Gospel Oak, 1979, with Will, Rachel and Tom.
Thursday, September 21st, Monastir
Back on our imperial rostrum again this morning.
One of the great delights is playing with John on his close-ups. John is, on a good night, one of the world’s great corpsers, and today I have the rare luxury of being able to try and corpse him absolutely legitimately. On one take he is unable to speak for almost half a minute.
Drive back with JC. We take a bedtime Armagnac in my room and I bore him with a monologue about my novel. JC doesn’t think he could write one. His mind tends to the factual and informative, he says – he feels he can’t reproduce or create atmosphere.
Friday, September 22nd, Monastir
At the location by eight to provide off-camera lines for the crowd at Mandy’s house, which is located in a busy corner of the Ribat, dressed to give the feeling of a Jerusalem tenement block of AD33. Lots of Gilliam detail. Full of Arabs, it really looks amazingly good.
Graham gives us a few full-frontals early on. He does pose rather well – probably an unconscious result of many years’ absorption in gay mags.
As well as our ever-enthusiastic crowd of Arabs, we also have some English tourists, rounded up from nearby hotels and referred to by various collective nouns – the ‘Clarksons’, the ‘Cosmos’.
I was asking our patient, hard-working Arab assistant director, who has the unenviable task of explaining Terry’s instructions, how the locals were assembled. Apparently some are students and others just villagers, recruited after a tour of the surrounding areas in which the assistant director, as he told me, ‘explained Python to them’. That must be worth some sort of award.
Terry J’s method of teaching an Arab crowd to speak English is quite a phenomenon … He was pressed for time, admittedly, but the Jones technique went something like this …
‘Let’s try it then … “We are all individuals”.’
The good-natured, completely baffled Arabs mimic Terry as best they can.
Terry:’Good …! Good … you’ve nearly got it … Once more, “We are all individuals”.’
Arab noise.
Terry: ‘Very good! Now let’s try “Yes, we must decide everything for ourselves”.’
Economic note: the Arab extras get 3 dinars per day (£3.50), plus a loaf of bread and a tin of sardines at lunchtime. We are getting about a thousand pounds per filming day, plus accommodation at a first class hotel and a lunch from the Italian caterers which will be a choice of spaghetti, ravioli, steak, veal, omelette, salad and fresh fruit. At the Hotel Méridien, pride of Air France’s new hotels, the Arab who comes to turn my bed back in the evening gets one dinar 500 millimes per day.
Avoid an invitation to a spaghetti party this evening – Signor Memmo, the caterer, is challenging Achmed, our Arab production head, to a spaghetti-making contest. My voice is strained after two days as Pilate and today’s efforts, so I will rest it before the Ex-Leper tomorrow.
Eat in the gloomy Meridien restaurant. But food good, and fall to talking with John about relationships. John has been going to therapy groups for two or three years. Says he finds most of those present are Jewish couples. He seems to be very conscious of the fact that his mother gave him very little affection. He was always close to his father.
However, he has a very good relationship with the head waiter. I found that the reason was that John had given him ten Mogadon, as the man hadn’t slept properly for a month. Now he’s eating out of JC’s hand.
Saturday, September 23rd, Monastir
At the make-up house at seven to prepare for the Ex-Leper. He’s supposed to look golden, tanned, muscular and fit, and I must say, as a result of my recent sun-bathing, plenty of swimming and running through French woods and along Tunisian beaches, I don’t look too bad. Certainly in better shape than for a while, and mentally congratulating myself for having coped with the food over these first two weeks without any recourse to pills, potions or other medicaments. This seems to be an increasingly rare thing on the unit.
On the set, I realise how much of an ivory tower I am in at the Meridien – and such detachment surely does not behove a diarist. I missed, for instance, the scenes after Pilate’s filming. Apparently there were near riots as people struggled to make sure they got their 3 dinars. On Friday morning Terry J’s car was chased by hopeful extras as he left the hotel.
Also I missed (thankfully) the sparks’ excesses at the spaghetti party, when a specially-prepared giant cake was thrown at the wall. They can’t stand any form of lack of excess.
