Pail, Michael

PALIN, MICHAEL

British Comedian/Actor

Most Americans probably remember Michael Palin best as a member of the six-man British comedy troupe Monty Python's Flying Circus. And while it surely the case that some of Palin's most memorable work was with Monty Python, both in the group's TV series or its films and live performances, the versatile comedian/actor also has done much notable television work on his own, including Ripping Yarns and Around the World in 80 Days.

Palin's comedy career began at Oxford University, where he wrote and performed comedic revues with classmate and future Python Terry Jones. After graduating with a history degree in 1965, Palin moved to London, where his first TV job was as host of Now!, a teenage pop music show broadcast by the now-defunct Television West Wales. In his spare time, he continued to write with Terry Jones, who was working for the BBC. The team wrote scripts for The Ken Dodd Show, The Billy Cotton Bandshow, and other BBC shows.

Palin and Jones first worked with fellow Pythons Graham Chapman, John Cleese and Eric Idle in 1966, writing for The Frost Report. Palin also worked with various future Pythons on Do Not Adjust Your Set (1968-69) and The Complete and Utter History of Britain (1969), a Jones and Palin production.

In 1969, Palin, Jones, Chapman, Cleese, Idle and Terry Gilliam (the group's lone American) created Monty Python's Flying Circus, after rejecting other possible titles such as "Owl Stretching Time," "Vaseline Parade," and "Bunn, Wackett, Buzzard, Stubble, and Boot." The show ran for 45 episodes, 1969 to 1974, on the BBC, and took on a life of its own, spawning five films, a series of stage shows and numerous books, records and videos.

Some of Palin's most memorable performances in Monty Python include: A man who believes he's qualified to be a lion tamer because he already has the hat; Arthur Pewtie, who suspects his wife is being unfaithful and goes for marriage counseling, only to watch the counselor make love to his wife; a lumberjack who, in his spare time, "puts on women's clothing, and hangs around in bars" (and sings about it, backed by a chorus of Mounties); a cheese-shop owner whose shop is "completely uncontaminated by cheese."

With a kindly face and gentle demeanor, Palin is frequently cast as a sweet, unassuming man (such as the cheated-upon Arthur Pewtie, or the stuttering animal-lover Ken in the film A Fish Called Wanda.) But he's equally good in more outrageous characters (like the transvestite lumberjack, or, in another Python sketch, a high court judge who removes his robe, revealing that he's wearing only ladies' underwear beneath).

After the TV series Monty Python's Flying Circus ended, Palin continued to perform with the group in films, stage shows and a series of Secret Policeman's Balls, benefit concerts for Amnesty International that featured several comedians and musicians. Palin also hosted four episodes of NBC's Saturday Night Live from 1978 to 1984.

In 1976, the BBC began airing one of Palin's most memorable efforts, Ripping Yarns. Conceived, written, and performed with Jones, Ripping Yarns consisted of two series, one of six shows and one of three shows. Each show had its own plot, and the plots were not interrelated; the stories were based on English stories of the early 1900s.

For the next several years, Palin appeared mostly in films. He returned to television in 1989's Around the World in 80 Days, a six-hour documentary of Palin's attempt to re-create Phileas Fogg's fictional journey, retracing Fogg's route using only transportation that would have been available in Fogg's day. Followed by a five-man BBC crew, Palin travels on trains, hot-air balloons, dogsleds and garbage barges through Greeces, Africa, India, Asia, America and back to England.

Palin did a similar, eight-hour series, Pole to Pole, in 1993. In Pole to Pole, Palin and a BBC crew traveled from the North Pole to the South Pole, through Finland, Russia and Africa.

