Monty Python Live (Mostly)

Yes, those are mostly well known famous sketches you probably know if you are a fan. Adapted and made more glamorous and spectacle for such enormous audience but the core is very well known. But it's never boring or unfunny and it was great to see old (now literally) guys together again. They still have it and they can still make me laugh. They still have the energy and big smiles, so why stop at any age?

I found the whole thing to be rather flat and forced. The problem, in my opinion, stems from the Pythons putting on this big, extravagant, over-long show - perhaps to justify the high ticket cost of seeing the show there in London? - with endless dancing and musical numbers, and some celebrity guest stars (on the DVD we only see Mike Meyers and Eddie Izzard on stage with the troupe; Warwick Davis and Stephen Fry, among others, also appeared during the show's run, and can be seen, briefly, in the DVD extras. Brian Cox and Stephen Hawkins appear in a funny taped segment).

The old skits performed here feel tiresome; the clips from Flying Circus are too familiar to be funny. The only genuine laughs occurred when one of the Pythons deviated from the anticipated - either purposely (a new gag scripted into an old skit) or accidentally (because someone has flubbed/forgot a line or ad-libbed an unexpected joke). The longest and best laugh of the entire show came toward the end in the combination Pet Shop/Cheese Shop skit with Michael Palin and John Cleese.

The big thing missing was irreverence, not taking themselves too seriously. Things got off to a good start with a funny piece of animation that revealed Graham Chapman's head - which then got kicked like a football (English football). Unfortunately, this was followed up by the still-unfunny-as-it-was-back-on-MPFC llama skit, with John Cleese and the Pythons addressing the audience in Spanish (not French, as in the original skit, if I recall correctly). There were far too many musical numbers, which I found myself fast-forwarding through. Hey, at least that helped cut down on this DVD's long running time!

Monty Python Live (Mostly) is the troupe taking a victory lap as establishment figures - not the take-no-prisoners comedy radicals that they once were. Besides, "Sit on my Face" seems awfully quaint in comparison to the potty-mouth kids of South Park. The end result here would've been much better if they'd allowed themselves to tweak their known skits and come up with something new and surprising, audience expectations be damned.

(On a side note, the booklet accompanying the DVD gives thanks to Tim Brooke-Taylor for allowing use of The Four Yorkshiremen skit but doesn't credit Marty Feldman as co-writer of the skit. It was originally performed on the At Last The 1948 show by Feldman, Brooke-Taylor, Cleese and Chapman).

Imagine having won a competition 40 years ago, then imagine that until now people do not remember you or relate you with anything other than having won that bleeding competition! All your life's journey, all your successes and failures, your whole existence on earth has been reduced into one achievement that happened almost half a century ago...as if all what you've done since then didn't count! That is what a person like, say, Douglas Adams always felt when people remembered him only as the writer of his very first novel, The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy, even though he had written 8 other books. That is what people like Arthur C Clark smiled bitterly whenever people remembered him only as the Author of 2001 Space Odyssey.

And that is how the five great geniuses who participated in this show would feel when, after 45 years of amazing achievements and spectacular successes in transforming the humor culture of the whole world in all of its visual, musical and conceptual aspects, they are remembered only as "Pythons", the group they had once belonged to 40 years ago!

People Always kept pestering Douglas Adams to write "another hitchhiker's book", and forcing Arther C. Clark to finish yet another 2001 Space Odyssey sequel, as if writing sequels to those particular works was the only thing those great minds could do, as if the rest of their creations wasn't significant. Similarly, people(myself included) hoped 'The Pythons' would come up with 'new Python material' for this live performance. 'The Pythons', no doubt, were not very excited about doing so. Quite understandably in my opinion.

