All About the Pythons Trivia Quiz

Answer: Terry Gilliam

Terry was born in Minnesota. He moved to New York to work on a satirical magazine called "Help!". When he moved to London, he worked as an illustrator and designer and also did animation. After Monty Python broke up, he continued directing movies such as "The Fisher King" and "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas".

Answer: BBC

The BBC decided on the title "Monty Python's Flying Circus" after John Cleese and the other men were throwing around titles such as "A Horse, a Spoon, and a Basin", "Owl Stretching Time", "The Toad Elevating Moment", "Bunn Wackett, Buzzard Stubble and Boot". The title came from the name of the Red Baron's fighter wing, Flying Circus.

The BBC gave the men free rein over the show. The first episode aired on Sunday, October 5, 1969 with an audience of 320 people.

Answer: Cleveland

Carol Cleveland was brought in to the show half way through the writing process of the first season of "Monty Python's Flying Circus". She was only supposed to air in four episodes, but the Pythons hired her for the entire series. If other women were needed for a sketch they would be hired, but Carol would be the only woman with lines.

Carol was born in the United Kingdom, but grew up in the United States. She returned to England to act and besides "Monty Python's Flying Circus" she has been in several plays and her one-woman show.

Answer: Different

Victor Lownes, head of Playboy UK, put up half of the money for the Monty Pythons to make "And Now For Something Completely Different". The idea was given to John Cleese while he and Victor were having lunch. John took eight weeks of unpaid leave to write the script in an abandoned milk depot in Northern London. He used sketches from season two of "Monty Python's Flying Circus" to make the movie. The Pythons didn't want the movie shown in London because it was sketches they were using from the second season of the series. They wanted the movie to air in America as a way to introduce Americans to Monty Python. It didn't happen.

The title of the movie came from a UK children's show that used "And Now For Something Completely Different" to introduce new segments of the series.

Answer: John Cleese

John Cleese had expressed to the other Pythons that he wanted to leave in season three. The decision came when he realized he wasn't as excited about season three as he was for season one and season two. John agreed to do shoot a few episodes of season three before leaving; however, he ended up filming all of season three.

Answer: Holy Grail

The Pythons considered "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" to be their first real movie. The title was originally "Arthur King". The title and the script were scrapped and a new script was written. Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Jethro Tull, Island Records and Charisma Records all fronted 20,000 to 30,000 pounds each to fund the movie. The rest of the funds came from a movie buff named Michael White.

King Arthur was played by Graham Chapman. "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" took five weeks to film in Scotland. Three castles were chosen for the movie and at the last minute all three choices were scrapped by Scotland's Department of the Environment. Doune Castle was chosen to play three different castles in the movie.

"Monty Python and the Holy Grail" opened on April 1975 with the tagline "Makes Ben-Hur look like an Epic!".

Answer: Radio

American radio stations played Monty Python on the radio first. When listeners wanted to see the people they were listening to, music industry producer and later Python manager Nancy Lewis had "And Now For Something Completely Different" put in movie theaters in 1972. The movie didn't last very long in American theaters.

In 1973, Annie Leibovitz did a photo shoot with the Pythons in San Francisco for "Rolling Stone". When Joey Bishop was host of "The Tonight Show", he introduced the Pythons on the late night program with a less than stellar introduction.

Greg Garrison, a producer of "The Dean Martin Comedy Hour", bought the rights to the Monty Python series. The BBC show was converted from Phase Alternate Lines to National Television Standards Committee for American televisions. The series was released first in Dallas, Texas in 1974 and then went to other cities. "Monty Python's Flying Circus" aired on PBS and outperformed Masterpiece Theater for several weeks.

FYI, a sleazy club in downtown Manhattan called itself "Monty Python's Flying Circus". The club wasn't open long, but the Pythons would get bills from creditors after the club went out of business.

Answer: ABC

In December 1975, the Pythons took ABC television to court to sue them for copyright infringement and unfair competition. Judge Morris Lasker agreed with ABC television that parts of "Monty Python's Flying Circus" should be edited because of images and language. Judge Lasker made the decision after watching the unedited version of "Monty Python's Flying Circus" and then the edited version for American television.

The Pythons took the case to the American Court of Appeals in 1976. They dropped the case after being assured of keeping all rights to the forty-five episodes they created of "Monty Python's Flying Circus".

Answer: True

When the movie came out in theaters it was met with controversy but the Pythons were the first in the UK to make a biblical comedy film. The title was originally "Jesus Christ: Lust for Glory". Each Python read up on the Bible before the making of the movie. The script was written in two weeks while they stayed in Barbados in 1977. The film was shot in Tunisia, North Africa using some of the scenery from the series "Jesus of Nazareth" which is the only way the movie was able to be made with the budget the Python's had acquired. Graham Chapman was chosen to play Brian and Eric Idle wrote the song that was performed during the crucifixion scene. Orion picked up "Monty's Python's Life of Brian" for America distribution.

FYI, when the destroyer HMS Sheffield was hit in May 1982 during the Falklands War the crew sang "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" while waiting to be rescued.

Answer: The Meaning of Life

The final draft of "The Meaning of Life" was written in Jamaica in 1979 and given the title by Eric Idle (the first title was "Monty Python's Fish Film") The movie covers seven stages of man/woman in sketches. It was made after the success of "Monty Python's Life of Brian". Universal bought the rights to the movie on an original song "The Galaxy Song" that Eric wrote for the movie.