Eric Idle in Conversation With Ryan Stiles

Eric Idle one of my idols his list of credits is so long so long but among the highlights in 1969 he co-created Monty Python's Flying Circus he later started with his Python pals and films Monty Python and the Holy Grail and the life of Brian he's written musicals the award-winning Spamalot among them he's appeared on television on stage he's written books and now he has this a really wonderful memoir always look on the bright side of life and I know everybody knows the words to that song right oh thank you his friend and somebody who I also think is absolutely hilarious and wonderful Ryan Stiles joined second city comedy on some of the 1986 Filmore he's on film work and television he's best known for his work on the American and British versions of whose line is it anyway and the role of Lois kanisky on The Drew Carey Show he played herb Melnick on the CBS comedy Two and a Half Men and appeared on the show Drew Carey's improv Ganza and he was born in Seattle put your hands together for Eric Idle and Ryan Stiles and a great evening [Applause] [Applause] I'm gonna fine all right now I'm just plugging in I'm just doing that there this is a little bit of housekeeping we actually have a balcony to that's wonderful that's all right sorry came a little all right well it was fun it was good I wish we had arms yeah I mean not I'm the chairs I mean really nice to be sitting like this I guess the main question I want to ask the start is how's the audio for everybody can you hear honest is it good you want more more audio up please Dave can you go how it's at is that better or up are we at the track high so we can go because otherwise we have to use these darn things and we don't like French television everybody on French television always has microphones if there's a panel of six people they all have microphones because none of them will ever shut up so is that better are you happy with that okay oh the fact that you've picked me to come and do this with you says to me that you really don't know that many people in Seattle I've caught a lot of people to shovel but not as funny as you oh I wondered I've dragged you down from Bellingham which I which shows a very very kind of you I did yeah yeah so I'm very honored that you would come and consent to do this silly evening with me I'm the I should say I'm not a fan but this is gonna look great on their resume so yeah well it's not much number is this it's nothing number five here this is five five yes I've been doing a series of conversations and what I really like about the format is this you get the other guy which is really interesting so instead of like doing a show it's all spontaneous or improvised and then and I like that about then why did we rehearse for three hours for three they sense at all you you dragged me into improvisation world I did yeah about it wasn't my fault though it wasn't no I didn't suggest that about four years ago yeah I think so we were they were at the Moore theater who's live and Jeff Davis said will you come and watch me and I said all right if I must and they were on stage I said don't you dare try and get me on stage and so he's backstage with and he says every time she's really gonna hurt me if I try and bring him on stage and proof says he doesn't scare me and so the he did he dragged me on and it's really to be put on the spot you know you're either complete asshole and have to sit there or you come onstage this is how Eric Idle was dragged under stage okay [Laughter] [Applause] because he hates he hates performing are you but you live in LA right yes okay because I read all kinds of different things were you live in Vermont actually Wikipedia is that Wikipedia should never believe anything did you mean I have never lived in them well now I'm curious about Wikipedia what other false things are on Wikipedia that we don't know about my fourth and fifth marriage never happened never happens I mean three marriages no our money on my second oh I got stuck on my second I wonder what happened to the third day they said well I was no waiting oh you still my daughter from the second marriage is there and I've been with my current wife for 41 years and I'm happy to say she's not here tonight right and you said you fell in love with her at first sight I did actually really it's true absolutely no no that well it happens at first sight though we freaked number one were you drinking yeah I come off a beach in Barbados that very day I flew to New York Lorne Michaels met me and took me to Saturday Night Live and I went to a party and afterwards this young beautiful woman asked me to dance and I danced and after two minutes I was just completely overcome I couldn't speak and I said I'm never gonna leave you and she said you're right and I am I haven't it's 41 years ago Wow was that during the 80s 77 77 with a new work high or drunk well it was a 70 Night Live party say it wasn't you know they did that just to do the show all right well I'm surprised and I'm not you know I don't remember I'm surprised about this book that you remember this much because I don't remember half of my life well I I mean you're you know such detail in this book stuff I would never remember well you went there oh that's true that's true I'd never thought I'd write but I think what happened was when Lily my daughter is here was born at the same time as the computer and so when she was a baby in New York her friend gave me a computer and the great thing about the computers he never forgets so every time I thought something was amusing I write it down or maybe we had a Python meeting and I was always joking the file is under say no more the memoirs of an ex comedian oh yeah and so I had all this stuff which is kind of useful when you go back I rewrote it mainly but it was nice to have that basis of things right to recall were you at her birth yes yeah absolutely I was will you at all your births all your kids birth both of them thinking about everything yeah she was born in Thomas's Hospital in the south of South London and then we moved here when she was about three or four great to River to put her mom's support her through school right okay and of course she was at college at Whitman we in Walla Walla now which is nice very close since how some of our friends are here tonight hello walk I didn't see you before how Tabitha Josh they're all here all her friends are gang she's up for the to meet with them they're nice very nice people what's a very nice City it is a nice city I spend a lot of time here yeah it's much better than you're going to LA after this rule they're not gonna be a very good crowd Millie you know that right now and you just came from the Midwest right and we saw they're a little more conservative there and how did your songs go over there well it went well they were they're happy to show up you know well it it was an April girl which is nice yeah and oh but I was Bob Odenkirk who's was born in Naperville oh it was yeah anyway um maybe watch them now you see no we haven't you know they're in they're in throb just haven't picked song what's that so I do fix fun yes shall we well I'm not going to okay I would love to I might you can't do a quick song yeah now I have to say something because I haven't been in a church since I left school and it sort of scares