1. The fast-thinking British comedians started the absurdity right off the bat by walking on stage, taking a bow to accommodate the excited crowd’s applause and then walking off. A voiceover announced that Act 2 would begin in 15 minutes, but for now, we were to enjoy Act 3.
2. Some classic lines about Cleese’s marital status: “I was married for 34 years,” to which Idle responds, “To four different women.” And later, Cleese explained: “One of my ex-wives died, you know. I was sad. It was the wrong one.”
3. From there, the retrospective of these comedy giants’ careers began. They have associated with each other personally and professionally for 53 years, with both getting their start in comedy groups at Cambridge University.
4. Cleese, now 77, was one of those talents that everybody seemed to notice. While still at Cambridge, he and his comedy cohorts had a five-month run in London’s West End and a quickly closed show on Broadway.
5. Meanwhile, Idle was hamming it up at the Edinburgh Festival. He went to check out his rival school’s show, The Oxford Review, where he saw Terry Jones and Michael Palin perform for the first time. His thoughts on it: “We’ve been keeping them afloat ever since.”
6. It wasn’t long before esteemed television presenter David Frost called Cleese to put him on a sketch comedy show called The Frost Report with Ronnie Corbett and Ronnie Barker. Writers for the show included Idle, Jones, Palin, Graham Chapman and Marty Feldman.
7. Cleese transitioned into another sketch show At Last It’s The 1948 Show which featured early versions of famous Monty Python sketches including “The Bookshop Sketch." Done onstage Friday night, certain things were updated (Idle: “Do you have The Art of Pussy Grabbing by Donald Trump?”), but the overall premise of a man who only asks for alternate versions of well-known books remained the same.
8. The final piece of Monty Python puzzle came to the group on Idle’s children’s television program Do Not Adjust Your Set, where Terry Gilliam joined as a writer for Season 2.
9. The goal of the seminal troupe was to make each other laugh. If the sketches didn’t do that, they weren’t used, or, as Idle claimed, “We sold them to The Two Ronnies.” They also wanted to explore the boundaries of silliness. Cleese and Idle reenacted “The Wine Shop Sketch,” where the former gives the latter a glass of wine. Idle goes on a long explanation of the wine varietal, where it’s from and its attributes—to which Cleese responds, “No. It’s wee-wee.”
10. One illuminating moment took place as the stars picked their favorite sketches that featured the other one. Cleese loved Idle as a guard who could never follow instructions in Monty Python and The Holy Grail. He was especially enamored of the way Terry Jones directed it, with one solitary shot so the comedy did all the work. Idle favored a sketch from German show Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus that saw Cleese play Little Red Riding Hood against a wolf, which was just a cute puppy in a costume.
11. Idle’s greatest songs were performed to the delight of the sing-along audience. “The Galaxy Song” might not all be true anymore, but it still holds up as well as it did in 1982. “Sit On My Face” had the lyrics scrawled across a large screen so the choir wouldn’t miss a beat. “Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life,” which Cleese said is the “No. 1 funeral song in England," closed the show out right.
12. Cleese's funeral eulogy for departed Python Graham Chapman was a nice tribute. In a fitting moment, he used the words that he and his deceased writing partner came up with for one of Monty Python's most famous bits, “The Dead Parrot Sketch,” to send his mate on his way. “Graham Chapman is no more. He has ceased to be.”
