureau?

Woman: It is a most elusive fish.

Man: [strangely] And it went wherever I did go!

Woman: Oh fishy, fishy, fishy, fish.

Man: Fish, fish, fish, fishy oh!

Woman: Oh fishy, fishy, fishy fish.

Man: [strangely] That went wherever I did go.

First fish: That was terrific!

Second fish: Great!

Third fish: Best bit so far.

Fishes: Yeah! Absolutely... ! Terrific! Yeah!... Fantastic...

Really great

[Whistles 'More'... Pause.]

Fifth fish: They haven't said much about the Meaning of Life so
far, have they...?

First fish: Well, it's been building up to it.

Second fish: Has it?

Fifth fish: yeah, I expect they'll get on to it now.

Third fish: Personally I very much doubt if they're going to say

anything about the Meaning of Life at all.

Fourth fish: Oh, come on... they've got to say something...

Other fishes: ... Bound to... yeah... yeah...

[They swim around a bit.]

Second fish: Not much happening at the moment, is there...?

THE MEANING OF LIFE

-------------------

PART IV

MIDDLE AGE

[A hotel lobby. The lift doors open.]

[Mrs Hendy is bending down in front of Mr Hendy, doing something of

an intimate nature to his camera lens.]

Mr Hendy: Oh that's much better. Thank you honey.

Mrs Hendy: You're welcome.

Mr Hendy: It was sort of misty before. That's fine.

[A strange girl in a crinoline steps forward. This is

M'Lady Joeline. played by Mr Gilliam.]

Joeline: Hi! How are you?

Mr Hendy: We're just fine.

Joeline: So what kind of food you like to eat this evening?

Mr Hendy: Well we sort of like pineapples...

Mrs Hendy: Yeah anything with pineapples in is great for us...

Joeline: Well, how about the Dungeon Room?

Mr Hendy: Oh that sounds fine...

Joeline: Sure is. It's real Hawaiian food served in an authentic

medieval English dungeon atmosphere...

[Suddenly a red hot brand sears the flesh of some poor wretch. This
is the restaurant. Dark, full of torture instruments, stocks,
Chamber of Horrors stuff.]

[They sit down. A waitress dressed in a grotesque travesty of a

Beefeater's outfit, comes up.]

Waitress: Hello, I'm Diana, I'm your waitress for tonight... Where
are you from?

Mr and Mrs Hendy: We're from Room 259.

Mr Hendy: Where are you from?

Waitress: [pointing to kitchen] Oh I'm from the doors over there...

Mr Hendy: Oh.

Mrs Hendy: Great...

Waitress: [reaching across to the central serving table] Iced

Water...

Mrs Hendy: Oh thank you...

Waitress: Coffee...

Mr Hendy: Than you *very* much...

Waitress: Ketchup...

Mr Hendy: Oh lovely... real nice

Waitress: T.V....?

Mr Hendy: Oh... that's fine...

Mrs Hendy: Yeah that's swell

[The Waitress dumps a T.V. down on the table.]

Waitress: Telephone...
Mr Hendy: Er... telephone...?

Waitress: You can phone any other table in the restaurant after
six.

Mr Hendy: Oh that's great...

Mrs Hendy: Some choice...

Mr Hendy: Yeah, right...

Waitress: O.K.... D'you want any food with your meal?

Mr Hendy: Well, what d'you have?

Waitress: Well we have things shaped like this in green or we have

things shaped like that in brown...

Mr Hendy: What d'you think darling?

Mrs Hendy: Well it *is* our anniversary, Marvin...

Mr Hendy: Yeah... what the hell... we'll have a couple of the

things shaped like that in brown, please...

Waitress: O.K. fine... thank you sir... [She writes]... 2 brown

Number 259... and will you be having intercourse tonight...?

Mr Hendy: Er... do we have to decide now...?

Mrs Hendy: Sounds a good idea honey. I mean it sounds swell. I mean
why not?

Mr Hendy: Yeah, right... could be fun...

[Waitress takes out a condom and slaps it on the table.]

Waitress: Compliments of the Super Inn - Have a nice fuck!

Mr Hendy: Oh, thank you.

Waitress: You're welcome...

[She leaves.]

Mr Hendy: [reads:] 'Super Inn Skins' - that's nice.

[Suddenly a Hawaiian band comes through the door and

surrounds Mr and Mrs Hendy at their table, before leaving
them to their own devices, which are not many. There is
a long silence.]

Waiter: Good evening... would you care for something to talk about?

[He hands them each a menu card with a list of subjects

on.]
Mr Hendy: Oh that would be wonderful.

Waiter: Our special tonight is minorities...

Mr Hendy: Oh that sounds interesting...

Mrs Hendy: What's this conversation here...?

Waiter: Oh that's football... you can talk about the Steelers-Bears

game, Saturday... or you could reminisce about really great
World Series -

Mrs Hendy: No... no, no.

Mr Hendy: What's this one here?

Waiter: That's philosophy.

Mrs Hendy: Is that a sport?

Waiter: No it's more of an attempt to construct a viable hypothesis

to explain the Meaning of Life.

[The fish in the tank suddenly prick up their fins.]