me a little because I was in the choir do you have a clean soul okay but I'm moving this is not like that I don't have such a thing but I'm getting this is a very quick one I just thought like I thought I'd just see if you this is something I wanted to say and it's very important for me it's a serious this is serious really okay here's a little song it won't take very long it's about the world today and it's something I really need to say selfies they just get on my teach it takes to Marvin out to get that poster go [Applause] so tell those Shelby to type their daddy selfie stick and shove them this is not working either is it check one two two I don't remember I really don't remember no you second city uh yeah but that was later on I think I played a lot of strip clubs and stuff when I did stand-up but seriously yeah like like Cheech and Chong well Tommy Chong was from Vancouver - aha we played a few of the same places yeah thank you about me Eric I haven't got a book out see I was I always said if I ever wrote a book I would have to wait till my mother died because there would be too much I don't want her to know well mine's going quite a while right I'm fairly safe you know I think your relationships blow me away the people that you've known throughout your life and I just Robin of course that you talk about in your book and George Harrison and I can't imagine would be like hanging out with George Harrison I mean what would you guys do in an average day well it was it was it was nice I mean your regular guy you know I mean he was when I met him he was not a Beatle anymore he'd finished being a Beatle but you ever finish being a Beatle well I mean you don't go on the road or he'd stop touring he didn't like it and he hated it all you know being being one of them you know because it's it's sort of an constricting so he had this huge has a huge wonderful house in friar Park in Henley which is like a big gothic was actually bigger than my boarding school and it has a model of the Matterhorn in the garden a huge Matterhorn it has ice caves you could get in little boats and go underneath the waterfalls it's just a magic place built by this eccentric millionaire so Frank crisp in 1880 or something like that so it's like a Victorian Disneyland it was an extraordinary place and he had in it the most amazing studio he built and you know he'd record and he always loved playing and recording and then sometimes you stay in a room and it had every single major Beatle guitar on the wall you know there's every single one you know was amazing there from every era but it was you know he was a fairly regular guy I wasn't he taught Lily to drive about it's all dead on the living on the lawn with her what was that car a smart car he drove all over the lawn teaching Lily to dry really yeah it's like 12 is coming 9:00 sorry yeah that doesn't seem very smart at all does it really did you ever go out and people would recognize you and not him once we were filming the Rutles and I was dressed as Dirk quickly who is the Paul McCartney character and Neil Innes was John Lennon and we will by the famous crossroads on Abbey Road and George came to visit and he was pushed out of the way by someone who came up to us and abscess if we were the real ones you said you know we'll sure we've been here ten years dressed like this you know so yeah you wrote that on your own didn't you in the results I wrote it yeah yeah right but I didn't Neal wrote all the songs I read that I wrote the film and I'm director who was easiest to write with I didn't write with anybody I didn't know I like writing alone really yeah so I don't like tour was that the case with all of you er no Graham Chapman would write with John Cleese and Michael Palin would write with Terry Jones oh really so the to writing blocks and you and me in the middle yeah oh well you never said that personally uh it was quite hard because I had to make all four of them laugh to sell my bits and they was right it was like something ha ha ha ha ha as their friend read it out you know so and I think there was a wonderful moment when George came to visit us on the life of Brian he said how's it going and I said well you know it's kind of hard really to get on camera with Palin and please and he said imagine how hard it was to get studio time with Lennon and McCartney point taken okay I get it that if he put up he put up the money for that right I mean yeah that's he paid and Charlie for the budget of the life of Brian he mortgaged his house well here's the question I have though you say he mortgaged his house wouldn't a Beatle have a lot of money laying around that you don't have to mortgage your house well do you remember the song taxman okay okay I got you okay so he bought his house for 4.5 million dollars and put that all up for the bungees of the life of Brian because he wanted to see the movie which is still the most anybody's ever paid for cinema ticket in history but it still wouldn't have been made I believe with that was the story on that the studio didn't really they were gonna do it and then they found out what it was about and they kind of pulled out of it yeah the English EMI the guy I bought it because he loved it and read it and they made him laugh and then Lou grade who ran the company and his brother read it and said we don't mean nothing to do with this you know I can't do this well then he had a look but George had a production company after that they did Brazil and although it formed a production company called handmade films to make the life of Brian and that was the first film he made and then the second film was Time Bandits right and the last film was nuns on the run sure yeah but Brazil was in there somewhere Brazil was no didn't he do Brazil I don't think no I think a studio did Brazil because they wouldn't release it I think it was Universal Terry Gilliam took an advert in the trade papers and said dear I remember his name when are you gonna release my film Brazil right so yeah it wasn't by hand who is the pain in the ass and the group the guy who just you know always had to be careful around who was the pain in the ass yeah some a catch question or something you know you know we see they were vague it was a very good group actually it was that we got on remarkably well we were all graduates we'd all most of us have been to Oxford or Cambridge apart from the American terry gilliam who had been to Occidental College and you know so he came and joined us but y'all got along well well Dean we don't we would argue but we'd argue about very silly things like whether the chair should be an upright chair or ass it's you know how argue about details of the comedy in the scripts unlike you people we wrote things down and learn them but he rewrote them I mean when you're right when you're right as a pair though I know you say you don't write with people but don't you improvise while you're writing yeah I don't know you break into characters as those characters and I didn't write much like that no no I wrote it I was I was a writer so I just would I tried writing with various people but I never really enjoyed it I didn't like talking to people in the morning I still don't I think you shouldn't now you shouldn't talk to anybody before lunchtime I think it's no no gentlemen would do they have a feeling you would be you