New article about Eric Idle [split topic]

[TheMonk]

Interesting new article about Idle:
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-new-yorker-interview/eric-idles-life-of-python

Sounds like he's well and truly fallen out with the rest of them, which is sad.
That Holy Grail sequel he proposed sounds atrocious though. A good thing that never happened.

[madhair60]

hahahaha

[Thosworth]

Interesting new article about Idle:
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-new-yorker-interview/eric-idles-life-of-python

Sounds like he's well and truly fallen out with the rest of them, which is sad.
That Holy Grail sequel he proposed sounds atrocious though. A good thing that never happened.

I have to say I actually ... don't mind the sound of it. Also he sounds relatively reasonable in the rest of the interview. Which is frustrating as I now have to slightly recalibrate here. (Slightly - he was still a massive dick to Innes)

[Ron Maels Moustache]

I'm kind-of coming round to the idea that Cleese might actually be the worst Python, just because of how far he's fallen from being such an incredible comic performer and writer to being such an endlessly bitter, moaning old codger whinging about cancel culture and gladly taking the right-wing shilling.

Idle has always just been Idle, he was always a bit of a dick and in that respect isn't really as disappointing as Cleese's decline into miserable irrelevance.

[Pavlov`s Dog`s Dad`s Dead]

Idle's characteristically reticent about his social life in that piece, isn't he?

[DrGreggles]

hahahaha

With Bald Rick on drums...

[McDead]

Also the punchline to one of the episodes (perhaps the 'bottle' episode of them all in a traffic jam?) is another Eric Idle jolly comic song via their cassette deck. We are supposed to assume that the garage mechanics have composed a comic ditty about what a moaning old codger our hero is and recorded a comic ditty for him. But Eric Idle's voice is so instantly recognisable its impossible to overcome disbelief.

Nah I love that song. "He can bugger off to kingdom come!" Greatly helped by the slow wave of realisation and outrage that crosses Richard Wilson's face as he realises what he's hearing.

I like idle in the modern era, he will never be the nicest python (Palin) or the funniest (Cleese in his prime), but he seems like a good un nowadays. Cleese is the worst of the modern bunch, like RMM says, just a rotten right wing moaning old cunt who has significantly lost his touch.

Did you see the updated taunting Frenchmen sketch he did for GB News? Bloody awful.

[CaledonianGonzo]

I'm kind-of coming round to the idea that Cleese might actually be the worst Python, just because of how far he's fallen from being such an incredible comic performer and writer to being such an endlessly bitter, moaning old codger whinging about cancel culture and gladly taking the right-wing shilling.

Idle has always just been Idle, he was always a bit of a dick and in that respect isn't really as disappointing as Cleese's decline into miserable irrelevance.

Didn't Terry Gilliam get Me Too'd by Ellen Barkin?

Probably makes him the bottom of the running order.

[idunnosomename]

I think its entirely concievable Victor Meldrew pissed off a garage with his dodgy Honda so much they'd go to the length of spending the best part of a day rewriting the words, rehearsing and recording "Bread of Heaven" over the cassette in the car's stereo. Mrs Warboys is only impressed by it after all.

I also thought of Bald Rick for how piss weak The Final Crusade sounds. Fuck me.

[Ron Maels Moustache]

Didn't Terry Gilliam get Me Too'd by Ellen Barkin?

Probably makes him the bottom of the running order.

Oh fuck yeah, I'd forgotten about Gilliam's dodgy behaviour. Plus almost killing people multiple times on the set of Baron Munchausen. Yeah, Cleese gets a reprieve from being The Worst in that case.

[Radicalised Sitcom Writer]

Nuns on the Run was good. As touched upon, great comedic actor.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

Before I read the article I knew he'd start going on about George fucking Harrison again.

[McDead]

I think its entirely concievable Victor Meldrew pissed off a garage with his dodgy Honda so much they'd go to the length of spending the best part of a day rewriting the words, rehearsing and recording "Bread of Heaven" over the cassette in the car's stereo. Mrs Warboys is only impressed by it after all.

I also thought of Bald Rick for how piss weak The Final Crusade sounds. Fuck me.

I can well imagine the gaffer - who, we must assume, is of a musical bent - coming in to the garage with lyrics conjured at the pub the night before, and saying "here lads, remember that sour old tosser who was in here with his Honda last week? I've written a song about him, fancy a sing along?" All it would require is someone with a prankster disposition and a musical ear.

I agree that the main theme is a fucking dirge, however.

[Icehaven]

Before I read the article I knew he'd start going on about George fucking Harrison again.

So that's how he really got cast as Han Solo, I knew it!

[Barry Admin]

Just start a new thread next time please.

[Shaky]

His repeated claim that the Pythons were "never friends" is bizarre given Palin's diaries feature plenty of occasions were they meet up in a non-work capacity over the decades. Not to mention the positive things the others have said about each other over the years. Idle's dismissive attitude says more about his wonky perception of where he sat in the group than anything, and all these musicals, one-man tours, half-arsed ideas, attempted films, reunions etc are blatant attempts to assert himself as THE Python genius. It seems like the second any of the others has tried to do something Python-related (or ajacent) not specifically spear-headed by him, he's refused to have anything to do with it (eg. the new material for their 30th anniversary).

