Added: 6 years ago
From: YoungAmerican
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  • This is great thumbs up !!

  • THANK YOU!

  • lol at the loud wine bottle opening at 12:14

  • I love that the tape ends, at the most important part of his sentence..! ...:)

  • Thumbs up if you wanted to know the other names for monty python

  • cheers to KERA in Dallas 

  • i love la camilla!

  • Chapman looks as drunk as a lord!

  • @jkoff76 1975 he probably was.

  • tewwy jones

  • March 1975.

  • OMG! They were allowed to smoke in the studio! :D

  • The Beatles of comedy!!.. and they have the hair to prove it.

  • GORGEOUS hair...

  • Things I love about this video...

    1. The way the whole audience is sitting on the floor. So 70s.

    2. Graham Chapman's pipe

    3. Terry Gilliam's American accent in the process of morphing into a British one

    4. The guy at 10:43. Definitely baked.

    5. The way that chick at 11:10 looks at Graham. Pure lust.

    6. Everything about Michael Palin. I'm not gay, but if I had to fuck one of the Pythons, it'd be him.

    7. The ending. WE'LL NEVER FUCKING KNOW

  • He was about to say "owl stretching time" one of the early possible names for the show. Graham came up with that one.

  • Oh my god! He was electrified?! That's horrible!

  • why do everyone in the video have weird hairstyles??was there a shortage of barbers back then?

  • @80corecpu: it was the '70s. I think everyone had hair like that.

  • @80corecpu They didn't want to be barbers. They wanted to be lumberjacks.

  • @80corecpu Nothing weird about those hairstyles. It was the '70s, hair was long. Looks better than the crew-cut 1950s hair kids are wearing now.

  • lol that looks like where full house was

  • haha little did everyone know how epic the holy grail was gong to be

  • Heh, Chapman is definitely stoned.

  • I think Michael Palin is easily the most charmingly endearing of the Pythons, except for maybe Terry Jones.

  • I have never use this kind of comments. I dont normally do that. But I have to say - They are utterly gorgeous!!! I love those 70s haircuts.

  • Turn those f'in phones off.

  • I could watch that all day, ragin it cut off! >:(

  • oh mah fuckin'gawd ! did he dye ? did he died !? is he deaded ? easy ok ? has he have deathed ?

  • america's radio sweetheart?

  • I actually saw this interview back in Texas...I remember the armadillo sitting in Palin's lap. I was a big Python fan from their beginning.

  • Love how English Gilliam sounded back then!

  • lol its a boy

  • Aw, Graham is so adorable! If slightly intoxicated.

  • its amazing that he still managed to be so witty, he was up to 2 liters of gin a day...

  • Wow, they all look super foxy in this clip! :)

  • The clip itself feels like 'Election Night' or something... How wierd!

  • Chapman's pissed again. Tragic waste of a great talent.

  • I think it was actually the pipe that killed him considering he ended up getting throat cancer and not liver disease or something of the like. He quit cold turkey shortly after this.

  • 1975? It only took you six years to catch on, then!

  • mike writes about this armadillo in his Diary

  • where did you find his book? i cant find it anywhere

  • Are you in the US? My local library had it, and I live in a small suburb of Richmond, VA. I think Amazon has it as well :)

  • Cool.  Graham looks completely pickled.

  • Thanks for posting this!

    They're absolutely wonderful and gorgeous in this interview

    I love Graham Chapman TOO MUCH

    The world would be so DULL and DULL and DULL... without Monty Python :-)

  • Aww, darn thing cuts off! "Owl-" Stretching Time!!!!

  • Never trust a man with glasses on!!!!!! :-)

  • Those old phones used to make you jump out of your skin, loud as hell. Always fun to ring Granny when she was watching horrors in the house by herself.

  • I still have one.

  • thanks for the vid !!! enjoyed it verry much !!!