would much rather be a world-famous singer than a world-famous coming no no I'd rather be a world-famous retired person oh are you I know what that's like writing because you do all on your own you spend a year writing the sort of biography which I did in France and those places and which is fascinating looking back over your life and trying to make some sense of it and then suddenly it all changes and you suddenly you're on the road and you're on Colbert and you know things like that what would you do if you're retired I'd write I just wouldn't publish for an apartment of the company but I like I like the experience of writing I like getting up first thing in the morning usually before just around dawn wherever I am and then sitting down with a pencil and a pad and just seeing what's in my mind and what comes out but you've done a couple of American series I'm terrible in sitcom why it was I hate it because you have to hit mercs and read lines and oh no because they rewrite it all the bloody time every day you'll come I did two sitcoms and I did hate both of them but every day they'd bring in a different script and so you could never learn it when we did Python we would write it all of the series and then we film bits of it the interlocking bits and then we rehearse for five days and learn it so we knew what we were doing in front of a live audience but in sitcom it's just awful they you know different script is that when you felt that you were kind of the most creative is when you were doing Python around that area time ago it always seems like the people that feel they were the most creative when they were making the least amount of money for some reason oh yeah that's definitely true yeah we were definitely making the least amount of money but um because nobody's controlling you and you're really not we had complete freedom which is very very rare in show business there's always some bloody executive telling you how it should be funny so we were executive free comedy because the BBC were opening up a Sunday night slot they figured that somebody may be staying up after 10:30 when the pubs closed and they were right you know there were people but they didn't want to know what we were doing they just said they trusted John because he'd done the frost report and they just said I'll just go and do 30 and they didn't read it and they didn't bother to come to it and they didn't watch it and there they it was great it's a whole different thing over there it's it's just much easy for one thing in England if you've ever done anything say like Lulu you're always a star there but here if you don't if you don't appear it somewhere for a year and they forget all about you but you're always revered there it seems like you sound a little bitter about I am I am below drew carey's been off the air for 20 years now so so much of show business here everything you know now the streaming and good evening and as you are being streamed so if you're not here with somebody you should be you know just be careful of you which is how you're thinking right now but I mean there's just so much in America it's and sometimes people come from England and they'll say well how do I make myself known you just have to keep going like Billy Connolly you go round and round and you can like Eddie Izzard you have to keep coming back and then the next time there are more people who've told each other and then eventually you sort of achieve critical mass and you in the next video show right yeah yeah but who are the who the people that you can have looked up to when you're growing up and coming up out of that Beyond the Fringe yeah which was a stage show in about 1961 which I went to London to see and it had Peter cook Dudley Moore Jonathan Miller and Alan Bennett's and it was a it was a revue it was a it come out of heaven but the Admiral Festival and they were just so funny and I didn't know you were allowed to be funny about the Queen and the Prime Minister and the army and the church and the Navy and everything you know every institution they just made it so funny that it sort of changed my life and I that's what I wanted to be from then on I got the album and I learned all the sketches like people do and it just I thought oh god this is this is great you can be funny his is there's got to be I mean there's so many scenes but what's the one scene that people just so you so she ate you with the most I mean you know well I suppose it's not really nice because and that's only because when we came to America first in 1973 we just toured Canada and we went down to LA and we did this a night show which was a disaster I totaled is that we we've gone across count Canada and everybody laughed at anything we did they just laughed and laughed at laughs they knew our work backwards and you know one night in Winnipeg the curtain went up and the whole of the front row was dressed as a caterpillar there at the alcohol and the beer as much higher in Canada and you know I don't know why but anyway so we were right you know we were a star II and we went onto the Tonight Show and we were supposed to do 30 minutes material and we went on and it was two of us who going I'll be burying the cats was he dead now but it's not at all a well cats you know they do that screeching and we look to the audience they're like this and we did half an ounce material in 20 minutes we'll have a laugh and then ran outside and rolled about on the grass because there's nothing funnier than people not laughing it's especially if you're used to it that's so it was I'm one of my most abiding memories of that of that trip where was the line that you figured you needed a real woman in the scene as opposed to one of you playing a woman in the scene because you had real women in the scenes no but it was and it was about the fourth show and it was in in the I think Michael maybe I wrote it I wrote it it was called a marriage guidance counselor sketch and please and the the point is that you need a real woman when you're playing a real sex so otherwise it's bizarre you know if it's one of us dressed as it's it's a it's a whole different world but because it was a scene about this mr. pewt it was rather worried about his wife you know she wasn't entirely faithful to him and the my guidance counselor's getting a behind-the to take her clothes off and you know anyway but that doesn't work if it's a guy it has to be a real woman you know who does and so that's when Carol Cleveland came into our lives and she was cast as that yeah and the really the really bizarre thing was it was it was episode two or three I can't remember which but the first four episodes were directed by this guy called John Howard Davis not Ian McNaughton because he was still doing Spike Milligan series and John Howard Davis was famous for being the little boy in David Lean's Oliver Twist please may I have some more and he greatly directed by them the first course is really bizarre isn't it and then he directed to all of Fawlty Towers oh really yeah see now your interest in twelve of those twelve Fawlty Towers right cuz you guys only do like six a year or something six episodes a year two series yes I keep thinking of the scene where John's teaching the class how to have sex on the desk that probably wouldn't have gone over as big if you were the one under John on that