Fish: What's he say, eh?

Mr Hendy: Oh that sounds wonderful... Would you like to talk about

the Meaning of Life, darling...?

Mrs Hendy: Sure, why not?

Waiter: Philosophy for two?

Mr Hendy: Right...

Waiter: You folks want me to start you off?

Mr Hendy: Oh really we'd appreciate that...

Waiter: OK. Well er... look, have you ever wondered just why you're
here?

Mr Hendy: Well... we went to Miami last year and California the

year before that, and we've...

Waiter: No, no... I mean why *we're* here. On this planet?

Mr Hendy: [guardedly]... N... n... nope.

Waiter: Right! Have you ever *wanted* to know what it's all about?

Mr Hendy: [emphatically] No!

Waiter: Right ho! Well, see, throughout history there have been
certain men and women who have tried to find the solution to
 the mysteries of existence.

Mrs Hendy: Great.

Waiter: And we call these guys 'philosophers'.

Mrs Hendy: And that's what we're talking about!

Waiter: Right!

Mrs Hendy: That's neat!

Waiter: Well you look like you're getting the idea, so why don't I
give you these conversation cards - they'll tell you a little
about philosophical method, names of famous philosophers...
there y'are. Have a nice conversation!

Mr Hendy: Thank you! Thank you very much.

[He leaves.]

Mrs Hendy: He's cute.

Mr Hendy: Yeah, real understanding.

[They sit and look at the cards, then rather formally and
uncertainly Mrs Hendy opens the conversation.]

Mrs Hendy: Oh! I never knew that *Schopenhauer* was a

*philosopher*...

Mr Hendy: Oh yeah... He's the one that begins with an S.

Mrs Hendy: Oh...

Mr Hendy: ... Um [pause]... like Nietzsche...

Mrs Hendy: Does Nietzsche begin with an S?

Mr Hendy: There's an S in Nietzsche...

Mrs Hendy: Oh wow! Yes there is. Do all philosophers have an S in

them?

Mr Hendy: Yeah I think most of them do.

Mrs Hendy: Oh!... Does that mean Selina Jones is a philosopher?

Mr Hendy: Yeah... Right, she could be... she sings about the
Meaning of Life.

Mrs Hendy: Yeah, that's right, but I don't think she writes her own
material.

Mr Hendy: No. Maybe Schopenhauer writes her material?

Mrs Hendy: No... Burt Bacharach writes is.

Mr Hendy: There's no 'S' in Burt Bacharach...

Mrs Hendy: ... Or in Hal David...

Mr Hendy: Who's Hal David?

Mrs Hendy: He writes the lyrics, Burt just writes the tunes... only
now he's married to Carole Bayer Sager...

Mr Hendy: Oh... Waiter... this conversation isn't very good.

Waiter: Oh, I'm sorry, sir... We *do* have one today that's not on
the menu. It's a sort of... er... speciality of the house.
Live Organ Transplants.

Mrs Hendy: Live Organ Transplants? What's *that*?

THE MEANING OF LIFE

-------------------

PART V

LIVE ORGAN TRANSPLANTS

[A photo of the Emperor Haile Selassie hangs on the wall of a

suburban house. Upstairs 'Hava Nagila' is being played on a lone
violin. The door bell rings.]

Mr Bloke: Don't worry dear, I'll get it!

[He opens the door.]

Mr Bloke: Yes!

First Man: Hello, er can we have your liver...?

Mr Bloke: My what?

First Man: Your liver... it's a large glandular organ in your

abdomen... you know it's a reddish-brown and it's sort of -

Mr Bloke: Yes, I know what it is, but I'm using it.

Second Man: Come on sir... don't muck us about.

[They move in.]

Mr Bloke: Hey!

[They shut the door behind him.]

[The first man makes a grab at his wallet and finds a

card in it.]

First Man: Hallo! What's this then...?

Mr Bloke: A liver donor's card.

First Man: Need we say more?

Second Man: No!

Mr Bloke: Look, I can't give it to you now. It says 'In The Event
of Death'...

First Man: No-one who has ever had their liver taken out by us has
survived...

[The second man is rummaging around in a bag of clanking

tools.]

Second Man: Just lie there, sir. it won't take a minute.

[They throw him onto the dining room table and, without
any more ceremony, start to cut him open. A rather sever
lady appears at the door.]

Mrs Bloke: 'Ere, what's going on?

First man: He's donating his liver, madam...

Mr Bloke: Aarrgh... oh!... aaargh ow! Ow!

Mrs Bloke: Is this because he took out one of those silly cards?

First Man: That's right, madam.

Mr Bloke: Ow! Oooh! Oohh! Oh... oh... God... aargh aargh...

Mrs Bloke: Typical of him. He goes down to the public library -

sees a few signs up... comes home all full of good intentions.
He gives blood... he does cold research... all that sort of
thing.

Mr Bloke: Aaaagh... oh... aaarghh!

Mrs Bloke: What d'you do with them all anyway?

Second man: They all go to saving lives, madam.

Mr Bloke: Aaaaargh! Oh... ow! Oh... oh my God!

