Monday, October 9th
Today I am about to earn £850. This is more than Helen earned in a whole year as a professional teacher.
For this £850 I am required to perform two 15-second commercials for Hunky Chunks. The make-up is poor, the studios of TV International in Whitfield Street are shabby – so why this money? Well firstly because Quaker Oats, the client, make so much profit from selling their foods that they can afford to throw away £850, and secondly because the bait has to be very tempting to make self-respecting human beings, let alone actors, talk about ‘The moist, meaty dog-food that contains more concentrated nourishment than canned dog-food.’
So I sold my soul for £850, and was made to squirm for it. The first ad was done outside in the street with me, a crate of dog-food and a camera. Who should come along as I was recording, but David Jason who lives nearby. He and John Cleese (who was working on the same Hunky Chunks series) hid in a doorway and peered out at me in the middle of a take.
Sunday, October 15th
Thomas and I and William returned from a walk on the Heath to find hordes of policemen in about half a dozen assorted vehicles, milling around Richard and Christine’s house on the corner of Oak Village. In the middle of the blue helmets was Helen, obviously the centre of some attention. For an awful moment I thought that she was being arrested – an unimaginable irony in view of her obsessionally law-abiding behaviour. However, it turned out that Helen had been alerted by Muriel of the house opposite to a man climbing over the wall of the Guedallas’ with a colour TV set and stand. It gradually dawned on Helen that the Guedallas were away and also that TV repair men didn’t work on Sundays, and anyway they usually tried the front door first before climbing over the back garden wall.
So Helen and Muriel’s husband Bob went looking for this character, and took themselves by surprise when they rounded a corner and literally bumped into him. Helen – quite courageously, considering he had an Alsatian dog with him – asked him what he was doing in the Guedallas’ house. Declining explanations, he made a run for it and Helen, not Bob, made a grab for him. He easily pushed her away and ran off. Bob shouted valiantly after him, ‘We’ve got your identification.’ And he was gone.
Helen had already rung the police. They soon descended in droves – local fuzz and Scotland Yard. The unfortunate telly-snatcher didn’t stand a chance. He was picked up almost immediately and so were the TV and the stand. Helen was quite the local hero, and very pleased with herself.
Saturday, October 21st
Dinner across the road with the recently moved-in neighbours, Rod and Ann. Ann (we found out) is the sister of John Sergeant, who was in revue at Oxford two years after me, and with whom I once did some sketch writing about four or five years ago. He acted in the Alan Bennett series On the Margin as Bennett’s straight man1 and then left comedy for news – worked at Reuters and now with the BBC as a sound reporter.
Tonight we were reunited. We spent a very enjoyable evening, and I was especially interested in his stories of reporting from Vietnam and Belfast. Vietnam is badly beaten up, but not such a totally flattened country as people make out – the on-the-spot action news film, which the American networks put out as reports from the battlefield, are all taken by South Vietnamese cameramen. In Ireland everyone reads the papers avidly. The IRA leaders are available at all times to talk to newsmen if you know the right number to ring. John was hijacked in his car once by an IRA man who threatened to blow his brains out if he tried to resist.
Monday, October 23rd
At 8.00 I went out to a Gospel Oak meeting. There are quite a number of consultative meetings held in and around Oak Village, as the whole area is being subjected to such massive redevelopment. In 1951 the first redevelopment in Gospel Oak was Barrington Court – by Powell and Moya. It’s a long, ten-storey block, but is as good as many present-day functional designs, and better than most. The West Kentish Town development followed in the 1950s – it’s not picturesque, but it is low-rise and friendly.
Then a progressive deterioration of architectural standards, which reached its nadir in the appalling block which borders Mansfield Road and is known locally as the Barracks. It is without charm, without style, without any beauty whatsoever – it is essentially a mathematical achievement, a result of juggling a lot of people with a little money, stymied as the Camden planners are now by the general abandonment of high-rise blocks.
Some of the new occupants were at the St Martin’s Church Hall tonight to hear proposals for Lismore Circus renovation and for the next part of the Gospel Oak scheme.