This evening we are invited to a cocktail do by the Tunisian Minister of Tourism. Drive round to the Skanes Palace Hotel at 7.30. Cosier decor than the Meridien, but still in the International Modern Airport style. First thing I see is one of the chippies with a sticker across his forehead and the word ‘English’ on it, looking dangerously provocative, but it all passes off without incident.
Monday, September 25th, Monastir
Up at 7.30. Swim, breakfast in room. See John C leaving. He says, ominously, that although he’s not in today’s scenes, he is going to ‘help out’ behind camera. John Goldstone is worried about TJ’s unshakeable commitment to full-frontals in the Mandy/Brian bedroom scene. Says he’s talked to John about it. So that’s why John’s gone in.
Arrive on set to find a harassed Terry J. He’s not pleased at John’s interference today – words have been changed at the last minute. By the pool at the Sidi M, over lunch, TJ, GC both feel very tensed up by John’s presence ‘behind the camera’. The first sign of any serious split in the Python ranks.
There’s little danger from Eric, who keeps himself very much to himself and will not get into costume unless he’s absolutely certain that he will be seen. The lengths to which he has to go to preserve this elusiveness would seem to me hardly worth the strain.
I actually enjoy a fairly unrewarding afternoon as a revolutionary creeping up smoky passages – and have pleasant chats with Bernard [McKenna] and Andrew and others. We shoot till six in conditions of increasing discomfort.
Tuesday, September 26th, Monastir
Long, complicated, but unusually vivid dreams these nights. Last night I was in a jumbo jet flying from Australia to London, in which there were rooms, pillared, columned and lavishly spacious – rather like those of Heron Bay. I wasn’t feeling well, and Graham diagnosed measles. I remember thinking it could be a three-or-four-week break in the schedule – but Graham said he’d give me some special stuff, which, provided I kept out of everyone’s way for a few days, would put me right. I was then confined to the bulbous interior of a cargo aircraft’s nose, surrounded by blocks of ice.
Was promised a day off today and, after a swim, settle to a longer than usual breakfast in my room of two very tastily fried eggs, fruit juice, croissant and coffee. Talk briefly to the dear, dark-eyed lady at reception, who always replies to one’s ‘Thank you’ with a disturbingly cheery ‘Never mind’.
Then I’m called in and sit in the caravan in a full beard and wig make-up until lunch, when, still not used, I strip it all off and take to the pool, where GC is relaxing after his usual busy morning. Medical work is running acting very close as Graham’s chief activity these days – even at the poolside today he was approached by the stills photographer’s wife with a raging sore throat, Terry J with a sore throat and Peter Biziou on behalf of Cristina, who is ill in bed.
This afternoon hang around, but am still not used. However, finish Tess of the D’Urbervilles and begin Vile Bodies before a rather cool and buffeting wind drives me off the poolside and down to the bar of the Sidi.
For the first time since our arrival, found myself drinking out of sheer laziness and, as more and more people wandered into the bar, I could hardly be bothered to get out of the way of about four beers and, two hours later, a group of us spilled over to the Coq for briks and things.
Today has shown signs of strain in the unit. Terry G is worried that TJ is driving everyone along at
such a frenetic pace that he isn’t leaving enough time to get the best shots. Gilliam is especially irked that the elaborately splendid detail of his market place is not being seen. He keeps muttering that this might as well have been done at Shepperton for two million less.
Thursday, September 28th, Monastir
Boring Prophet morning for me. Quite exhilarating as had to ad-lib most of the dull, droning speech. We did four or five takes and I tried to, or rather felt compelled to, make it a little different each time. Terry G spends most of the day coated in mud and does another of his extraordinary and grotesque gargoylical performances – this time as a Blood and Thunder Prophet.
I’m through by three and, feeling oppressed by the layers of dirt – mainly fuller’s earth and the less wholesome aerosol spray – which attend nearly all my characters, I soak some of it off in the sea. A fresh north-west wind has blown everyone off the beaches and left empty deck chairs whose canvases now flap and slap violently in the wind, as if repelling unseen occupants.