  • thanks this vid is absolutely great

  • i love Terry Gilliam's comepletely distorted accent

  • The video references the point in time in March 1975 when Python troupe was in Dallas, not when it first aired. Monty Python did indeed first air in the U.S. on KERA in Dallas as noted in Michael Palin's recent autobiography (pg 221). It is well-documented by remaining Python members along with representatives from then syndicator TimeLife and KERA staff that KERA was absolutely the first in the U.S. to broadcast. Stations such as WHYY, WNET and WGBH soon followed, but KERA was first in 1974.

  • You're completely WRONG, YoungAmerican, by 1975, Monty Python had been aired nearly 3 years already, by both WHYY, PBS-ch.12 in Philadelphia, as well as on WLVT, PBS-ch.39, in Allentown, Pa. I personally bought the 1st Monty Python record album (LP) in 1972, here in E. Pa, where we were already HUGE fans, going on 2 years already. Texans may have "accidentally" discovered MP in '75, but that was YEARS after PENNSYLVANIANS had already been laughing out loud in hysterics at their antics. Sorry

  • Your all-caps and cynical "sorry"s weaken your points.

  • Comment removed

  • I love Michael Palin

  • There's Graham with the tobacco drug that killed him at a rather early age!

  • Sooooo....this is the Spanish Inquisition (never mind).....BUT this answers where it all began for us Americans I suppose, AND I've loved these guys ever since, so thank you to the person who gave the guys a chance on PBS! May Monty Python live forever!!

  • THIS INTERVEIW IS GOD!!!! but... Your name is really gay Mr. Young American :| i am sorry to say... Please change it.

  • where are eric idle and john cleese?

  • John Cleese left the Pythons in 1973 or 1974...but this interview was in 1975, after they had broken up.

  • To be fair they never really broke up as they recorded several albums all through the 1970s and 80s and they did make the Holy Grail with John Cleese in 1974 and it was released in 1975.

  • I wonder what Chapman was thinking about the constant phone ringing.... It seems it could drive any healthier human over the edge, let alone poor Graham, who seemed to be starving for some rest.

  • Comment removed

  • He may have been tired, but he was likely also quite drunk, as he generally was in those days.

  • Indeed. According to his autobiography, he quit cold turkey shortly after this, so this was likely one of his worst moments. I can't imagine being able to quit just like that after being up to 2 large bottles of gin a day... what an incredible guy.

  • ohhh they're great!!!!and i love the english accent soooooooooo much...

  • In case you're fretting, I think what Terry was about to say before the footage cut off was "Owl Stretching Time," in another interview the same question was asked and that was the reply.

  • Other proposed titles were "A Horse, a Bucket and a Spoon," "Bunn, Wackett, Buzzard, Stubble and Boot," "The Toad Elevating Moment," "Whither Canada?" and "Sex and Violence." The latter three were recycled as first-season episode titles, as was "Owl-Stretching Time."

  • 1:57 LOL!XD

  • Palin '12!

  • great stuff! thx 4 posting!

  • This is Gold !!!

  • lol the stuffed armadillo

  • Contrary to what the narrator at the beginning says and Wikipedia, KERA first showed MPFC in July of 1974. I remember seeing it in TV guide and thinking it was going to be a real circus show and asked my mom if I could watch it. I still watch it faithfully. By 1979 the Sunday night British comedy line-up was Benny Hill, MPFC, The Two Ronnies, Dave Allen at Large, and The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin.

  • omg, mike looks so cute here :)

  • The armadillo!! I just finished reading the section about it and this interview in Michael Palin's Diaries 1969-1979.

    If you love Palin and/or Python you need to get that book!

  • rofl chapman looks wasted!

  • i am sure he's wasted but that was the only way he did things

  • where was Eric?

  • and John?

  • I believe he was going to say "Owl Stretching Time"

    It's also on Wikipedia - a full list of potential names.

  • 33 years on and public TV fund drives are no better. In the US, the general public (along with a little gov't money and big arts charity donations) pays for programming on public TV stations. I'm glad for that, because no public TV, no Python (or Doctor Who, Red Dwarf and Blackadder) in the US, at least not in the 1970s-1990s.

    I first saw Python as a 7 year old in 1976, thanks to WMVS in Milwaukee. Yay for Channel 10!

