by Monty Python
As featured in the Flying Circus TV Show - Episode 20
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The cast:
MICHAEL MILES
John Cleese
HOSTESS
Graham Chapman
WOMAN
Terry Jones
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The sketch:
(A simple 'Take Your Pick' style set with Michael Miles grinning type monster standing at centre of it.)
Michael Miles: And could we have the next contender, please? (a pepperpot walks out into the set towards Michael Miles) Ha ha ha... Good evening, madam, and your name is?
Woman: Yes, yes;
Michael Miles: And what's your name?
Woman: I go to church regularly.
Michael Miles: Jolly good, I see, and which prize do you have particular eyes on this evening?
Woman: I'd like the blow on the head.
Michael Miles: The blow on the head.
Woman: Just there.
Michael Miles: Jolly good. Well your first question for the blow on the head this evening is: what great opponent of Cartesian dualism resists the reduction of psychological phenomena to physical states?
Woman: I don't know that!
Michael Miles: Well, have a guess.
Woman: Henri Bergson.
Michael Miles: Is the correct answer!
Woman: Ooh, that was lucky. I never even heard of him.
Michael Miles: Jolly good.
Woman: I don't like darkies.
Michael Miles: Ha ha ha. Who does! And now your second question for the blow on the head is: what is the main food that penguins eat?
Woman: Pork luncheon meat.
Michael Miles: No.
Woman: Spam?
Michael Miles: No, no, no. What do penguins eat? Penguins.
Woman: Penguins?
Michael Miles: Yes.
Woman: I hate penguins.
Michael Miles: No, no, no.
Woman: They eat themselves.
Michael Miles: No, no, what do penguins eat?
Woman: Horses! ... Armchairs!
Michael Miles: No, no, no. What do penguins eat?
Woman: Oh, penguins.
Michael Miles: Penguins.
Woman: Cannelloni.
Michael Miles: No.
Woman: Lasagna, moussaka, lobster thermidor, escalopes de veau a l'estragon avec endives gratineed with cheese.
Michael Miles: No, no, no, no. I'll give you a clue. (mimes a fish swimming)
Woman: Ah! Brian Close.
Michael Miles: No. no.
Woman: Brian Inglis, Brian Johnson, Bryan Forbes.
Michael Miles: No, no!
Woman: Nanette Newman.
Michael Miles: No. What swims in the sea and gets caught in nets?
Woman: Henri Bergson.
Michael Miles: No.
Woman: Goats. Underwater goats with snorkels and flippers.
Michael Miles: No, no.
Woman: A buffalo with an aqualung.
Michael Miles: No, no.
Woman: Reginald Maudling.
Michael Miles: Yes, that's near enough. I'll give you that. Right, now, Mrs Scum, you have won your prize, do you still want the blow on the head?
Woman: Yes, yes.
Michael Miles: I'll offer you a poke in the eye.
Woman: No! I want a blow on the head.
Michael Miles: A punch in the throat.
Woman: No.
Michael Miles: All fight then, a kick in the kneecap.
Woman: No.
Michael Miles: Mrs Scum, I'm offering you a boot in the teeth and a dagger up the strap.
Woman: Er...
Voices: Blow on the headl Take the blow on the head!
Woman: No, no. I'll take the blow on the head.
Michael Miles: Very well then, Mrs Scum, you have won tonight's star prize, the blow on the head.
(He strkes her on head with an enormous mallet and she falls unconscious. A sexily dressed hostess in the background strikes a small gong. The three bishops rush in and jump on her.)
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Trailer
As featured in the Flying Circus TV Show - Episode 21
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The sketch:
(BBC 2 World symbol.)