-Julie Prince

Michael Palin

MICHAEL (EDWARD) PALIN. Born in Sheffield, Yorkshire, England, 5 May 1943. Attended Birkdale School, Sheffield; Shrewsbury; B.A. in modern history, Brasenose College, Oxford. Married: Helen M. Gibbins in 1966, children: Rachel, Thomas and William. Performed in plays and revues while at Oxford and formed writing partnership with Terry Jones; subsequently wrote for such television shows as The Frost Report and then, with Jones, became a member of the Monty Python comedy team, 1969; later wrote and starred in the television series Ripping Yarns and also hosted acclaimed travel documentaries as well as appearing in a range of comic dramas; director, Meridian Television. President, Transport 2000. Recipient: British Academy of Film and Television Arts Award for Best Supporting Actor, 1988; Travel Writer of the Year Award, British Book Awards, 1993. Address: Mayday Management, 68a Delancey Street, London NW1 7RY, England.

TELEVISION SERIES

1966-67 The Frost Report (writer only)
1966-67 The Late Show (writer only)
1967 A Series of Bird's (writer only)
1967 Twice a Fortnight
1967-69 Do Not Adjust Your Set
1969 The Complete and Utter History of Britain
1969-74 Monty Python's Flying Circus (also co-writer) 1975 Three Men in a Boat
1976-80 Ripping Yarns (also writer)
1983 Secrets
1987 East of Ipswich (writer only)
1988 Number 27 (writer only)
1989 Around the World in 80 Days
1991 GBH
1992 Palin's Column
1993 Pole to Pole
1993 Tracey Ullman: A Class Act
1997 Palin's Pacific

TELEVISIONS SPECIAL

1980 Great Railway Journeys of the World

FILMS

And Now for Something Completely Different (also co-writer), 1970; Monty Python and the Holy Grail (also co-writer), 1974; Jabberwocky, 1976; Pleasure at Her Majesty's (U.S. title, Monty Python Meets Beyond the Fringe), 1976; Monty Python's Life of Brian (also co-writer), 1978; The Secret Policeman's Ball, 1979; Time Bandits (also co-writer), 1980; The Secret Policeman's Other Ball, 1981; Confessions of a Trainspotter, 1981; The Missionary (also co-writer and co-producer), 1982; Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl, 1982; Monty Python's The Meaning of Life (also co-writer), 1982; A Private Function, 1984; The Secret Policeman's Private Parts, 1984; Brazil, 1985; The Dress, 1986; Troubles, 1987; A Fish Called Wanda, 1988; American Friends (also co-writer), 1991; The Secret Policeman's Biggest Ball, 1991; Splitting Heirs, 1993.

STAGE

Hang Down Your Head and Die; Aladdin; Monty Python's First Farewell Tour; Monty Python Live at Drury Lane; Monty Python Live at City Center; The Secret Policeman's Ball; The Weekend.

PUBLICATIONS

Monty Python's Big Red Book, with others. London: Eyre Methuen, 1970.

Monty Python's Brand New Book, with others. London: Eyre Methuen, 1973.

Ripping Yarns. New York: Pantheon, 1978.

More Ripping Yarns. London: Eyre Methuen, 1980.

Missionary. London: Methuen, 1983.

Dr Fegg's Encyclopedia of All World Knowledge. New York: Bedrick, 1984.

Limericks. London: Hutchinson, 1985.

The Mirrorstone. New York: Knopf, 1986.

Around the World in 80 Days. San Francisco: KQED Books, 1989.

Pole to Pole. San Francisco: KQED Books, 1992.

Pole to Pole: The Photographs. San Francisco: KQED Books, 1994.

Hemingway's Chair (novel). London: Methuen, 1995.

FURTHER READING

Hewison, Robert. Monty Python: The Case Against Irreverence, Scurrility, Profanity, Vilification, and Licentious Abuse. New York: Grove, 1981.

Johnson, Kim. Life (Before and) After Monty Python: The Solo Flights of the Flying Circus. New York: St. Martin's, 1993.

_______________. The First 20 Years of Monty Python. New York: St. Martin's, 1989.

McCall, Douglas L. Monty Python: A Chronological Listing of the Troupe's Creative Output, and Articles and Reviews About Them. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 1991.