The meeting was entirely staffed by stereotypes. If one had written a play with these characters in it would have been called facile and uninventive. Mr and Mrs Brick of Kiln Place – a physically formidable pair and both with plenty to say forcibly and clearly. The populist vicar, who couldn’t resist occasional semantic jokes; the hard-line Marxist, in a nondescript coat but with a fine, strong, lean face, worn hard and lined in struggles for the proletariat. The woolly-headed liberals, the gentle, embarrassed architect, and even the local hippy, a squatter who berated the platform from the back of the room for being cynical and hypocritical in even having this meeting at all.
Notes that stuck in my mind – a small Andy Capp-like figure telling the platform with a feeling of frustrated sadness, ‘Living round here is bloody terrible.’ The soft-voiced, inoffensive, architect taking on the wrath of the gathering as well as its repartee. He was talking of how, even when the builders were working, ‘Lismore Circus retained its trees, its flowers, even squirrels …’ – ‘and rats’ came a voice from the audience. The lack of enthusiasm for the plans from the audience was understandable, but very, very sad. For here was an enlightened borough, with a good and humane record, selling something that people didn’t want in the most democratic way possible.
Friday, October 27th
An eventful day. Began with a Python meeting at John’s to discuss future long-term plans. An interesting thing happened. I had originally told Charisma that we did not want individual writing credits for the two sides of the single (‘Eric the Half-Bee’ by Eric and John and ‘Yangtse Song’ by myself and Terry) on the grounds that Python had never before singled out writers’ specific contributions. But Eric had told Jim that he wanted his name on the single. So this was the first awkward point that I brought up with John and Eric this morning. Predictably Eric bristled, but with a bitterness that I didn’t expect. He wanted his name on the record because he was going to write more songs and this would help him. He lashed out bitterly at what he thought was merely a weak-kneed way of protecting Graham. John, however, agreed with me – that the principle of Python’s ‘collective responsibility’ was more important. Eric went quiet, John went out to make coffee. I felt bad vibrations and tried to think of a compromise. But as suddenly as the storm broke it was over. Eric apologised, said I was absolutely right and that he was being stupid about it – but all this came out in such a way that I felt a warm flood of friendship as well as considerable relief.
After the meeting we all drove over to the BBC to see Duncan Wood and discuss the cuts he proposed in our new series. These cuts involved the excision of whole sketches about a French wine-taster who serves his clients only wee-wee, and an awful City cocktail bar where upper-class twits ask for strange cocktails – one of which, a mallard fizz, involves cutting the head off a live duck. Other cuts included the word ‘masturbating’ (a contestant in a quiz game gives his hobbies as ‘golf, strangling animals and masturbating’), the phrase ‘I’m getting pissed tonight’ and most of two sketches, one about a Dirty Vicar and the other about the Oscar Wilde Café Royal set, who run short of repartee and at one point liken King Edward VII to a stream of bat’s piss. But we were protesting mainly about the volume of the cuts, not particular instances – tho’Terry crusaded violently on behalf of masturbating, launching off at a Kinseyian tangent about the benefits of masturbation. ‘I masturbate, you masturbate, we all masturbate!’ he enth
used. Duncan crossed his legs and pulled hard on his cigarette. Our point was basically why, if we are going out at 10.15 – well after children and family peak viewing – are we suddenly being so heavily censored?
Duncan Wood at first protested that we weren’t being heavily censored, that four cuts in the first nine shows wasn’t bad (I must say in the first of the series we got away with the line from a judge, ‘Screw the Bible, I’ve got a gay lib meeting at 6.00,’ which certainly couldn’t be spoken on any other TV ser-vice in the world). So he has clearly relented over certain of the cuts he wanted Ian to make. He promised to review Shows 12 and 13 again, with us, so that we could all see what we were talking about.