Mrs Bloke: That's what *he* used to say... it's all for the good of
the country, he used to say.

Mr Bloke: Aaaargh!... Ow! Ooh!

Mrs Bloke: D'*you* think it's *all* for the good of the country?

First Man: Uh?

Mrs Bloke: D'*you* think it's *all* for the good of the country?
First Man: Well I wouldn't know about that, madam...we're just
doing our jobs, you know...

Mr Bloke: Owwwwweeeeeeeeeh! Ow!

Mrs Bloke: You're not doctors, then?

First Man: Oh!... Blimey no...!

[The second man grins and raises his eyes as he digs

around in the stomach. They laugh. A head comes round the
door... It's a young man.]

Young Man: Mum, Dad,... I'm off out... now. I'll see you about
seven...

Mrs Bloke: Righto, son... look after yourself.

Mr Bloke: Aaargh... ow! Oh... aaargh aargh!

Mrs Bloke: D'you er... fancy a cup of tea...?

First Man: Oh well, that would be very nice, yeah... Thank you,
thank you very much madam. Thank you. [Aside.] I thought she'd
never ask...

[She takes him into the kitchen... shuts the door. She
bustles about preparing the tea...]

You do realise... he has to be... well... dead... by the terms

of the card... before he donates his liver.

Mrs Bloke: Well I told him that... but he never listens to me...
silly man.

First Man: Only... I was wondering what you was thinking of doing
after that... I mean... will you stay on your own or... is
there someone else... sort of... on the horizon...?

Mrs Bloke: I'm too old for that sort of thing. I'm past my prime...

First Man: Not at all... you're a very attractive woman.

Mrs Bloke: [laughs a little] Well... I'm certainly not thinking of

getting hitched up again...

First Man: Sure?

Mrs Bloke: Sure.

First Man: [coming a little closer] Can we have your liver then?

Mrs Bloke: No... I don't want to die.

First Man: Oh come on, it's perfectly natural. Only take a couple
of minutes.
Mrs Bloke: Oh... I'd be scared.

First Man: All right, I'll tell you what. Look, listen to this -

[A man in pink evening dress emerges from the fridge.]

Man in Pink Evening Dress: Whenever life gets you down, Mrs Brown
And things seem hard or tough
And people are stupid obnoxious or daft
And you feel that you've had quite enough...

[As he starts to sing, the wall of the kitchen disintegrates to

reveal a magnificent night sky. The vocalist in pink escorts Mrs
Bloke up into the stars.]

Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving

And revolving at 900 miles an hour,
That's orbiting at 19 miles a second, so it's reckoned,
A sun that is the source of all our power.
The sun and you and me and all the stars that we can see,
Are moving at a million miles a day
In an outer spiral arm, at 40,000 miles an hour,
Of the galaxy we call the Milky Way.

Our galaxy itself contains 100 billion stars

It's 100,000 light years side to side.
It bulges in the middle, 16,000 light years thick
But out by us its just 3,000 light years wide
We're 30,000 light years from galactic central point,
We go round every 200 million years
And our galaxy is only one of millions of billions
In this amazing and expanding Universe.

The Universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding

In all of the directions it can whizz
As fast as it can go, at the speed of light you know,
12 million miles a minute, and that's the fastest speed there
is.
So remember when you're feeling very small and insecure
How amazingly unlikely is your birth
And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space
Because there' bugger all down here on earth.

[The vocalist in pink climbs back into the fridge and the door
slams to.]

Mrs Bloke: Makes you feel so sort of insignificant, doesn't it?

First Man: Yeah yeah... Can we have your liver, then?

Mrs Bloke: Yeah. All right, you talked me into it.

First Man: Eric!

[A lettering artist is just finishing painting the words

'Liver Donors Inc' onto a wall plaque enumerating all the
subsidiaries of the Very Big Corporation of America.]
Chairman: [of the Very Big Corporation of America]... which brings
us once again to the urgent realisation of just how much there
is still left to own. Item 6 on the Agenda, the Meaning of
Life... Now Harry, you've had some thoughts on this...

Harry: That's right, yeah. I've had a team working on this over the
past few weeks, and what we've come up with can be reduced to
two fundamental concepts... One... people are not wearing
enough hats. Two... matter is energy; in the Universe there
are many energy fields which we cannot normally perceive. Some
energies have a spiritual source which act upon a person's
soul. However, this soul does not exist *ab inito*, as
orthodox Christianity teaches; it has to be brought into
existence by a process of guided self-observation. However,
this is rarely achieved owing to man's unique ability to be
distracted from spiritual matters by everyday trivia.

[Pause.]

Max: What was that about hats again?

Harry: Er... people aren't wearing enough.

Chairman: Is this true?

Edmund: [who is sitting next to Harry] Certainly. Hat sales have

increased, but not *pari passu... as our research -

Bert: When you say 'enough', enough for what purpose...?

Gunther: Can I ask with reference to your second point, when you
say souls don't develop because people become distracted...
has anyone noticed that building there before?

[They all turn towards the window to see a building

approaching or sliding into position outside.]

All: Gulp! What? Good Lord!