Voice Over (Eric Idle): Here is a preview of some of the programmes you'll be able to see coming shortly on BBC Television. To kick off with there's variety ... (still picture of Peter West and Brian Johnston) Peter West and Brian Johnston star in 'Rain Stopped Play', a whacky new comedy series about the gay exploits of two television cricket commentators (photo of E. W. Swanton) with E. W. Swanton as Aggie the kooky Scots maid. For those of you who don't like variety, there's variety, with Brian Close at the Talk of the Town. (Brian Close in cricket whites on a stage) And of course there'll be sport. The Classics series (engraving of London and caption: 'The Classics) return to BBC 2 with twenty-six episodes of John Galsworthy's 'Snooker My Way' (composite photo of Nyree Dawn Porter holding a snooker cue) with Nyree Dawn Porter repeating her triumph as Joe Davis. And of course there'll be sport. Comedy is not forgotten (Caption: 'Comedy) with Jim Laker (photo of Laker) in 'Thirteen Weeks of Off-spin Bowling'. Jim plays the zany bachelor bowler in a new series of 'Owzat', with Anneley Brummond-Haye on Mr Softee (photo of same) as his wife. And of course there'll be sport. 'Panorama' will be returning, introduced ('Panorama' caption with photo of Tony Jacklin) as usual by Tony Jacklin, and Lulu (photo of Lulu) will be tackling the Old Man of Hoy (photo of same). And for those of you who prefer drama - there's sport. On 'Show of the Week' Kenneth Wostenholme sings. (still of him, superimposed over Flick Colby Dancers, Pans People, ono) And for those of you who don't like television there's David Coleman. (picture of him smiling) And of course there'11 be sport. But now for something completely different - sport.
('Grandstand' signature tune starts and then abruptly cuts into the usual animated credit titles.)
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'Archeology Today'
As featured in the Flying Circus TV Show - Episode 21
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The cast:
INTERVIEWER
Michael Palin
PROFESSOR KASTNER
Terry Jones
SIR ROBERT EVERSLEY
John Cleese
DANIELLE
Carol Cleveland
* * *
The sketch:
(ANIMATION: a sketch about an archaeological find leads to a caption on screen: 'ARCHAEOLOGY TODAY' Interview set for archaeology programme. Chairman and two guests sit in chain in front of a blow-up of an old cracked pot.)
Interviewer: Hello. On 'Archaeology Today' tonight I have with me Professor Lucien Kastner of Oslo University.
Kastner: Good evening.
Interviewer: How tall are you, professor?
Kastner: ... I beg your pardon?
Interviewer: How tall are you?
Kastner: I'm about five foot ten.
Interviewer: ... and an expert in Egyptian 'tomb paintings. Sir Robert... (turning to Kastner) are you really five foot ten?
Kastner: Yes.
Interviewer: Funny, you look much shorter than that to me. Are you slumped forward in your chair at all?
Kastner: No, er I...
Interviewer: Extraordinary. Sir Robert Eversley, who's just returned from the excavations in El Ara, and you must be well over six foot. Isn't that right, Sir Robert?
Sir Robert: (puzzled) Yes.
Interviewer: In fact, I think you're six foot five aren't you?
Sir Robert: Yes.
(Applause. Sir Robert looks up in amazement.)
Interviewer: Oh, that's marvellous. I mean you're a totally different kind of specimen to Professor Kastner. Straight in your seat, erect, firm.
Sir Robert: Yes. I thought we were here to discuss archaeology.
Interviewer: Yes, yes, of course we are, yes, absolutely, you'r
e absolutely right! That's positive thinking for you. (to Kastner) You wouldn't have said a thing like that, would you? You five-foot-ten weed. (he turns his back very ostentatiously on Kustner) Sir Robert Eversley, (who's very interesting) what have you discovered in the excavations at El Ara?
Sir Robert: (picking up a beautiful vase) Well basically we have found a complex of tombs...
Interviewer: Very good speaking voice.
Sir Robert: ... which present dramatic evidence of Polynesian influence in Egypt in the third dynasty which is quite remarkable.
Interviewer: How tall were the Polynesians?
Kastner: They were...
Interviewer: Sh!
Sir Robert: Well, they were rather small, seafaring...
Interviewer: Short men, were they... eh? All squat and bent up?
Sir Robert: Well, I really don't know about that...
Interviewer: Who were the tall people?
Sir Robert: I'm afraid I don't know.
Interviewer: Who's that very tall tribe in Africa?