After the sting had been taken out of the meeting we got to talking about censorship generally – and why the BBC seemed to be suddenly more frightened of causing offence. Genial Duncan chain-smoked and talked in a vague and roundabout way of’pressures from outside’ causing a temporary tighten-up in censorship. Who and what these pressures were was never revealed. There seemed no evidence that there was popular support for BBC censorship – quite the opposite – the most outspoken of BBC progs, Till Death Us Do Part, has an audience of nearly 20 million, and Python itself has higher viewing figures than ever (round about 10 million for the first show of the latest series). Duncan was either stalling or genuinely didn’t know, but there was a sinister ‘I am only obeying orders’ tone to his whole attitude.
We parted amicably – he was happy because he had said nothing and got away with it – as Eric said it was like arguing with a piece of wet cod.
Saturday, November 4th
I travel down on the 24 bus – I really prefer public transport these days – it’s more restful, cheaper and wonderful entertainment along the way. Bonuses like an early-morning walk through Soho – one of the areas London ought to be proud of for the quality and quantity of its delights. It is, for instance, a much more honest place of enjoyment than Mayfair, with its Rolls-Royces, expensive shops, poor and snobbish restaurants and red lights. This Saturday morning Soho Square was free of cars, people were washing down the pavements outside their restaurants, there was a quiet and leisurely feeling of waking up, and I felt very happy to be in London.
Spent three hours with André, editing and tightening the B side of the new album until it was in a very strong and satisfying shape, then, with Terry and André, walked across Regent Street and into Savile Row, where the Apple Studios are situated in a well-preserved row of Georgian town houses. They seem to be the only place that has the technology to cut our multiple B side.
Down the stairs to the basement. Into a foyer with heavy carpets, two soft sofas and felt covered walls, all in a rather dark, restful plum colour. A big glass-topped coffee table, designed for only the best coffee table books, was littered with copies of the Daily Mirror. A flamboyant stainless steel strip was sunk into one wall. Immediate impression on entering the cutting room of being in a Harley Street dentist’s consulting room.
At one point, about 7.00, I had just come back into the studios after having a drink when a slight, thin figure walked towards me. The face was familiar, but, before I could register anything, a look of recognition crossed George Harrison’s face, and he shook my hand, and went into a paean of praise for Monty Python – with the same exaggerated enthusiasm that I would have lavished on the Beatles had I met them five years ago. He said he couldn’t wait to see Python on 35mm, big screen.
Finally left Apple about 8.00 – the cutter, John, promised to have more attempts at the cut over the weekend, but the chances of producing this highly original B side don’t seem too rosy.
Tuesday, November 7th
Heard during the afternoon that Apple were unable to cut the three-track B side. Terry took the tapes round to EMI for them to have a go, so we can only cross our fingers. Tonight is American election night, and I invited Simon Albury and his brother Robert round to hear the results and watch the telly special from 12 till 2.00.
Sadly McGovern got wiped out, almost totally, carrying the District of Columbia’s three electoral votes, and Massachusetts – who probably voted because of Kennedy anyway. He has been dogged by misfortune in his campaign – mainly the Eagleton affair, but also because Nixon played a crafty, quiet campaign. It was not until this last week that people have really begun to lay into Nixon’s record – he was somehow let off the hook by the press, not because they praised, but because they failed to criticise him until too late.
To bed about 2.45.
Wednesday, November 8th
At last an, as yet, uninterrupted day’s writing ahead of me, a luxury which hasn’t happened for a long time. Thomas leaves for his playgroup at 9.55. Helen takes William out to the shops. All is quiet for a bit – the sun shines in onto my desk, and I feel all’s well with the world. But the phone soon starts ringing – EMI cannot do the cut, what shall we do?
Almost an hour is spent ringing round the Pythons to get them to a meeting on Thursday to listen to the record. We decide to cut the B side in mono, which apparently will allow the three-track cut to work. So Apple now have the job again.
Looked at a book of Yoga exercises.
Friday, November 10th
In the evening a pleasant meal with Robert [Hewison]. Delicious beef olives cooked by the maestro. As usual I was impressed and injected with academic enthusiasm by the neat order of Robert’s little flat – with its shelfful of Goncourt journals in French, the latest books on Coleridge – of course his great Ruskin collection (Robert is now a B.Litt.).
Monday, November 20th
Arrived back in London after a long weekend in Southwold with Helen, Thomas and William.