THE CRIMSON
PERMANENT ASSURANCE

A tale of piracy
on the high seas
of finance

London, England

In the bleak days of 1983, as England languished in the doldrums of

a ruinous monetarist policy, the good and loyal men of the
Permanent Assurance Company - a once-proud family firm recently
fallen an hard times - strained under the yoke of their oppressive
new corporate management...

Pushed beyond the bounds of decent and reasonable victimisation -

the aged retainers take their destiny in their own hands and...
MUTINY!

And so - the Crimson Permanent Assurance was launched upon the high
seas of international finance!

There it lay, the prize they sought - the richest jewel in the
crown of the IMF - a financial district swollen with multi-
nationals, conglomerates and fat, bloated merchant banks.

Hidden behind the faceless towering canyons of glass, the world of

high finance sat smug and self-satisfied as their future, in the
shape of their past, slipped silently through the streets -
returning to wreak a terrible revenge.

Adopting, adapting, and improving traditional business practices

the Permanent Assurance puts into motion an audacious and totally
unsuspected Take Over Bid.

And so, heartened by their initial success, the desperate and

reasonably violent men of the Permanent Assurance battled on,
until... as the sun set slowly in the west the outstanding return
on their bold business venture became apparent... the once proud
financial giants lay in ruins - their assets stripped - their
policies in tatters.

[They sing]

It's fun charter an accountant

And sail the wide accountan-cy,
To find, explore the funds offshore
And skirt the shoals of bankruptcy.

It can be manly in insurance:

We'll up your premium semi-annually,
It's all tax-deductible,
We're fairly incorruptible,
Sailing on the wide accountan-cy!

And so... they sailed off into the ledgers of history - one by one
the financial capitals of the world crumbling under the might of
their business acumen - or so it would have been... if certain
modern theories concerning the shape of the world had not proved to
be... disastrously wrong.

THE MEANING OF LIFE

-------------------

PART VI

THE AUTUMN YEARS

[Elegant restaurant. A man in a dressing gown, who is not Noel

Coward sits at a piano.]

Not Noel Coward: Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Here's a little
number I tossed off recently in the Caribbean. [Sings]
 Isn't it awfully nice to have a penis,
Isn't it frightfully good to have a dong?
It's swell to have a stiffy,
It's divine to own a dick,
From the tiniest little tadger,
To the world's biggest prick.

So three cheers for your Willy or John Thomas,

Hooray for your one-eyed trouser snake,
Your piece of pork, your wife's best friend,
Your Percy or your cock,
You can wrap it up in ribbons,
You can slip it in your sock,
But don't take it out in public,
Or they will stick you in the dock,
And you won't come back.

[Spontaneous applause breaks out all over the restaurant.]

Oh... thank you very much.

Woman: Oh what a frightfully witty song.

[Clapping.]

[Mr Creosote enters.]

First Fish: [in tank] Oh shit! It's Mr creosote.

[All the fish disappear with six flicks of the tail.]

Maitre D: Ah good afternoon, sir, and how are we today?

Mr Creosote: Better...

Maitre D: Better?

Mr Creosote: Better get a bucket, I'm going to throw up.

Maitre D: Gaston! A bucket for monsieur!

[They seat him at his usual table. A gleaming silver

bucket is placed beside him and he leans over and throws
up into it.]

Maitre D: Merci Gaston.

[He claps his hands and the bucket is whisked away.]

Mr Creosote: I haven't finished!

Maitre D: Oh! Pardon! Gaston!... A thousand pardons monsieur. [Puts

the bucket back.]

[The Maitre D produces the menu as Mr Creosote continues

spewing.]
Maitre D: Now this afternoon we monsieur's favourite - the jugged
hare. The hare is *very* high, and the sauce is very rich with
truffles, anchovies, Grand Marnier, bacon and cream.

[Mr Creosote pauses. The Maitre D claps his hands and

signs to Gaston, who whisks away the bucket.]

Maitre D: Thank you, Gaston.

Mr Creosote: There's still more.

[Gaston rapidly replaces the bucket.]

Maitre D: Allow me! A new bucket for monsieur.

[The Maitre D picks the bucket up and hands it over to

Gaston. Mr Creosote leans over and throws up onto the
floor.]

And the cleaning woman.

[Gaston hurries off. The Maitre D takes care to avoid the

vomit and places the menu in front of Mr Creosote.]

And maintenant, would monsieur care for an aperitif?

[Creosote vomits over the menu. It is covered.]

Or would you prefer to order straight away? Today for

appetizers... er... excuse me...

[The Maitre D leans over and wipes away the sick with his
hand so that the words of the menu are readable.]

... moules marinieres, pate de foie gras, beluga caviar, eggs

Benedictine, tart de poireaux - that's leek tart - frogs' legs
amandine or oeufs de caille Richard Shepherd - c'est a dire,
little quails' eggs on a bed of pureed mushrooms, it's very
delicate, very subtle...

Mr Creosote: I'll have the lot.

Maitre D: A wise choice, monsieur! And now, how would you like it
served? All mixed up in a bucket?

Mr Creosote: Yes. With the eggs on top.

Maitre D: But of course, avec les oeufs frites.

Mr Creosote: And don't skimp on the pate.