Sir Robert: Well, this is hardly archaeology.
Interviewer: The Watutsi! That's it - the Watutsi! Oh, that's the tribe, some of them were eight foot tall. Can you imagine that. Eight foot of Watutsi. Not one on another's shoulders, oh no - eight foot of solid Watutsi. That's what I call tall.
Sir Robert: Yes, but it's nothing to do with archaeology.
Interviewer: (knocking Sir Robert's vase to the floor) Oh to hell with archaeology!
Kastner: Can I please speak! I came all the way from Oslo to do this programme! I'm a professor of archaeology. I'm an expert in ancient civilizations. All right, I'm only five foot ten. All right my posture is bad, all right I slump in my chair. But I've had more women than either of you two! I've had half bloody Norway, that's what I've had! So you can keep your Robert Eversley! And you can keep your bloody Watutsi! I'd rather have my little body... my little five-foot-ten-inch body... (he breaks down sobbing)
Sir Robert: Bloody fool. Look what you've done to him.
Interviewer: Don't bloody fool me.
Sir Robert: I'll do what I like, because I'm six foot five and I eat punks like you for breakfast.
(Sir Robert floors the interviewer with an almighty punch. Interviewer looks up rubbing his jaw.)
Interviewer: I'll get you for that, Eversley! I'll get you if I have to travel to the four corners of the earth!
(Crash of music. Music goes into theme and film titles as for a Western. Caption on screen: 'FLAMING STAR - THE STORY OF ONE MAN'S SEARCH FOR VENGEANCE IN THE RAW AND VIOLENT WORLD OF INTERNATIONAL ARCHAEOLOGY' Cut to stock film of the pyramids (cica 1920). Superimposed caption: 'EGYPT- 1920' An archaeological dig in a fiat sandy landscape. All the characters are in twenties' clothes. Pan across the complex of passages and trenches.)
Danielle: (voice over) The dig was going well that year, We had discovered some Hittire baking dishes from the fifth dynasty, and Sir Robert: was happier than I had ever seen him.
(Camera comes to rest on Sir Robert Eversley digging away. We close in on him as he sings to Hammond organ accompaniment.)
Sir Robert: Today I hear the robin sing Today the thrush is on the wing Today who knows what life will bring Today...
(He stops and picks up an object, blows the dust off it and looks at it wondrously.)
Sir Robert: Why, a Sumerian drinking vessel of the fourth dynasty. (sings!) Today!!!! (speaks) Catalogue this pot, Danielle, it's fourth dynasty.
Danielle: Oh, is it... ?
Sir Robert: Yes, it's... Sumerian.
Danielle: Oh, how wonderful! Oh, I am so happy for you.
Sir Robert: I'm happy too, now at last we know there was a Sumerian influence here in Abu Simnel in the early pre-dynastic period, two thousand years before the reign of Tutankhamun, (he breaks into song again) (singing) Today I hear the robin sing Today the thrush is on the wing (Danielle joins in) Today who knows what life will bring.
(They are just about to embrace, when there is a jarring chord and long crash. The interviewer, in the clothes he wore before, is standing on the edge of the dig.)
Interviewer: All right Eversley, get up out of that trench.
Sir Robert: Don't forget... rm six foot five.
Interviewer: That doesn't worry me... Kastner.
(He snaps his fingers. From behind him Professor Kastner appears, fawningly)
Kastner: Here Lord.
Interviewer: Up!
(He snaps his fingers and Kastner leaps onto his shoulders.)
Sir Robert:. Eleven foot three!
Kastner: I'm so tall! I am so tall!
Sir Robert: Danielle!
(Danielle leaps on his shoulders.)
Interviewer: Eleven foot six - damn you! Abdul
(A servant appears on Kastner's shoulders.)
Sir Robert: Fifteen foot four! Mustapha!
(A servant appears on Danielle's shoulders.)
Interviewer: Nineteen foot three... damn you!
(The six of them charge each other. They fight in amongst the trestle tables with rare pots on them breaking and smashing them. When the fight ends everyone lies dead in a pile of broken pottery. The interviewer crawls up to camera and produces a microphone from his pocket. He is covered in blood and in his final death throes.)