Tonight at rushes (one and a half hours’ worth) my chief worry is the Ex-Leper. The dancing, prancing, gum-chewing character seems to go down well enough, but he looks like a cross between Tarzan and Geronimo – and somehow this detracts from the impact of the scene. As TJ says, he’s the only character so far who has looked out of period. The Terrys agree, and a re-shoot of this end part of the scene is scheduled for tomorrow.
Dinner at the Sidi Mansour with the British Ambassador and his wife. A special menu, fresh flowers, champagne and lines of various shaped glasses adorn the table. No ethnic music, fortunately.
Sit next to Mrs Ambassador. A plummy-voiced, not unattractive lady a hand taller than her husband. She speaks with lazy confidence and I marvel at how very British she is – she manages to sound and look more like a bishop’s wife on a four-day visit to Tunisia, than someone who’s been here a year. Not a trace of tan, or any real enthusiasm for things Tunisian.
She was not unkind, but the very nature of her language and way of expressing herself produced some treasured lines … ‘Do you know, our gardeners, every night, whenever they go home …’ I wait with bated breath for the revelation, ‘… always take a little bunch of weeds with them.’ She was referring to the Tunisian habit of not wasting anything. She was also good on not ‘spoiling the local people’. Her example was not giving them the best Fortnum and Mason tea, ‘which they probably wouldn’t like anyway’.
Friday, September 29th, Monastir
A hard last day of the week. Into the small Ribat today, where a hypocaust has been constructed which is even harder to walk through than the tunnel. It’s very hot, too, and besides being encumbered with extraordinarily clumsy props, there’s an almost stifling smell of incense1 inside the tunnels.
A BBC film unit arrive to shoot us. They look a sad little group – white and flabby and rather down at heel. Makes me aware how well we all must look after three weeks of sunshine out here.
Swim in the sea at lunchtime. Re-do the Ex-Leper ending afterwards. All sorts of things go wrong – a plane flies over, the BBC camera crew get in shot, the Ribat lavatory attendant gets in shot, an extra called Mahomet wanders in and out of shot at unpredictable moments, as no-one takes the trouble really to explain things to him.
Terry G keeps strewing the ground where I’m standing for the Ex-Leper with scatterings of sheep’s legs, squashed water melons and foul-smelling water around which the flies gather.
Then back to crouch in the tunnel again as Francis. John Stanier, the operator, says it isn’t nearly as bad as filming forty feet down in a water-filled sewer in Midnight Express. This cheers me a little. It’s now after seven and darkness has fallen on the Ribat. Final massive shot of the wall being cleaned at night. Comradeliness of night-shooting compensates for feeling of discomfort caused by dirt, very uncomfortable gear and cold wind.
Sunday, October 1st, Monastir
Beside the sea an Arab boy is striking a recalcitrant camel with a stick. Big, swinging blows directed at the head. Have noticed before that there are some quite vicious camel and donkey punishers plying the Corniche. Tania once saw an elderly man striking an even more elderly and wretched horse with such force that it fell on to its side, whereupon he began to kick it. Tania (ex of Bronx Zoo, and as fine an example of how to treat God’s creatures well as you could wish to find) ran up and remonstrated with him.
The hotel is quiet. Tim Hampton [our line producer] arrives at five to eleven with his four-year-old son Piers to play tennis with me in the Python competition.
Our tennis match, on a rough-textured, dusty court, surrounded by palms and reminiscent of Barbados, lasted for nearly one and a half hours in punishing heat. Neither of us could serve very well, but we played comfortable, if unexciting rallies – and took almost every game to deuce. Tim, an awfully pleasant and well-mannered chap, was a gallant loser – and I a winner only by consistent mediocrity and once holding my serve.
Woken at a quarter to one by flashes. A violent storm passes down the coast. Almost continuous blue, yellow flashes and hotel-splitting cracks of thunder. And torrents of rain.