either I think you have a real do you remember that one answering the meaning of life oh yeah yeah yeah the point that's the point where you have to use a real woman as opposed do you exactly that's a very good example of why you need to have a real a real female you know I mean there were several of those moments and we would but Carol did you know she was really funny she's still real she's still around she came and we got her in to do the reunion show at o2 in 2014 thank you no sympathy and next year is actually really really sadly and sickly next year is the 50th anniversary of Monty Python 50 years I know it was 1969 October 1969 did you have a hard time convincing the other guys about Spamalot to get that done and was that a big fader it was I'm really looking for the fights and the desire Sam I know the way you're going because you're from a group but actually I was trying to write a musical with Jang Dupree and I had written a musical called behind the back behind the crease which was a musical about cricket so we couldn't bring it here obviously but it was on Radio 4 which is a great place to do a musical because you don't have to do dancing and sets and costumes but it was it was and so we were looking for subjects to do for a musical nice sunny throw the Grail it's actually rather great because not only is it it's like this miniature version of vogner it's like Parsifal you know it's huge heroic quest for the Grail but also you can do it on stage with no horses and to me it seemed that that kept being always about to be a song like I'm not dead yet you know which is clearly was waiting to be a song all the time so I thought well how am I gonna persuade them because they're not easy to convince you know these things and so we I wrote it I wrote it I wrote the checks I wrote the book and then we recorded about four or five songs of which the one they really loved was the song that goes like this which is and they they then all said yes and nobody was more surprised than me and how long separate that's been a while all right it was it opened in Chicago in 2004 and on Broadway in 2000 see it doesn't seem that long ago 14 years yeah no movie is there a movie yeah but it's a movie in the works and you know we're we're we're sort of casting it's at the moment you're casting so you guys each cast an Arthur and you have to you know Hollywood is such a weird bizarre place you'll say something really funny and well and they say oh no no I'm not famous enough and not star enough no it's true I mean I remember I tur in Hollywood before I gave it up like because I got tired of people lying to me at lunch and I I had this film I was developing called the road to Mars and had Robin Williams dan Aykroyd and David Bowie is the robot and they said no no that cast is just not good enough so I turn it into a novel which is yeah it's a way to get back it's a horrible place Hollywood it is how well it is but not to live if you don't have anything to do with the business it's a very agreeable place to live is it really oh yes Ruby if you come from England anyway well you live in a lovely because you live like two houses away from Giroud oh yeah I might drew carey's actually my immediate neighbor is Sasha Baron Cohen and he moved next door because he thought he'd feel comfortable next to me so that was quite nice and then next to him is Drew Carey so I call it comedy corner with a K you know and then it's really it's really bizarre because you have a nap in the garden and suddenly you hear these damn tour buses going by say oh saying them all now I mean that's magical and then they'll go buy a new him doing their borat impersonation I don't think they do drew because he doesn't he's not easy to impersonate is he because though he's done at all but he's looking great he's you know lost a lot of weight and I'm very happy for him because it wasn't looking good for a while we used to refer to him as - an admin that's how big he was barefoot I I been catching his show recently which I'd missed in which you're in not you what the crazy show price is right no pricing right all the Drew Carey Show The Drew Carey Show yeah and that's very funny people you know I don't see a lot of money from that so I don't really care about that soon what's the smallest check you've ever got because some people get in for pennies you should get checks for pounds and shillings from the BBC for repeats of jokes that I when I first started to write professionally I got three and a half guineas a minute for a radio show yeah I read but what's that mean a minute it's like a lawyer isn't it well you for every minutes material they'd pay you three and a half guineas and then they guarantee you three minutes a week so you have a minimum wage and then then when I moved to Tel Aviv easy it was ten and a half guineas a minute for TV that was really good money you don't even know what a Guinea is to you isn't it it's Nagini a pound it's one pound and one shilling what's a punt I mean a punt that's Irish isn't it I punch what's that is that a pelt I don't know he's a pound right an Irish pound yeah but we were a little out here today you know very cosmopolitan audiences Seattle did you ever pass up a job you wish had taken not knowingly no as many I did that I wish I hadn't oh yeah oh yeah sitcoms excuse me I'll ask the question this name one there be some well I done two desperately bad attempts at sitcom the first was called nearly departed which was on NBC and which I play the ghost it was a ripoff of chopper and I think it lasted there were six episodes about which three aired and then the other one I did was in the 90s Brooke Shields asked me to be on suddenly Susan because no she was very lovely lady but the lovely funny man had died in Vegas or as we used to call the show certainly snoozing yeah and it it was it it was desperately unfunny and it was just but she's a lovely lady she's an adorable lady and I met that lovely Kathy Griffin we'd be backstage having a lot of laughs and they dancers they come backstage not just to keep quiet because they were recording comedy fed that kind of felt bad for Kathy with that whole thing that happened with I think it was a monstrous I would not apologize in the first place so well us I have no career like you can put it over I think it was very difficult and she was picked on by the government and pulled off she wasn't allowed to fly anywhere and she was pulled off planes and they gave her a really rough time what are they thinking in London about in England about this the whole thing we got happened in here you mean well I think we had our own problems because we have records it yeah yeah it's all messed up everywhere they hate Trump I really hate him it's just getting worse and worse it system well I escaped to France because I can't take it anymore because you can't get away from it in America it's on everywhere airports and you know everywhere you go it's this rum tum tum tum tum because he's a major wonderful brilliant self publicizing narcissistic Nazi I thought I think not since Joseph Goebbels has anybody been that effective at propaganda because he keeps moving the dice on me one week he's being laughed out at the UN then the next day he's got something else you know he just keeps getting you annoyed and so I decided I took a decision this year to just