Maitre D: Oh monsieur I can assure you, just because it is mixed up

with all the other things we would not dream of giving you
less than the full amount. In fact I will personally make sure
you have a *double* helping. Maintenant quelque chose a
boire - something to drink, monsieur?
Mr Creosote: Yeah, six bottles of Chateau Latour '45 and a double
Jeroboam of champagne.

Maitre D: Bon, and the usual brown ales...?

Mr Creosote: Yeah... No wait a minute... I think I can only manage

six crates today.

Maitre D: Tut tut tut! I hope monsieur was not overdoing it last
night...?

Mr Creosote: Shut up!

Maitre D: D'accord. Ah the new bucket and the cleaning woman.

[Gaston arrives. The Cleaning Woman gets down on her

hands and knees. Mr Creosote vomits over her.]

[Some guests at another table start to leave. The

Maitre D approaches.]

Maitre D: Monsieur, is there something wrong with the food?

[The Maitre D indicates the table of half-eaten main

courses. The guests shrink from his vomit-covered hand.
The Maitre D realises and shakes a little off. It hits
another guest, who wipes his eye.]

Guest: No. The food was... excellent...

Maitre D: Perhaps you are not happy with the service?

Guest: Er no... no... no complaints.

Guest's Wife: It's just we have to go - um - I'm having rather a

heavy period.

[A slight embarrassed silence while the rest of the party

look at her.]

Guest: And... we... have a train to catch.

Guest's Wife: [as if covering for her previous gaffe] Oh! Yes!
Yes... of course! We have a train to catch... and I don't want
to start bleeding over the seats.

[An awkward pause. The Maitre D gropes for words.]

Guest: Perhaps we should ne going...

[They start to go. The Maitre D follows.]

Maitre D: Very well, monsieur. Thank you so much, so nice to see

you and I hope very much we will see you again very soon. Au
revoir, monsieur.

[He pauses. A look of awful realization suffuses his

 face.]

Maitre D: ... Oh dear... I've trodden in monsieur's bucket.

[The Maitre D claps his hands.]

Another bucket for monsieur...

[Mr Creosote is sick down the Maitre D's trousers.]

and perhaps a hose...

[Someone at another table gently throws up.]

Companion: Oh Max, really!

[At another table someone else has really thrown up all

over the place. His mother and brother look at him
incredulously. Meanwhile Mr Creosote has scoffed the lot.
The Maitre D approaches him with a silver tray.]

Maitre D: And finally, monsieur, a wafer-thin mint.

Mr Creosote: No.

Maitre D: Oh sir! It's only a tiny little thin one.

Mr Creosote: No. Fuck off - I'm full... [Belches]

Maitre D: Oh sir... it's only *wafer* thin.

Mr Creosote: Look - I couldn't eat another thing. I'm absolutely

stuffed. Bugger off.

Maitre D: Oh sir, just... just *one*...

Mr Creosote: Oh all right. Just one.

Maitre D: Just the one, sir... voila... bon appetit...

[Mr Creosote somehow manages to stuff the wafer-thin mint

into his mouth and then swallows. The Maitre D takes a
flying leap and cowers behind some potted plants. There
is an ominous splitting sound. Mr Creosote looks rather
helpless and then he explodes, covering waiters, diners,
and technicians in a truly horrendous mix of half
digested food, entrails and parts of his body. People
start vomiting.]

Maitre D: [returns to Mr Creosote's table] Thank you, sir, and now

the check.

THE MEANING OF LIFE

___________________

PART VI B
 THE MEANING OF LIFE

[Some time later.]

[The Cleaning Woman is still on her knees, cleaning up the remains

of Mr Creosote. The Maitre D lights up a cigarette in pensive
mood.]

Maitre D: You know, Maria, I sometimes wonder whether we'll ever

discover the meaning of it all working in a place like this.

Maria: [shrugs] Oh, I've worked in worse places... philosophically

speaking.

Maitre D: Really, Maria?

Maria: Yes... I used to work in the Academie Francaise

But it didn't do me any good at all...
And I once worked in the library in the Prado in Madrid,
But it didn't teach me nothing, I recall...
And the Library of Congress, you'd have thought would hold
some key...
But it didn't. And neither did the Bodleian Library.
In the British Museum I hoped to find some clue,
I worked there from 9 till 6 - read every volume through,
But it didn't teach me nothing about Life's mystery...
I just kept getting older, and it got more difficult to see.
Until eventually me eyes went and me arthritis got bad,
And so now I'm cleaning up in here - but I can't really be
sad,
Cause you see I feel that Life's a game
You sometimes win or lose,
And though I may be down right now
At least I don't work for Jews...

[The Maitre D pours the bucket over her head and turns to
the camera looking most upset.]

Maitre D: I'm so sorry... I had no idea we had a racist working

here... I apologise... most sincerely... I mean... where are
you going - I can explain... oh, quel dommage...

[The camera pans off the Maitre D and alights on Gaston,

smoking a cigarette.]

Gaston: As for me... if you want to know what I think... I'll show
you something... come with me...

Maitre D: [out of shot] I was saying that - hallo... hallo...