Brought two family portraits back home – one of my great-grandfather, Edward Palin, Vicar of Linton, drawn almost a hundred years ago, I guess – a fine looking man – and the other of his wife Brita née Gallagher – she by contrast looks hunched and rather wizened. I should imagine that was drawn nearer the turn of the century. Amazing to think that I have physical genetic links with these remote figures.
I had this wrong. The older lady was not Brita, my great-grandmother, but Caroline Watson, a rich American lady who had adopted Brita when she arrived on a coffin ship in New York in the 1840s, an orphan from the Irish potato famine. I was to discover fuller details from a cousin of my father’s (entry for September 30th 1977). It was such a remarkable story that in 1990 Tristram Powell and I made it into a film called American Friends.
Wednesday, November 22nd
Success with Mark Shivas!
Terry and I talked our way into a commission for an hour-long ‘Black and Blue’ play – with an improvised verbal synopsis which he appeared to be quite pleased with. It required quite a gamble on his part, and we both felt greatly encouraged by his confidence.
Impressed by his modesty and the almost Spartan simplicity of his office. As producer of the highly successful Six Wives of Henry VIII series, he must be one of the most sought-after producers in TV and yet he remains in an anonymous, nondescript, austere office in TV Centre. Such are the artistic attractions of working for an organisation such as the Beeb that they tend to cancel out other disadvantages. After seeing Shivas, we visited Ian MacNaughty and then Terry Hughes to whom we delivered a Two Ronnies script. Ian MacN – with Eke always at his side like a prowling lion to encourage, goad, solace, and generally keep him healthy – was in his office, but he didn’t know for how long. He wants to go freelance next spring, presumably to do another Python film, for we have never made it clear we will be directing it ourselves.
I think perhaps we should now come clean and let him know that there is not much more work for him with Python. He is a much happier man now than he used to be. So any final break will be that bit more difficult.
Monday, December 4th
A very successful Python meeting at John’s. Everyone was remarkably direct about future plans and there was a remarkable freedom of pressure on anyone to fit in with others’ plans. The basic f
actor in the future life of Python is that John has had enough of Python TV shows – he doesn’t enjoy writing or performing them – the thought of doing any more makes his stomach tighten, so he said. He is the oldest of us, he has done more TV than any of us, and had done twenty-six Frost Reports before any of us really started performing. So he’s ahead of us in the disillusionment stakes – tho’ I cannot agree with him at all about the drudgery of doing TV shows. I find them hard, but exhilarating experiences and I’m still at the stage of appreciating how fantastically lucky I am to have the opportunity to write and perform my own material, on TV, almost free of restrictions. Still, John does not share this view – and will not commit himself to any more Python work after the film next summer.
The next major factor was that Eric and Graham especially were concerned about making some money next year – so far, making a film is the least lucrative thing we’ve done. To solve this we decided to try and fix up a two-or three-week university tour in April, on the lines of our successful Coventry Festival show a couple of years ago.
Later in the evening, Eric rang me up – still a little worried about where work, therefore loot, was to come from in the next year. I had mentioned my keenness to do some more TV next Christmas and Eric was ringing to lend support to this. Has today seen the first seeds of a new post-Python TV series, without John and possibly without Graham, or will we, as I forecast, find ourselves all together again next December?
It rained all day. I gave up [John Barth’s] The Sot-Weed Factor on page 440 and started to read Laurie Lee’s Cider with Rosie, by the fire.
Tuesday, December 5th
Drove to Harrods to see around their own chocolate factory – the first breakthrough in our protracted attempts to gain some first-hand experience of a chocolate factory for our ‘Black and Blue’ script. Harrods was like an ocean liner in the dark, rainy, wild evening. A Mr Jackson from the confectionery department, white-haired, but probably no more than 50, with a knowing smile and a rather self-deprecating manner, took us into Harrods underground travel network via a Colditz-style entrance behind the butchery department. We walked under Knightsbridge, feeling even more as tho’ we were in an ocean liner – only this time in the engine room.
Diaries 1969–1979 The Python Years Page 14