go away and not listen about him because I think he needs that in these data so what is it about people that the people that support him they just can't see this I don't understand how you can't see that well otherwise they wouldn't be in power I mean it's true the only way of Republicans can be in power is if they cheat it's true because they're in a minority I don't you know it's it's their dilemma what will they do but the last seven or eight elections they've been in the minority with of the of the vote and you know so some people want power and so they make compromises with the devil in which case you know that sort of explains Lindsey Graham I think I think I don't know any other titles that you thought maybe you were gonna use for that for this book I think I was used to college say no more because I thought that's a nice title you know I actually I wanted that on my tombstone and then I thought my next thought was no I'd rather have I'd like a second opinion and then Billy Connolly he's wonderful he had wanted on his tombstone carved very small letters ouch you're standing on my balls [Laughter] did did this the song was it written before you did the crucifixion scene or there was a something that kind of came to you half way through it or no it was during the writing of the life of Brian and we were sort of you know we were occasionally we'd all write together especially on the film's you have to do that and we realize that all our characters were heading for crucifixion how the heck will we're gonna end the movie and so I said well clearly we have to end with a song I said yeah yeah but it has to be you could be on the crosses but it has to be ridiculously cheering stupidly optimistic something like looking on the bright side and I said it then it should have a whistle like a Disney song they said yeah that's it we can all go home now and they put it in the script of school I'm looking on the bright side and I went home and I wrote it when I got home and about 20 minutes and I how many times how many times you have to do that before you get through it what do you mean before you say I mean as soon as the whistling started do you think you'd be breaking up on that in the film yeah I mean when you shooting it I'm you shooting it you're you know it's months later maybe a year later and you stuck somewhere down in Tunisia it's rather cold I don't complain about being crucified but you know it's actually I do think it's quite it was very interesting everybody it's very philosophical because three days being sort of in the didn't have nails you know obviously but we had little bicycle seats and there was 34 of us up on the crosses and only three ladders Oh No so if you needed to pee between takes you had a shout and scream desperately yeah because there's no there was no luxury it's very I I think it's quite interesting it was very interesting because you know you have to be kind of philosophical I think this is what it's like you know it's it's quite I think it's quite good I thought it was very instructional I Finn just a perspective when you when you do that and we were very careful about people accuses just being blasphemous oh it's not true we we'd all been grown up in in churches like this at school I had to go to church from the age of seven twice on Sundays every Sunday and so I must have heard the Bible which I loved the skits and James the King James Bible at least three or four times read aloud so this lovely language of Shakespearean language is coming at you and I love being in the choir I love singing and learning how to read dots and we gonna sing in Lichfield Cathedral with other mass choir so I really enjoyed that and so when we were decided where we were it came from a very bad thing I said not for the first time we were opening a Holy Grail in New York and Sammy said what is your next film going to be and I said Jesus Christ lust for glory and and then when we got back to England John said actually it's very interesting that's a very interesting subject to deal with because nobody's ever treated it with comedy you know and it's true so if we treated it very seriously we spent about a month and a half reading the Dead Sea Scrolls and what's it calling can have you know what the other books that didn't make it in which are very fascinating some of the tales of the resurrection extraor there's like 18 foot people angels' outside you know with rolling aside stones and these so I mean the Bible's a library it's been selected by people over the years and so these were passages that didn't make it but one thing we agreed right at the beginning is we you wouldn't make fun of Jesus Christ because everything he says is good I mean almost everything like the Beatitudes he wants people to be look be kind and forgiving to people feed the poor heal the sick everything is everything he says you can't possibly quarrel with you can't get comedy out of it and so that meant that we then focused on the followers and churches which of course run by human beings and betray the same failing so there must have been protests on that there were protests when it opened but mainly by people who didn't see the film thought it was going to be just mocking religion which he thanks she isn't because Jesus Christ is in the film twice once at his birth when we make it very clear that the wise men have gone to the wrong stable and it's a manda stable I'll keep them and that the bones if they go next door and this is Brian being born and and also then again you move forward in time and there's the Sermon on the Mount and this Ken collie you're giving the sermon on the mount or then you pull right back to the back of the crown said I think he said blessed are the cheese makers which is clearly before we have microphones you gotta know this on what you wanna do another song let's save it out are you gonna say that audience question sure I mean that's yeah have you like oh I already asked you that well how are the it was the planning for Spamalot the movie coming I guess I should have looked at that before him we who should play author who do you think God so what who should play Arthur who why did you say that he said Ben Gazzara absolutely there you know that's gonna be somebody like they're gonna make the wrong choice it's gonna be like you know Seth Rogen or someone or you know you know that you know who they're gonna try to cast in this yes I do that's what I love about England too another thing they could care less what you look like on television over there they deal with the talent first and then looks at secondary where here they just they don't really care they just put on attractive people who came act I now again I'm really bitter that I haven't worked in a long time I remember being shocked and watching Canadian television and there were old people reading the news oh yeah you know who look like regular poke with regular names they weren't probably taking the mountains and you know oceans Johnny ocean yeah stormy do you write the words in the music to the lumber who asked that if they wrote the words and music to the Lumberjacks oh no someone must have I did not Michael Palin and Terry Jones wrote that and the music was written by somebody else was George was George Harrison in one of those shots as a lumberjack George Harrison came when we play city