  • :=)

  • montey piethong

    ha americans

  • Well done that engineer.

  • Python fans-

    We should compile a database of people to subscribe to/videos to watch for others! Message me with suggestions! When there's enough, I'll post a video compiling the list of things every python fan must watch on youtube :D

  • geniuws.i love the armidillo and graham looks awesome with the pipe

  • LOL funny hats. :)

  • What Terry Jones was about to say was "Owl stretching Time" Which was one of the 1st names to be suggested for the show.

  • Amazing footage. I knew many of the sketches from them being played on one of the local FM stations for several years before the show came to the US. I remember the great anticipation we all had for the show to finally arrive.

  • I didn't see this interview when it aired, but I was lucky enough to be living in the Dallas area when Monty Python aired. I had no idea it was the first area of the country to broadcast it. Now I feel special.

  • In their biography there are lots od possible names, for example: "it's" "owl stretching time" "Gwen Dibley's Flying Circus" "A horse, a spoon and a bucket" "The toad elevating moment" "Megapodes Flying Circus" "Bun, Wackett, Buzzard, Stubble and Boot" "Them"... And much more:-)

  • Does anyone know why John Cleese wasn't there?

  • This is according to Wikipedia's entry on Fawlty Towers: "Fawlty Towers was a British sitcom made by the BBC and first broadcast on BBC2 in 1975." Could probably be chalked up to bad timing. Hope that helps...

  • cleese had already left MP by that time

  • Yeh,left the TV show,but he said he was always gonna do any films,so that doesn't explain him being missing here,after all he's in 'Holy Grail'.Plus Eric's not there,so maybe they just stayed at the hotel

  • I've seen an interview with Michael Palin where he says one of the first names for the show was going to be "its". There were others also...too bad it cut off!

  • Wtf where are Eric Idle and John Cleese?

  • none of them.

  • terry jones is so adorable

  • Chapman's cleary drunk.

  • But Chapman quit drinking - COLD TURKEY no less - in 1977.

  • @xleper17: Why haven't there come to america? And why nasty and bitter?

  • Incredible material; thanx for sharing.

  • oooh Graham... poor love.

    Idle and Cleese, if you read Michael Palin's diary, were jerks about coming to America... I'm glad they didn't come, could of ruined the whole vibe by being all nasty and bitter.

  • But Cleese lives in America now and I think Idle does, too.

  • John Cleese is my favorite. I also watched Faulty Towers.

  • thanks for posting! this is great to see.

  • I agree. My favorite sketches were the Lumberjack song and the Pet Shop. "If you hadn't nailed it to the perch..."

  • Thanks for posting this interview. Only seen stills in such books as The Pythons by The Pythons etc.

  • My two favourite Pythons are missing :(. But it`s fun to see such an old show. I wasn´t even born in 1975.^^

  • Chapman's probably drunk, but that's his style. Very informative.

  • Yeah the poor bastard. I think he stopped drinking after 1975 though; just before he played Brian.

  • I seem to recall seeing Monty Python on TV on the PBS station channel 11 WTTW before 1975. I remember it because my sister and I used to pretend we were Gumbies. Of course,later chicago became the Monty Python fan capitol of the world.

  • What Terry Jones was about to say was "Owl stretching Time"

    Which was one of the 1st names to be suggested for the show.

  • Wonder why the engineer cut it off to soon?

  • Nooooo. I was just getting into that video!

  • Cleese was already gone from the group, he wasn't on the fourth season of flying circus.

  • And the phones are ringing and ringing *LOL*

  • Valuable piece of historical footage. A treasure for all MP fans. Big points to you for uploading.

  • Terry Jones was a bit restrained in describing the hold commercial TV had in the US in the 1970s. By 1975 all Python's TV stuff was finished, with only movies to follow. It was old news in the rest of the word. It had been a hit everywhere, subtitled and dubbed from one end of Europe to the other. The US was about the only country that had never heard of it. Such was the power of the networks, they kept it out for five years.