Gaston: Come on... this way.

[He nods to the camera and walks out of the restaurant

and the camera follows him.]

Voice of Maitre D: I can explain everything.

Gaston: Come on - don't be shy. Mind the stairs... All right. I
think this will help explain.

[He walks through the town.]

Gaston: Come along... Come along... Over here... Come on... Come
on... This way... Come on... Stay by me, uh? Nearly there now.

[Eventually Gaston comes over a hill and nods down to a

little thatched cottage nestling idyllically in a valley.
Smoke rises up from the chimney.]

You see that? That's where I was born. You know, one day, when
I was a little boy, my mother she took me on her knee and she
said: 'Gaston, my son. The world is a beautiful place. You
must go into it, and love everyone, not hate people. You must
try and make everyone happy, and bring peace and contentment
everywhere you go.' And so... I became a waiter...

[There is a rather long pause, while he looks a bit

self-deprecating and nods shyly at the live.]

Well... it's... it's not much of a philosophy, I know...

but... well... fuck you... I can live my own life in my own
way if I want to. Fuck off! Don't come following me!

THE MEANING OF LIFE

-------------------

PART VII

DEATH

Distraught Male Voice: I just can't go on. I'm not good any more,
goodbye... goodbye... aaaargh!... Aaaargh!

[A leaf falls to the ground.]

Distraught Female Voice: Oh my God! What'll I do!? I can't live

without him... I... aaaargh!

[Another leaf falls.]

Distraught Children's Voices: Mummy... Mummy... Mummy... Daddy...

[Two more leaves fall.]

More Distraught Voices: Oh no! Aaaargh!

[All the remaining leaves fall with one accord.]

This man is about to die. In a few moments now he will be killed.

For Arthur Jarrett is a convicted criminal who has been allowed to
choose the manner of his own execution.

Governor: Arthur Charles Herbert Runcie MacAdam Jarrett, you have

 been convicted by twelve good persons and true, of the crime
of first degree making of gratuitous sexist jokes in a moving
picture.

Padre: Ashes to ashes, dust to dust...

[Ingmar Mergman now takes over the direction of the film

and re-invokes one of his greatest triumphs on a low
budget. Bare windswept trees starkly silhouetted against
the... oh you know. Lots of good sound effects, too:
howling wind, howling dogs, howling sabre-toothed field
mice. Suddenly we see the Grim Reaper. He is hooded, in
a black cloak with a sackcloth jock-strap, and bearing...
a scythe.]

[He materializes outside a lowly cottage and strikes the

door with his scythe. Geoffrey, who is Marketing Director
of Uro-Pacific Ltd, opens the door. From inside the house
comes the sound of a dinner party.]

Geoffrey: Yes?

[Pause. The Reaper breathes death-rattlingly.]

Is it about the hedge?

[More breathing.]

Look, I'm awfully sorry but...

Grim Reaper: I am the Grim Reaper.

Geoffrey: I am Death.

Geoffrey: Yes well, the thing is, we've got some people from
America for dinner tonight...

[Geoffrey's wife, Angela is coming to see who is at the

door. She calls:]

Angela: Who is it, darling?

Geoffrey: It's a Mr Death or something... he's come about the

reaping... [To Reaper.] I don't think we need any at the
moment.

Angela: [appearing] Hallo. Well don't leave him hanging around

outside darling, ask him in.

Geoffrey: Darling, I don't think it's quite the moment...

Angela: Do come in, come along in, come and have a drink, do. Come
on...

[She returns to her guests.]

It's one of the little men from the village... Do come in,
 please. This is Howard Katzenberg from Philadelphia...

Katzenberg: Hi.

Angela: And his wife, Debbie.

Debbie: Hallo there.

Angela: And these are the Portland-Smythes, Jeremy and Fiona.

Fiona: Good evening.

Angela: This is Mr Death.

[There is a slightly awkward pause.]

Well do get Mr Death a drink, darling.

[The Grim Reaper looks a little startled.]

Angela: Mr Death is a reaper.

Grim Reaper: The Grim Reaper.

Angela: Hardly surprising in this weather, ha ha ha...

Katzenberg: So you still reap around here do you, Mr Death?

Grim Reaper: I am the Grim Reaper.

Geoffrey: [sotto voce] That's about all he says... [Loudly] There's

your drink, Mr Death.

Angela: Do sit down.

Debbie: We were just talking about some of the awful problems

facing the -

[The Grim Reaper knocks the glass off the table. Startled
silence.]

Angela: Would you prefer white? I'm afraid we don't have any beer.

Jeremy: The Stilton's awfully good.

Grim Reaper: I am not of this world.

[He walks into the middle of the table. There is a sharp

intake of breath all round.]

Geoffrey: Good Lord!

[The penny is beginning to drop.]

Grim Reaper: I am Death.

Debbie: [nervously] Well isn't that extraordinary? We were just

 talking about death only five minutes ago.

Angela: [even more nervously] Yes we were. You know, whether death
is really... the end...

Debbie: As my husband, Howard here, feels... or whether there is...

and one so hates to use words like 'soul' or 'spirit'...

Jeremy: But what *other* words can one use...