center in New York in about 1975 George came on stage as one of the lumber jazz one of the Mounties one night and it was just brilliant he was just you know there he was and they were saying and they know fast no attention nobody noticed this was great and he loved it and then Harry Nielson heard about this and he was gonna appear he had to come on stage and Harry Nilsson you know it was rarely so rarely sober so he would they dressed him up and he came on with dark glasses and he was pierced indeed he lurched about the stage and attracted all the attention and we told him when the curtain fought you just step back curtain will fall when we come forward and take it about and so we we finished the song and then we looked around and where's Harry and he'd gone forward to greet the audience of great cheers fallen off the stage into the pit and broke his wrist so some of the you know crew members laughed a little at that I think a lot of people may have the wrong impression about George just because he didn't you never see a lot of stuff about him smiling or laughing there he never stopped laughing but you don't you didn't really see that with George well you mean you did yeah no that's nice but I mean people I'm a people are amazed when I said I was a good friends with David Bowie and you'd love to laugh he just was all the time he laughed all the time and we would improvise gay dresses oh I love what you're wearing oh just where did you get that sure from it really this is a body really well so we didn't provide these really annoying characters all the time on holiday but your George never masturbated while I'm next to each other anything like that I think everybody was waiting for me to ask that to be perfectly candid George told me that went on but they were 14 or 15 you know which boys don't do that before I don't know I don't really remember doing well it was clearly before they had anybody else to do it for them and they were 16 they're playing in Hamburg so and by the way who cares well clearly I don't know what was he selling his album right yes let me speak it would be a bit honest I think a bit too honest yeah yep all right blink once was the fish slapping dance the first Python segment to be filmed no but it's once when we were all asked to select our favourite bits of Python we all selected our own favorite sketches and quite interestingly nobody chose the same sketches at all in our like an hour's material but everybody chose the fish slapping dance so all our best herbs we'll start with the fish snapping dance which is is there is there a scene that you just did not want to do that you still had to do when I go crap we have to do that again that kind of thing no there was there was a sketch that I wrote that got cut very early in the BBC hated it and John collaborated with them and so because he found it disgusting and repulsive and when we went on tour about two years ago recently I made him do it every night and it was it was very simple it was a wine tasting sketch when the guy would hand me a glass of wine and I go hmm hmm oh yes no this is that this is a Riesling grape it's from the south side of the hill very sandy soil and I would say it was a Sancerre no sir it is wewe try this one mmm oh yes one there's no mistaking this it's a burgundy grape it's clearly it's clearly from the Beaujolais no suit is we we that was the length of the sketch it just just descended from there you made him do it you made him do it every day I made him do it every night on stage and it would get laughs oh I can't performers just refuse to do it because you just can't do it right you have to do it what why why couldn't if John said well I'm not gonna do it well I think he found it disgusting in 1969 so he just wanted to do it well he did one that he didn't want it on the TV show oh yeah what and I'm kind of curious about this what would be the the ideal idol day it starts in the morning I well I like to get up early no no coffee any morphine I do tea but first of all I drink about a big bottle of water because somebody once told me that if you drink water you've dehydrated at night and it puts water into your lungs and that creates oxygen which goes straight to your brain and wakes you up and I found that a very water in your lows the lungs get you are dehydrated young you don't like them with water they produce oxide on't think this is frayed hearing well you come from a coffee drinking nation that drink thousands all this a coffee it's been maddened by the radio and drives to work tell an asshole to go ahead then I drink tea and I have different teas throughout the day and I start off with lapsang souchong which is a giant smoky chinese tea which is a bit like tea and a cigarette and then I move through the day I love you a veggie or anything like that I don't eat meat and how don't eat meat no and not since 1977 really really so what's the rule on your eyes is that eyes or no III think our own species no mammals oh so I hate fish oh you don't persecute Aryan yeah okay that happened in 1977 well that's not before it was popular is it popular yes sir is there an exercise regimen I we do pool exercises so we're in LA so we have those wings or the little fairy and things yeah it's very healthy and the pool is really good I mean Swimming's one of the reasons I moved to LA so I like to swim I think it's really great for your body to falter yeah I used to do those exercises in the pool and you feel like you're cheating a bit because you're not really you know you're doing this well I suppose social she should hope people come and visit and they all do it together seconds and she plays music so it's been very nice it's good fun but you feel it healthy you're feeling good not bad you still writing everything every day I more not on the road no wait you still like being on the road yeah yeah it's that it's the packing and unpacking of the suitcases and the traveling it's the I learned that very early I did the tour of the USA in about 2000 and getting on planes was was what not quite as bad as it is now but then in 2003 I found this one of the things all the tour bus which is fabulous and we went from Boston 15,000 mile across America stopping every night to do a show in these wonderful old theaters and I really enjoyed that because you you're you know you were living in inside the bus yeah it's kind of fun but you really have to trust the driver yeah well our driver was called English oh really yeah so we trusted him and it's just it's just bad food and it's just it's horrible it really is you don't eat it yeah well I have this big the back room is fantastic you have your own bathroom you know and LU and then big beautiful music speakers and we would drive through Vermont we need to go through Vermont sin although the tour bus is great yeah but there's other ones where you're gonna bail or a car when I went with Cleese it was even better we got a tour bus and we'd stay in Four Seasons and then have the tour bus so we could nap between sleeping in Four Seasons we were all day circumcised day I knew there was gonna be something I just didn't know what I was gonna all right your favorite non oh that's an interesting question your favorite non Python music piece well I mean I think here comes the Sun is Rob would probably be one of my favorite pieces and they're in 