Monday 19th March

That was the catch phrase that epitomized what the Pythons were all about.  Quite often after a remarkably silly sketch John Cleese in his radio announcer voice-over, or sometimes in a dinner jacket in front of a microphone would look dead serious and say, “And now for something completely different.”  And of course the next sketch would be just as stupid, or maybe some of the same stuff.  The most ironic thing was that of course the Pythons themselves were something completely different, so it actually made no sense, because everything they did was so completely different that it didn’t need saying.  It was also very subversive humour, I am not sure if my mother ever really got it, and Grandma would just get bored, pick up the paper and say, “I really don’t know why you watch this rubbish Catherine, it’s just a lot of men acting silly and using funny voices.  Are you sure there isn’t something on the commercial channel?”  I would smile sweetly and say, “It’s nearly over Grandma, not much longer to go.”

I don’t remember really laughing out loud while watching Monty Python, not like we all did at Hancock, or Steptoe and Son.  This was a different sort of humour, often a subtle comment on society and its stuffiness.  Looking back it was a natural progression from ‘That was the week, that was’ and ‘The Frost Report’.  Maybe it was a conspiracy of the young, in much the same way that ‘South Park’ became for a much later generation; to the older generation, in the latter case, me – a load of rubbish, and not even funny, but to the cognoscenti, those in the know, those young enough and hip enough to be in on the joke it was obvious what it was all about.

I loved the Python’s mix of music and cartoons too, and I think that this perfectly reflected what the ‘sixties’ was about.  It wasn’t just music, or fashion, or politics, but art and literature and cinema too.  It was a refreshing new style after the drudgery and privation of the war years, and the conformity of the fifties, suddenly everything seemed possible.  And was, really.   And for my generation, it has been much the same ever since, a bit of punk, new wave, rave etc:, but essentially it is all the same, nothing new at all really.

I am longing for someone to come up with something really new and say in a semi-serious voice, “And now for something completely different.”