Geoffrey: Exactly...

Grim Reaper: You do not understand.

Debbie: Ah no... obviously not...

Katzenberg: Let me tell you something, Mr Death...

Grim Reaper: You do not understand!

Katzenberg: Just one moment. I would like to express on behalf of

everyone here, what a really unique experience this is...

Jeremy: Hear hear.

Angela: Yes, we're *so* delighted that you dropped in, Mr Death...

Katzenberg: Can I finish please...

Debbie: Mr Death... is there an after-life?

Katzenberg: Dear, if you could just wait please a moment...

Angela: Are you sure you wouldn't like some sherry?

Katzenberg: Angela, I'd like just to say at this time...

Grim Reaper: Be quiet!

Katzenberg: Can I just say this at this time, please...

Grim Reaper: Silence!!! I have come for you.

[Pause as this sinks in. Sidelong glance. A stifled

fart.]

Angela: ... You mean to...

Grim Reaper: ... Take you away. That is my purpose. I am Death.

Geoffrey: Well that's cast rather a gloom over the evening hasn't
it?

Katzenberg: I don't see it that way, Geoff. Let me tell you what I
think we're dealing with here, a potentially positive learning
experience...
Grim Reaper: Shut up! Shut up you American. You always talk, you
Americans, you talk and you talk and say 'Let me tell you
something' and 'I just wanna say this', Well you're dead now,
so shut up.

Katzenberg: Dead?

Grim Reaper: Dead.

Angela: All of us??

Grim Reaper: All of you.

Geoffrey: Now look here. You barge in here, quite uninvited, break
glasses and then announce quite casually that we're all dead.
Well I would remind you that you are a guest in this house
and...

[The Grim Reaper pokes him in the eye.]

Grim Reaper: Be quiet! You Englishmen... You're all so fucking

pompous and none of you have got any balls.

Debbie: Can I ask you a question?

Grim Reaper: What?

Debbie: ... How can we all have died at the *same* time?

Grim Reaper: [pointing] The salmon mousse! [They all goggle.]

Geoffrey: [to Angela] Darling, you didn't use tinned salmon did
you?

Angela: [unbelievably embarrassed] I'm most dreadfully

embarrassed...

Grim Reaper: Now, the time has come. Follow... follow me...

[Geoffrey suddenly runs forward with a revolver. He

looses four shots at the Grim Reaper from about three
feet. They pass through him. Pause. Everyone is rather
embarrassed.]

Geoffrey: Sorry... Just... testing... Sorry... [He sits.]

Grim Reaper: Come! [Out of their bodies, spirit forms arise and
follow the Grim Reaper.]

Angela: The fishmonger promised me he'd have some fresh salmon and
he's normally *so* reliable...

Jeremy: Can we bring our glasses?

Fiona: Good idea.

Debbie: Hey I didn't even eat the mousse... [They follow the Grim
 Reaper out of the house.]

Angela: Honestly, darling, I'm so embarrassed... I mean to serve

salmon with botulism at a dinner party is social death...

Jeremy: Shall we take our cars?

Geoffrey: Why not?

[Slightly to the Grim Reaper's surprise, they follow him

up to heaven in a Porsche, a Jensen and a Volvo.]

Grim Reaper: Behold... Paradise!

[Heaven bears a striking resemblance to a Holiday Inn.]

Mr Hendy: I love it here, darling.

Mrs Hendy: Me too, Marvin.

Receptionist: Hello. Welcome to Heaven. Excuse me, could you just

sign here, please sir? Thank you. There's a table for you
through there in the restaurant. For the ladies...

Fiona: [reading the box of chocolates that has been handed to her]
'After Life Mints'.

Receptionist: Happy Christmas.

Debbie: Oh is it Christmas today?

Receptionist: Of course madam, it's Christmas, *every* day, in

Heaven.

Debbie: How about that?

[A restaurant in Heaven. It is full of all the characters

who have died in the film. Plus some of the naked girls,
because... well, we don't have to give a reason, do we?]

Tony Bennett: Good evening ladies and gentlemen, it's truly a real
honourable experience to be here this evening a very wonderful
and emotional moment for all of us, and I'd like to sing a
song for all of you: [sings]

It's Christmas in Heaven: all the children sing

It's Christmas in Heaven

Hark hark those church bells ring'

It's Christmas in Heaven

The snow falls from the sky...

But it's nice and warm and everyone

Looks smart and wears a tie

It's Christmas in Heaven

 There's great films on TV...
'The Sound of Music' *twice* an hour
And 'Jaws' I, II, *and* III

There's gifts for all the family

There' toiletries and trains...

There's Sony Walkman Headphones sets

And the latest video games!

It's Christmas It's Christmas in Heaven

Hip hip hip hip hip hooray
Every single day
Is Christmas Day!

It's Christmas It's Christmas in Heaven

Hip hip hip hip hip hooray
Every single day
Is Christmas Day!'

[But before we get to the end of this chorus the TV set

is switched off and the whole picture collapses into a
little spot and we pull out to find that we have been
watching a TV set in front of the Middle of the Film
lady.]

THE END
OF THE FILM

Lady Presenter: [briskly] Well, that's the End of the Film, now
here's the Meaning of Life.