We don't consider pestering John Cleese to create another Fawlty Towers, or Fish Called Wanda, or even Fierce Creatures. We don't Ask Terry Gilliam to give us another Brazil. We don't believe it is a very good idea that Terry Jones would try his hand in a sequel for Starship Titanic, and only a few of us ever watched Michael Palin's travelogues, but whenever one of those names is mentioned our mind flashes 'Pythons'! Yes, that was great. We want more of that. And the more we want it, the more we prove to the Pythons that they were really nothing else than Pythons. That was their finest hour. And the past half century really didn't count. Do not expect them to be happy about this!!

It is then understandable that they would've never bothered to comply with our sadistic desire to lock them inside the Python's sarcophagus... if it wasn't for money. Especially at this old age when they would've enjoyed their retirement, or at least their attempt to make use of their remaining years in creating something good enough to be remembered for other than their one and only achievement that counts in the past half century!

And since the money they needed wasn't a huge amount, for John's Alimony is almost paid for, and the costly legal dispute that forced the group into reunion would require less than a million quid, then their collaboration can be as brief as possible. In fact they mentioned it several times that they turned down a huge number of offers to perform this show all over the world.

Wouldn't it have been wonderful if they had came up with new material? New sketches? New brilliant Pythonic insights on the social and political dilemmas of our age, and the absurdity of the human condition in general? Of course it would. It would've also been a great farewell from them to their audiences, and a great generator of huge sums of money. But, above all, it would've cemented them in our memory and in the deep bleeding annals of history as nothing but 'The Pythons'.

Think about it.

Having watched a lot of the Monty Python sketches on TV as a kid, I have always had a particular fondness for the comedy from these English chaps. And the 2014 farewell show definitely is something you have to watch if you enjoy Monty Python.

With 45 years of comedy, the guys certainly have brought a lot of laughs to the audience throughout the years. And what works is the quirkiness of the sketches and their ability to take things a step further out than what you expect and still keep it hilarious and enjoyable.

And the six chaps, being John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin and Graham Chapman each brought something unique and funny to the troupe, giving the sketches their own personal and memorable touch. And that is what I enjoyed throughout the years.

It was good fun to watch the guy revisit old and classic sketches and songs in this 2014 show, and I will say that they went out with a bang, because "Monty Python Live (Mostly)" was great entertainment.

My rating of "Monty Python Live (Mostly)" lands on a six out of ten stars.

The Pythons are in their 70s, they have been one man down for 25 years and they have got back together one last time to make a lot of dosh and help pay for John Cleese's recent divorce.

The last night at the O2 was simulcast around the world and nearly live on British television, I say nearly live so for the early part of the show broadcast in the early evening, the swearing was bleeped out. The unedited version went out the next day.

So here are the remaining Pythons, older croakier and a few with forgetful memories. Terry Jones is the worse with memory issues but old age and ill health catches with us all. Eric Idle is still energetic and he gets to sing his catchy songs including looking at the brighter side of life.

Terry Gilliam known with the Pythons more for his animation and better known these days as a director and battling to raise money to make films throws himself with gusto at the sketches. As with Idle he is giving 100% commitment, his movements are just more snappier as if to tell the rest of the team that he has still got it and tell Hollywood to give him more money to make the movies that he wants to make.

Eddie Izzard and Mike Myers turn up for a spin as fan-boys and Carol Cleveland helps out with the sketches just like in the old days.

It's been a while since I have since the TV shows and I have never seen videos of their live shows such as Live from The Hollywood Bowl. To be honest I was reluctant to see this. In recent years Cleese seems to be a curmudgeon always complaining about something and even Palin in his recent travel shows has become more croakier.

However after a few minutes you get used to the older troupe and once the famous sketches and songs start to arrive you get into the spirit of the thing. There are a few ad-libs, a few forgotten lines and a little mischief here and there. The dancers make the whole thing a little more professional and although I believe that there were a few new sketches they were omitted from the uncensored repeat (I guess they will turn up as DVD extras.) We want to see the old hits. The dead parrot sketch, Spam song, Lumberjack song, Blackmail, Nudge nudge wink wink say no more.

So what if they did it for the money, it keeps the old fans happy, maybe get a younger audience and a nice pension for them