1976 they sent Voyager 1 and 2 out into space and they put the sounds of the earth on a I think it was a mercy the gold disc and it's still just leaving the solar system actually and on that they had all the sounds of the earth and they wanted to put a Beatles song here comes the Sun on it and Lou greige the publisher said no they couldn't have the copyright in two million years somebody may get seen to sit except that but at least you didn't give the rights away I guess the jog to My Sweet Lord it's the best song the jog to yeah it really is it's just got the right beat for jogging and it's such a happy song I don't know why I'm thinking this question because it really has nothing to do with anything but to Sir with love did you cry when Lulu saying at the end to Sir with love I'm not just any tears what's the last move you cried I don't really remember that movies much you don't go to but I don't go to movie theaters though I I did I went to see the Paul Feig film what was it called a simple favor which I very much enjoyed very good what's all that yeah yeah I miss drive-ins did you have to hurry you didn't have drive-ins in Britain did you hmm driving driving movies no oh they're fantastic they're fantastic I know I heard about them but have you have seen the English weather what's on there you know I have to help the windscreen wipers on all the bloody time yeah but if you went to see twister or something would just add more to it remember about dating well it's very American I guess very American and I think it's for more like southern and you have to have been in a nice warm climate great duuude a lot of Indian Indian yeah I don't know why I'm asking these odd questions hurry because it's good for a lot of edgy dishes I like Indian food yeah I'm just trying to get you are you hungry are you some say we should go to dinner I've got the questions about because I'm getting older now and I've got a lot of questions about stuff like that yeah I'm skin skin tags and things like that because I find things in my body every day that I'm where did that come from you know I know well the bunny just turned into a rather repellent thing you have to carry around yeah right yeah I'll go weeks without looking at my penis weeks I've been used without looking at your penis but you had you were you were quite the player where you Bjelica so according to the book you were you wrote you were yeah I mean we we have our naughty time so we were on the road you know in Canada and then Canadian girls were very very agreeable and now why do you think that is that Canadian girls were big well we hadn't got to America yet that's the North American female generally yeah so they were they were nice and friendly and you know welcoming and we were young and stupid and yeah what did you think you really grow up at for men yeah I do they ever grow up yes yeah we do you know about in the mid thirties you should be growing up a bit yeah but otherwise you know I used to say the brain has has two organs which is the the brain and the penis and only enough blood to run one at a time that's my problem okay I've just been thinking too about okay if you needed help oh that's that's a horrible question if you needed help burying a dead body which member of the Python group would you ask to help and why well Cleese because he could dig better than anybody else had anyone ask questions come on people are gonna have a drink but we did used to talk about when we were filming hours on filming we play a game but if that we are we were in a plane and we went down in the Andes what water would we eat everybody in oh yeah yeah yeah and we decided well first the first choice was Graham because he's always late he never showed up but who would you know so we'd miss him least but it would be the most tender you think then we and then we decide well Graham got a pass because he was a it was a doctor so we'd know how to cut the body up properly so you know right so then we chose John Cleese because his body would last longer wouldn't have to kill anybody before then yeah but that would be stringing a lot of tendons and you want someone flesh on him now is there yeah does he take care of the questions we took you and I are not sure and every night some you say how pregnant are you oh I wouldn't read them out oh you never read whatever not they no not me though this is the most played song at funerals and Britain isn't it they always look on the bright side it's been the number one song song of British funerals since 2004 and thank you no it's good and it replaced it replaced my way I'm sorry I'm rather I'm rather proud I really will sing at British funerals yes really they sing always look on the bright side all the time they do absolutely it's sort of helps have you thought in this you have many years left on this earth but but when you do go are you gonna get cremated or what do you give it because I know what I'm doing and I think I think Hunter Thompson had the best thing where they put his ashes and fireworks and set off fireworks that make that's all because Graham Chapman did that they said oh did he really yeah they said she's actually up into space I don't really care because it's not really you at that point right you know it's just and I do think that there's something in reincarnation because all your carbon atoms get recycled into something else so I'd like to be reincarnated as a test line so my wife can still drive me you know so but you'd have to be so quiet all the time you wouldn't be able to you know I doesn't hear very noisy after death are you I suppose not chewing but afterwards all right oh please update us on the rattles please update us on the Rutles remember the Rutles yeah that was a it was a Beatle parody and I shoot one of my favourite things I ever did was in about 2003 ish I did a sequel it was cool all you need is cash the original in 1977 and then in that in 2000 I did one called can't buy me lunch where is my dress as the interviewer and went around and interviewed very famous people about the influence of the Rutles on their lives so I go to some like Tom Hanks and I'd question him about the ruffles and they and Salman Rushdie people like that they they talk very interestingly and Hanks cried you know he tears ran down his face as he remember the Rutles breaking up she's that actually rather wonderful and then that my but my favorite was Garry Shandling and I went and he said I said well what do you think of a hard day's rut he said a hard day's rut I loved a hard day I loved a hard day's ride I loved it that the train came in and then that the train came in and then the Nazis came he said I'm having a little bit of trouble confusing hard days wrought with Schindler's List now oh no no that buster I bet Paul's the one who hated that right pal Paul was a little when they saw it when we met him in the park my wife and I and he was walking with Linda and they said they were all we're not sure we're talking to you after the screening in England and then but Linda loved it oh she absolutely did because she liked all that send up a Paul John John was okay with it John I heard that he and Yoko absolutely adored it and wanted to go down to SNL to appear on it and and then George of course helped me do it he showed me this film they never released called the long and winding road