[An envelope is handed to her. She opens it in a

business-like way.]

Thank you Brigitte. [She reads.]... Well, it's nothing

special. Try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a
good book every now and then, get some walking in and try and
live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds
and nations. And finally, here are some completely gratuitous
pictures of penises to annoy the censors and to hopefully
spark some sort of controversy which it seems is the only way
these days to get the jaded video-sated public off their
fucking arses and back in the sodding cinema. Family
entertainment bollocks! What they want is filth, people doing
things to each other with chainsaws during tupperware parties,
babysitters being stabbed with knitting needles by gay
presidential candidates, vigilante groups strangling chickens,
armed bands of theatre critics exterminating mutant goats -
where's the fun in pictures? Oh well, there we are - here's
the theme music. Goodnight.

CAST IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE

THE MEANING OF LIFE

First Fish Graham Chapman

Second Fish John Cleese
Third Fish Terry Gilliam
Fourth Fish Eric Idle
Fifth Fish Terry Jones
Sixth Fish Michael Palin
Creosotish Man George Silver
Singer
'Meaning of Life' Eric Idle
Mrs Moore Valerie Whittington
First Nurse Judy Loe
Second Nurse Imogen Bickford Smith
First Doctor Graham Chapman
Second Doctor John Cleese
Mr Moore Eric Idle
Administrator Michael Palin
Dad Michael Palin
Mum Terry Jones
Priest Terry Jones
Bride Jennifer Franks
Groom Andrew Maclachlan
Mr Blackitt Graham Chapman
Mrs Blackitt Eric Idle
Martin Luther Terry Jones
Hymie Michael Palin
Mamie Graham Chapman
Daughters Victoria Plum
Anne Rosenfield
Headmaster John Cleese
Chaplain Michael Palin
Wymer Graham Chapman
Biggs Terry Jones
Carter Michael Palin
Watson Eric Idle
Mrs Williams Patricia Quinn
Captain Biggs Terry Jones
Blackitt Eric Idle
Spadger Michael Palin
Walters Terry Gilliam
Sturridge John Cleese
Hordern Graham Chapman
General Graham Chapman
R.S.M. Michael Palin
Atkinson Eric Idle
Coles Graham Chapman
Wycliff Andrew Maclachlan
Pakenham-Walsh Michael Palin
Ainsworth John Cleese
Chadwick Simon Jones
Perkins Eric Idle
Livingstone Graham Chapman
Sergeant Terry Jones
Another Cheery
Cockney Andrew Maclachlan
A Severed Head Mark Holmes
Another Terrible
Casualty Eric Idle
Front End Eric Idle
Rear End Michael Palin
Zulu Announcer Terry Gilliam
Lady Presenter Michael Palin
Man with
Bendy Arms Terry Jones
Woman Graham Chapman
Troll with a Tray Mark Holmes
Mr Hendy Michael Palin
Mrs Hendy Eric Idle
Joeline Terry Gilliam
Waitress Carol Cleveland
Waiter John Cleese
Mr Bloke Terry Gilliam
First Man John Cleese
Second Man Graham Chapman
Mrs Bloke Terry Jones
Young Man Peter Lovstrom
Distinguished
Vocalist in Pink Eric Idle
Noel Coward* Eric Idle
Mr Creosote Terry Jones
Maitre D John Cleese
Gaston Eric Idle
First Guest Graham Chapman
Second Guest Mark Holmes
First Guest's Wife Carol Cleveland
Second Guest's
Wife Angela Mann
Third Guest Andrew Maclachlan
Cleaning Woman Terry Jones
Governor Michael Palin
Arthur Jarrett Graham Chapman
Padre Michael Palin
Grim Reaper John Cleese
Geoffrey Graham Chapman
Angela Eric Idle
Jeremy Simon Jones
Fiona Terry Jones
Katzenberg Terry Gilliam
Debbie Michael Palin
Receptionist Carol Cleveland
Tony Bennett** Graham Chapman

* Not *the* Noel Coward, of course

** Not *the* Tony Bennett, of course

THE CRIMSON PERMANENT ASSURANCE

Starred

Sydney Arnold Cameron Miller

Ross Davidson Paddy Ryan
Eric Francis Eric Stovell
Russell Kilminster Andrew Bicknell
Peter Merrill Tim Doublas
Larry Noble Billy John
John Scott Martin Len Marten
Guy Bertrand Gareth Milne
Myrtle Devenish Leslie Sarony
Matt Frewer Wally Thomas
Peter Mantle

Photographed by Peter Hannan B.S.C.

Edited by Julian Doyle
Production
Designer Harry Lange
Costume Designer Jim Acheson
Choreography Arlene Phillips
Makeup and Hair
Design Maggie Weston
Special Effects
Supervisor George Gibbs
Director of
Photography Roger Pratt
Art Director John Beard
Make-up Artist Elaine Carew
Hairdressers Maureen Stephenson
Sallie Evans
Wardrobe Joyce Stoneman
Music John Du Prez

Transcribed by Jason R. Heimbaugh (jasonh@joker.aiss.uiuc.edu)