  • Very nice!! I'm reading MP's autobiography this broadcast is mentioned. EI is not there because a few months ago he officially left Python. JC rarely went on these publicity tours. PBS in Dallas was the first station to show Python. Funny thing MP took the armidillo and it scared him at night when he went to for a pee!

  • I wonder if he still has that armadillo?

  • Why did they cut it off? I want to see the rest of the footage!

    Not the Python interview...I want to see what is going on in that warehouse. The foreman was there, some kind of inspection, it looked like serious business.

  • lol

  • :( Eric is not there:(

  • Gotta love Mike for putting the Armadillo in front of the camera during the lumberjack song...

    lol Graham's smile at 10:27

  • That guy's voice is really annoying.

  • i agree

  • Damn, Chapman looks like he's been on a 5 day bender, which he probably had. RIP Graham.

  • where's idle n cleese?!

  • they left monthy python by then

  • oh, so did they make any material after they'd left?

  • im not sure...i think few more episodes of monthy python...

  • They were probably just too busy to go.

  • The TV show's last season was in 1974 (only Cleese left, Idle was still there). All the movies they did were after this and were made with the complete, original Python group.

  • oooooh interesting..

    lol, wunder y erics not there then

  • They hadn't left; Life of Brian was released in 79, so things were still going on.

    They were probably busy elsewhere doing promotion for 'Holy Grail'.

    Great footage though; thanks for posting.

  • MIchael looks unnaturally hot...

  • i so agree

  • Which crackpot producer thought it was a good idea to have constant phone ringing in the background!

  • reminded me of Holiday Armadillo, ROss dressed up in season 6 or 7 of Friends

  • as if the only reason Monty Python was a success is because it was on *american* tv

  • Wonderful video!

    But I hate the way americans pronounce "Pythooooooooon". Rubbish!

  • Oh Mike has lovely hair in this clip doesn't he? Oh...!! *Gets turned on*

  • Great footage, I love it.

    And Graham saing "medically speaking I think something's wrong with it" about the armadillo XD

  • just want to point out there show was not saved from the scraphead by a us station, they were huge in europe its just the us took wayyy longer to catch on.

  • 11 great nights of public TV, as opposed to the other 354.

  • oh dear god the awful collars! (ruffels and points scraping their knees)

  • Graham mentioned that the prog caught on in spite of being shown late at night. In fact it's timing, Friday night at 11, coincided with the pubs shutting thus giving it an audience who were in a more receptive mood. I watched the first episode in 1969, after beating my Dad home from the pub.

  • Anybody got any footage relating to the early broadcasts of series 4 (on ABC?)which were so hacked to pieces the Pythons sued the network and won?

    That would be interesting to see. Great footage. Thanks for downloading it.

  • Wow! Terry Jones looks great in this vid...awesome threads...he looks like a british rock star

  • SOO TRUE

  • Michael Palin has wonderful hair.

  • That is very true! :D

    There's a site called MPUAP (Michael Palin's UNofficial Appreciation Page) and it has photo albums of him. One of them is called "Great Hair Moments"!

  • LOl, i read your comment and immediately went to search the website...

  • SOOO true... his hair is unbelieveably gorgeous../

  • Graham's hair is gorgeous too.

  • Yeah i know!!! Love him a lot too...

  • they were the Beatles of comedy

  • I couldn't agree with you more! :D

  • Superb video! I watched with amazement; KERA and MPFC, during the mid-seventies. It started my lifelong love of British comedy. The things they showed, SHOCKING, and we loved it!

  • This is a great clip, extraordinarily rare. Fantastic footage! My only complaint is that one of the pledge drivers behind the fellow in the red shirt is chewing gum! How unbelievably rotten!

  • How could it stop there! Terry was gonna say some of the names for the show! WAAA!

    But LOVED the interview, who else thinks Michael Palin is FRIKIN GORGEOUS?!

  • MEEE!!!

  • oh yes, i think so too lovesmrdavidtennant

    michael is HOT!! wish i was born in the 60's *sigh*

  • Lol, i know me too! Shame he was married by this time!

    He is the best of the pythons!

    Have you seen A Fish Called Wanda?

  • MEEE~!