[McDead]

His repeated claim that the Pythons were "never friends" is bizarre given Palin's diaries feature plenty of occasions were they meet up in a non-work capacity over the decades. Not to mention the positive things the others have said about each other over the years. Idle's dismissive attitude says more about his wonky perception of where he sat in the group than anything, and all these musicals, one-man tours, half-arsed ideas, attempted films, reunions etc are blatant attempts to assert himself as THE Python genius. It seems like the second any of the others has tried to do something Python-related (or ajacent) not specifically spear-headed by him, he's refused to have anything to do with it (eg. the new material for their 30th anniversary).

See, now I don't like him again.

I believe they did all have their little cliques, and I'm not sure he was welcome in any of them, which is maybe why he feels that "none" of them were friends. Chapman and Cleese were manifestly pals, likewise Palin and Jones. Gilliam was off in his own little world, as is the wont of cartoonists. Maybe none of them were friends with you, specifically, Eric.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

What's in your basement, Eric?

[Stinky Lomax]

Oh fuck yeah, I'd forgotten about Gilliam's dodgy behaviour. Plus almost killing people multiple times on the set of Baron Munchausen. Yeah, Cleese gets a reprieve from being The Worst in that case.

iirc Gilliam has also said transphobic stuff in the past decade - "well maybe I'll identify as an attack helicopter" type stuff.

[Pranet]

Michael Palin has got an eye for the girls, but he mustn't do that.

Oh aye.

I'm Sir Robin, a friend of the musicians

Really Eric? Any musician in particular you were a friend of?

I dunno, they all have their good and their bad sides. I can't get too worked up over old men having old man opinions. Even Palin has said stuff like "in our day we just had to worry about being funny, now you have to worry about being politically correct".

[McDead]

Yeah, agreed with that @Pranet. It's nice when older people don't slip into reactionary conservativism, but it's pretty rare.

[Glebe]

Interesting, thanks Monk. Yeah it's really quite dispiriting how they seem to have fallen out, although it seems like it's really Idle vs Cleese and Gilliam.

[Peabo Bryson Is Not Dead]

I'm kind-of coming round to the idea that Cleese might actually be the worst Python, just because of how far he's fallen from being such an incredible comic performer and writer to being such an endlessly bitter, moaning old codger whinging about cancel culture and gladly taking the right-wing shilling.

Idle has always just been Idle, he was always a bit of a dick and in that respect isn't really as disappointing as Cleese's decline into miserable irrelevance.

Cleese silly walked so Gervais could jog.

[TheAssassin]

Before I read the article I knew he'd start going on about George fucking Harrison again.

George who?  Harrison who? Don't just dangle first names to us.

[TheAssassin]

So that's how he really got cast as Han Solo, I knew it!

George Lucas

Harrison Ford

all makes sense now

[Kankurette]

He's not as much of a cunt as Gilliam or Cleese, but I'm pretty bitter at how he treated Neil Innes.

[Asclepius]

As an ardent Bonzo-fan I always held that beef with Idle, too. But it's interesting quite how many of the Bonzos had significant beef with Innes, too. More than one of them accused him of sabotaging their own 2006-08 reunion resulting in a split that never healed. "Neil turned weird" as one of them said.

[TheMonk]

That modern day Cleese French taunter sketch. Ugh. But what is more disturbing is the uniformly glowing comments underneath saying he's still got it and the like.

People. They're the worst.

[phantom_power]

He's not as much of a cunt as Gilliam or Cleese, but I'm pretty bitter at how he treated Neil Innes.

I think that makes him worse. Having shitty political opinions of being and old reactionary is one thing but massively fucking over someone who is meant to be your friend is another level of cunt entirely

Oh aye.

Really Eric? Any musician in particular you were a friend of?

I dunno, they all have their good and their bad sides. I can't get too worked up over old men having old man opinions. Even Palin has said stuff like "in our day we just had to worry about being funny, now you have to worry about being politically correct".

I mean, he is right. And there is no inherent judgement attached to that statement. People do have to think about what they say more now, for good reason. It must have been easier when you didn't have to worry about who you might offend

[tribalfusion]

I dunno, they all have their good and their bad sides. I can't get too worked up over old men having old man opinions. Even Palin has said stuff like "in our day we just had to worry about being funny, now you have to worry about being politically correct".

There's a pretty significant difference between saying something relatively mild like what you cite in reference to Palin and stumping for GB News like Cleese or making repeated wildly overblown comments about political correctness, wokeness and the 'problems of white men' like Gilliam:


Terry Gilliam: 'I'm tired of white men being blamed for everything wrong with the world'


https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/terry-gilliam-interview-harvey-weinstein-victims-metoo-race-a9269136.html