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Dead Parrot Sketch
The "Dead Parrot Sketch", alternatively and originally known as the "Pet Shop Sketch" or "Parrot Sketch", is a sketch from ''Monty Python's Flying Circus'' about a non-existent species of parrot, called a "Norwegian Blue". A satire on poor customer service, it was written by John Cleese and Graham Chapman and initially performed in the show's first series, in the eighth episode ("Full Frontal Nudity", which first aired 7 December 1969). The sketch portrays a conflict between disgruntled customer Mr Praline (played by Cleese) and a shopkeeper (Michael Palin), who argue whether or not a recently purchased parrot is dead. Over the years, Cleese and Palin have performed many versions of the "Dead Parrot" sketch for television shows, record albums, and live performances. "Dead Parrot" was voted the top alternative comedy sketch in a ''Radio Times'' poll. Plot Mr Praline (Cleese) enters the pet shop to register a complaint about the dead Norwegian Blue parrot (parrots are not nati ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
How To Irritate People
''How to Irritate People'' is a US television broadcast filmed in the UK at LWT on 14 November 1968 and written by John Cleese, Graham Chapman, Marty Feldman and Tim Brooke-Taylor. Cleese, Chapman, and Brooke-Taylor also feature in it, along with future Monty Python collaborators Michael Palin and Connie Booth. In various sketches, Cleese demonstrates exactly what the title suggests—how to irritate people, although this is done in a much more conventional way than the absurdity of similar Monty Python sketches. Notable sketches Pepperpots The recurring characters of the "Pepperpots," old British housewives who annoy theater-goers and quiz show hosts in these sketches, would go on to be a major part of ''Monty Python's Flying Circus'', appearing in the majority of the show's episodes. Job Interview The "Job Interview" sketch, featuring Cleese as an interviewer who asks several unusual questions of Brooke-Taylor, the interviewee, was later performed, almost unchanged, in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monty Python Live At City Center
''Monty Python Live at City Center'' is a US-only live album by Monty Python, recorded at the New York City Center in April 1976 and rush released by Arista Records the following month. In order to get the album out in the shops quickly, the recordings were made early on in the run, where some of the performances were affected by faulty microphones. The team were joined onstage by regular actress Carol Cleveland and musician Neil Innes, who also performed in some sketches. The album was not released in the UK, due to its similarity to ''Live at Drury Lane''. As with that album, Michael Palin provided new linking material. A CD version was released in 1997. Track listing Side one #Introduction/The Llama #Gumby Flower Arranging #Short Blues #Wrestling # World Forum #Albatross/Colonel Stopping It #Nudge Nudge #Crunchy Frog # Bruces' Song #Travel Agent Side two #Camp Judges #Blackmail #Protest Song # Pet Shop #Four Yorkshiremen #Argument Clinic #Death of Mary, Queen of Scots # ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pleasure At Her Majesty's
''A Poke in the Eye (With a Sharp Stick)'' is the title of the first show in what later became the '' Secret Policeman's Ball'' series of benefit shows for human rights organization Amnesty International, although it pre-dated by three years the first show to bear that name. The film of the show was titled ''Pleasure at Her Majesty's'' which is sometimes mistakenly thought to be the title of the actual benefit show. Background The landmark 1976 show starring the Monty Python, '' Beyond the Fringe'', and The Goodies teams and other top British comedic performers of the 1960s and 1970s, led directly to the 1979 show ''The Secret Policeman's Ball'' - which in turn triggered the involvement of major rock stars such as Sting, Bono, Peter Gabriel, Bruce Springsteen, and Bob Geldof in working for the human rights cause. It set a precedent that would inspire many subsequent Amnesty galas, as well as Comic Relief. The concept was also the inspiration of similar events in aid of A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Breaking Character
In theatre (especially in the illusionistic Western tradition), breaking character occurs when an actor ceases to maintain the illusion that they are identical with the character they are portraying. This is a more acceptable occurrence while in the process of rehearsal but is considered unprofessional while actively performing in front of an audience or camera (except when the act is a deliberate breaking of the fourth wall). One of the most common ways of breaking character is corpsing, in which an actor loses their composure and laughs or giggles in a comedy scene or scene requiring ludicrous actions. If the breaking of character is particularly serious, it would normally result in an abandonment of a take in recorded or filmed drama. Famous breaks in film The advent of DVD players, with the use of their precise pause and slow-motion functions, has made it far easier to spot breaks in character in motion pictures, and many internet sites collect such examples. Examples of br ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Poke In The Eye (With A Sharp Stick)
''A Poke in the Eye (With a Sharp Stick)'' is the title of the first show in what later became the '' Secret Policeman's Ball'' series of benefit shows for human rights organization Amnesty International, although it pre-dated by three years the first show to bear that name. The film of the show was titled ''Pleasure at Her Majesty's'' which is sometimes mistakenly thought to be the title of the actual benefit show. Background The landmark 1976 show starring the Monty Python, '' Beyond the Fringe'', and The Goodies teams and other top British comedic performers of the 1960s and 1970s, led directly to the 1979 show ''The Secret Policeman's Ball'' - which in turn triggered the involvement of major rock stars such as Sting, Bono, Peter Gabriel, Bruce Springsteen, and Bob Geldof in working for the human rights cause. It set a precedent that would inspire many subsequent Amnesty galas, as well as Comic Relief. The concept was also the inspiration of similar events in aid of Amnesty ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amnesty International
Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says it has more than ten million members and supporters around the world. The stated mission of the organization is to campaign for "a world in which every person enjoys all of the human rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights instruments." The organization has played a notable role on human rights issues due to its frequent citation in media and by world leaders. AI was founded in London in 1961 by the lawyer Peter Benenson. Its original focus was prisoners of conscience, with its remit widening in the 1970s, under the leadership of Seán MacBride and Martin Ennals to include miscarriages of justice and torture. In 1977, it was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. In the 1980s, its secretary general was Thomas Hammarberg, succeeded ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monty Python Live At Drury Lane
''Monty Python Live at Drury Lane'' is a live album released by Monty Python in 1974. It was recorded on the final night of their four-week run at the Drury Lane Theatre in London earlier that year and edited onto disc with new studio linking material by Eric Idle and Michael Palin. The majority of the sketches are from ''Flying Circus'' and vary slightly from their television counterparts, although "Cocktail Bar" was written for the third series but not used. The team also revived sketches from ''At Last The 1948 Show'', including "Secret Service", "Wrestling" and "Four Yorkshiremen" - the latter on its way to being adopted as a Python standard. Neil Innes provided the musical interludes, while Eric Idle's then wife Lyn Ashley replaced regular Python actress Carol Cleveland in supporting roles. As with its predecessor, the second side of the original UK vinyl release had a cryptic message by George Peckham etched onto the runout groove, which read "THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF PORKY ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Lumberjack Song
"The Lumberjack Song" is a comedy song by the comedy troupe Monty Python. The song was written and composed by Terry Jones, Michael Palin, and Fred Tomlinson. It first appeared in the ninth episode of ''Monty Python's Flying Circus'', "The Ant: An Introduction" on BBC1 on 14 December 1969. The song has since been performed in several forms, including film, stage, and LP, each time started from a different skit. At an NPR interview in 2007, Palin stated that the scene and the whole song were created in about 15 minutes, concluding a day's work, when the Python crew was stuck and unable to come up with a conclusion to the barbershop sketch that preceded it. On 14 November 1975, "The Lumberjack Song" was released as a single in the UK, on Charisma Records, backed with "Spam Song". The A-side, produced by Python devotee George Harrison, was recorded at the Work House studio in London on 3 October 1975 and mixed at Harrison's Friar Park home the following day. A year later this si ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lumberjack
Lumberjacks are mostly North American workers in the logging industry who perform the initial harvesting and transport of trees for ultimate processing into forest products. The term usually refers to loggers in the era (before 1945 in the United States) when trees were felled using hand tools and dragged by oxen to rivers. The work was difficult, dangerous, intermittent, low-paying, and involved living in primitive conditions. However, the men built a traditional culture that celebrated strength, masculinity, confrontation with danger, and resistance to modernization. Terminology The term lumberjack is of Canadian derivation. The first attested use of the word comes from an 1831 letter to the ''Cobourg Star and General Advertiser'' in the following passage: "my misfortunes have been brought upon me chiefly by an incorrigible, though perhaps useful, race of mortals called lumberjacks, whom, however, I would name the Cossack's of Upper Canada, who, having been reared among th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
And Now For Something Completely Different
''And Now for Something Completely Different'' is a 1971 British sketch comedy film based on the television comedy series ''Monty Python's Flying Circus'' featuring sketches from the show's first two series. The title was taken from a catchphrase used in the television show. The film, released on 28 September 1971 in the United Kingdom and 22 August 1972 in the United States, consists of 90 minutes of sketches and animation sequences seen in the first two series of the television show. All of the sketches were recreated for the film without an audience, and were intended for an American audience which had not yet seen the series. The announcer (John Cleese) appears briefly between some sketches to deliver the line "and now for something completely different", in situations such as being roasted on a spit and lying on top of a desk in a small pink bikini, as well as the Colonel (Graham Chapman) interrupting them and deeming them "too silly". Background ''And Now for Something Comp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dead Parrot O2 Arena
Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism. For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including brainstem, and brain death is sometimes used as a legal definition of death. The remains of a former organism normally begin to decompose shortly after death. Death is an inevitable process that eventually occurs in almost all organisms. Death is generally applied to whole organisms; the similar process seen in individual components of an organism, such as cells or tissues, is necrosis. Something that is not considered an organism, such as a virus, can be physically destroyed but is not said to die. As of the early 21st century, over 150,000 humans die each day, with ageing being by far the most common cause of death. Many cultures and religions have the idea of an afterlife, and also may hold the idea of judgement of good and bad deeds in one's life (heaven, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