which said put together all their footage but none of them could ever agree on the final cut and it eventually in the 90s became anthology all those bits and pieces so my film of the Rutles is actually a parody of a film that was never released yeah did you have to take any you never thought they might sue you on that or anything you're the ones Beatles might get pissed off and see you on that or something George help me he's in it he's into being Michael Palin who plays Derek Taylor you know know about Apple so just the first kind of fake documentary could have the first mockumentary ever made yes it was so it was on NBC and so it's before spinal tap and it's before zelich so yeah now that was that written to or was that because I know spinal tap a lot of that was improvised did you improvise a lot of the Rutles or did you guys stick to the script then that was it in Python yeah pretty much so yes yeah I can only remember one time and ad-lib got in and that was in Holy Grail when I'm we're in the mud village and the Kings just come by and I said I said that was a king you should add you know I said he hasn't got all over him that was actually the very few ad-libs of Python okay well what's your most what's your most fond memory of George Harrison I don't know I mean um hmm he was he was a very good friend he was my friend since 1975 until he died and I was there at the end you know he I would go and visit him on his deathbed and transfer him up but he wasn't what was interesting to me is that we only ever disagreed on religion and so all the other thing we have we talked all night and all day but only and but he was hid I think it was born a Catholic and he became Hindu and so when he was on his deathbed he was very happy because he felt he wasn't going to have to face rebirth was I do anything for it I mean so III mean that I that to me was a very sanitary and he would always talk about they were the biggest things in the world and the biggest and most popular but it didn't matter everybody has to die so you had to come to terms with your own death and he began preparing for that in the in the late 70s so he was very comfortable with it and it was a lesson I took to heart they say you got to share that as a you know I mean Robbins I mean that you know that one really hit me I mean it was just like yeah blue such a sweet move a very very sweet man and sound and unexpected and and he did have this Lewy bodies disease thing which was not diagnosed and only happened they only found it out at the autopsy but where'd you meet him I met Robin in in England in London in 1980 where at the comic strip and he was just a force of nature I never seen anything like it I mean he was like it's like as if Einstein decided to do stand-up you know he was so brilliant I mean I just couldn't believe him and then I I would we became friends and I would follow him around in San Francisco and in clubs and he would just go on and on and it's just amazing there's a me it's funny cuz he was kind of if you are alone with him in a room he's completely different than if one other person came in then he had to perform if there was more than you know but he had to trust you to be unfunny right the jeans until you got to know him he would insist on being funny but then when you finally got to know him he would stop having to be funny you feel that pressure and he never had an entourage and he just always came into a room by himself very sweet very normal an unlovely man yeah yeah it was a shame they're really horrible Dave well let's choose everybody yep yep that's why I saved it for the end well this this should cheer them up what's the worst place you've ever been to the worst place yes the worst place yeah you never went back to could you travel yeah no is it Michael that travels a lot yeah get along with Michael yeah okay yeah I mean I mean he's Mike was very nice she's very lovely he's very sweet he's known as he's a sort of annoys him he's known as a very nice man and occasionally I'm mistaken for him when I'm travelling around and then when I am I would say yes I am Michael Palin now off you ugly old bastard but without question the worst place I ever was at was Wolverhampton for 12 years where Wolverhampton is in the middle of England England is the worst place you've been to and and it was just a really grim and awful places it's not quite the end of the world but you can see it from there and where is heaven for you where is the probably France yes I do love Provence can you speak French I speak French enough to annoy them can you say can you say my shoe is not tender today could you say my shoe is not tender to guess Machel sure ship battledore jude wield it still sounds sexy doesn't it it still sounds good okay did you ever have to say that to somebody well you see you don't mind flying or anything then I don't my flying no no I love get nervous soon and the flying so I mean you know it's less good nowadays we have to take these shoes off breno but I've gone to the age now I don't have to take my shoes off it's the only known advantage of being over 75 you don't have to take your shoes off at the airport I don't know why why is that I don't know why well I guess you have you presume they say takes them to wrong you know at this age you know alright just go through are you wearing pants excuse me are you wearing pants now no do you want to sing should we change we can stop with a shot yeah for us [Applause] [Music] all right and Yuri let's see if we can join in if anybody knows it this is the Brutus for loss of a son they all involve the Hulk or Bruce the Philosopher's it goes like hey man you can't was a real person who's very very stable Heidegger I'd beggar was a boozy beggar David could happen soon so Stein was a Barry swine who was just this lush they Slagle there's nothing Nietzsche couldn't teacher about the raising of the wrist Socrates himself was permanently pissed John Stuart Mill of his own free will on half a partner Shandy was particularly ill later they say sticking away Martha plainer whiskey every day Aristotle Aristotle was a bugger for the bottle Hobbes was fun though his trend and rainy day cart was a drunken fart I drink therefore I am yes Socrates himself is particularly missed little think about a bugger when he's peace [Applause] we should we should close with that with the with the song from the book but first I'd like to thank Ryan Stiles for being so kind [Applause] some things in life are bad I could really make you mad other things just make you swear and curse when you're chewing on life's gristle give or whistle and this will help things turn out for the best if life seems jolly rotten and that's to laugh and smile and dance and sing when you're feeling in the dumps forget about the trumps a purse your lips and whistle that's the thing [Music] guys look on the bright side of death adjust be true your terminal breath his life's a piece of when you look at it life's a laugh and deaths a joke it you see it's your shadow keep popping as you go just remember the last love is on you [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Channel: ubookstore

Views: 65,601

Rating: 4.7257681 out of 5

Keywords: Eric Idle, Monty Python, Spamalot

Id: zP5cIAf3y_k

Length: 73min 12sec (4392 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 10 2018