Interviewer: And there we end this edition of 'Archaeology Today'. Next week, the Silbury Dig by Cole Porter with Pearl Bailey and Arthur Negus. (He dies.)
* * *
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Silly Vicar
As featured in the Flying Circus TV Show - Episode 21
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The cast:
VOICE OVER
Michael Palin
REVEREND BELLING
Graham Chapman
* * *
The sketch:
Voice Over: And now an appeal for sanity from the Reverend Arthur Belling.
(Cut to studio. A vicar sitting facing camera. He has an axe in his head.)
Reverend Belling: You know, there are many people in the country today who, through no fault of their own, are sane. Some of them were born sane. Some of them became sane later in their lives. It is up to people like you and me who are out of our tiny little minds to try and help these people overcome their sanity. You can start in small ways with ping-pong ball eyes and a funny voice and then you can paint half of your body red and the other half green and then you can jump up and down in a bowl of treacle going 'squawk, squawk, squawk...' And then you can go 'Neurhhh! Neurhh!' and then you can roll around on the floor going 'pting pting pting' ... (he rolls around on the floor)
Voice Over: The Reverend Arthur Belling is Vicar of St Loony Up The Cream Bun and Jam. And now an appeal on behalf of the National Trust.
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Leapy Lee
As featured in the Flying Circus TV Show - Episode 21
* * *
The cast:
WOMAN
Eric Idle
BOXER
Terry Gillam
* * *
The sketch:
(Caption on screen: 'AN APPEAL ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL TRUSS' Cut to a smartly dressed woman.)
Woman: Good evening. My name is Leapy Lee. No, sorry. That's the name of me favourite singer. My name is Mrs Fred Stone. No, no, Mrs Fred Stone is the wife of me favourite tennis player. My name is Bananas. No, no, that's me favourite fruit. I'm Mrs Nice- evening-out-at-the-pictures-then-perhaps-a-dance-at-a-club-and- back-to-his-plice-for-a-quick-cup-of-coffee-and-little-bit-of- no! No, sorry, that's me favourite way of spending a night out. Perhaps I am Leapy Lee? Yes! I must be Leapy Lee! Hello fans! Leapy Lee here! (sings) Little arrows that will... (phone rings, she answers) Hello? ... Evidently I'm not Leapy Lee. I thought I probably wouldn't be. Thank you, I'll tell them. (puts phone down) Hello. Hello, Denis Compton here. No no... I should have written it down. Now where's that number? (as she looks in her bag she talks to herself) I'm Moo Tse T
ung... I'm P. P. Arnold... I'm Margaret Thatchef ... I'm Sir Gerald Nabarro ... (she dials) Hello? Sir Len Hutton here. Could you tell me, please ... oh, am I? Oh, thank you. (puts phone down) Good evening. I'm Mrs What-number-are- you-dialling-please?
(A boxer rushes in and falls her with one blow· Women's Institute applauding)
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Registrar (wife swap)
As featured in the Flying Circus TV Show - Episode 21
* * *
The cast:
REGISTRAR
Terry Jones
REFEREE
John Cleese
* * *
The sketch:
(We see a man coming through a door with a neat little bride in a bridal dress. The man walks up to the registrar who is sitting at his desk with a sign saying 'Registrar of Marriages '.)
Man: Good morning.
Registrar: Good morning.
Man: Are you the registrar?
Registrar: I have that function.
Man: I was here on Saturday, getting married to a blond girl, and I'd like to change please. I'd like to have this one instead please.
Registrar: What do you mean?
Man: Er, well, the other one wasn't any good, so I'd like to swap it for this one, please. Er, I have paid. I paid on Saturday. Here's the ticket. (gives him the marriage licence.)
Registrar: Ah, oh, no. That was when you were married.
Man: Er, yes. That was when I was married to the wrong one. I didn't like the colour. This is the one I want to had;e, so if you could just change the forms round I can take this one back with me now.
Registrar: I can't do that.
Man: Look, make it simpler, I'll pay again.