Monday, October 2nd, Monastir
Wake at six. Today we’re at Sousse, filming outside the city walls, where Zeffirelli filmed his crucifixion scenes. The day doesn’t look promising. Though it’s not actually raining, the countryside is waterlogged and the sky much cloudier than usual. It’s cooler too.
The opening shot (of Mandy and Brian) seems to take forever, and I sit around, half-naked, made up as the Ex-Leper. I’ve even been evicted from my caravan, which is being used as a make-up base for extra lepers. An hour and a half before I’m used – leaping up, bronzed and fit, from a crowd of lepers at the city gates. Eric is quite impressed by my Steve Reeves-ish torso.
No sooner is the leper shot done, than the heavens open and a steady, unspectacular rainfall begins. The clouds merge into a single leaden sky, and Sousse, and its ancient and impressive castle walls, becomes Yorkshire or Scotland or Dartmoor.
I share Eric’s caravan. Gwen, Eric and I natter. Eric takes a cluster of health pills – a small handful from a little pill box with compartments. Discover Gwen has three names – Allsop, Blount and Taylor. The first her real one, the second her married name, the third her adopted stage name. She worked in a bank for eight years before going to Stratford East Drama School, married a toolmaker called Fred Blount, who had a habit of obsessive hand-washing, and whom she divorced partly for this reason.
Eric told of his father, who was killed in the war when Eric was two. He was an RAF gunner – killed in a car accident whilst on Christmas leave. Which was why Christmas was never a very happy time at the Idles’.
Jonathan Benson (our genial, well-bred assistant director, who is writing a screenplay about the Lord Lucan affair) chimed in here, without a trace of anger or even malice, ‘I went to the pictures the night my old man died. He was a judge. We were glad to get rid of him …’
John Cleese was judging a flower show near Weston-super-Mare as his father was dying. He didn’t know whether to cancel or not – and felt he couldn’t let them down.
Tuesday, October 3rd, Monastir
The schedule has been rearranged and much of my heaviest work will now be when Helen and the children are here. The weather seems to be more settled this morning, but it rained again in the night.
After rushes last night I sat up talking with Anjelica Huston who told me of their experiences down in the desert. It sounds depressing – things you don’t expect, like the oases, which look beautiful, but on closer inspection are littered with plastic detritus and cotton wool swabs. And flies which cluster at nose and mouth and every other orifice within a matter of seconds.
We talked over Armagnac for a couple of hours. She’s one of those people I feel instantly at ease with. She’s articulate, but has a certain quality of apologetic nervousness.
She talked about her dad, John Huston, and the childhood in Ireland – which sounded almost per
fect – not only comfort and space and horses to ride, but also a steady stream of visitors like Brando and William Wyler and Katharine Hepburn – many of whom used her to get through to her father.
Then father and mother split and she didn’t see a lot of him and, for a while, was ‘kind of scared of him’. Now he’s living in Mexico, still making plans for movies, though he’s had a serious operation. He acts, but has great contempt for actor’s bullshit. He likes Jack [Nicholson], she said with a smile, and would quite like her to marry him … She laughed, as if appreciating the thought, but having no intention of acting on it.
Then there was more lightning to entertain us and more Armagnac and I began to talk about Python. Then she suddenly got up and said she ought to go – and we exchanged a polite kiss – the Armagnac had not altogether overcome a hint of attractive awkwardness in her as we said goodbye.
First thing this morning, the BBC filmed Eric, John and myself getting ready. John shows them his hair transplant and I show them how my dentures no longer seem to fit.
Then a rather jolly day inside Matthias’ room as plotting revolutionaries. Everyone on good form and much improvised joking. At lunchtime a meeting with John G and Anne H.
The subject of EMI’s settlement came up. They are talking of offering us something by way of recompense but would probably insist on a secrecy clause. John C resisted this idea for a bit, but when told that the alternative was a possible two-year wait for a court hearing, he agreed quite sharply.
Drove back to the hotel with JC. I took him a silly route through the car park which he enjoyed so much I had to drive him round again – in and out of narrow gaps, tightly round trees, almost on two wheels. He really enjoyed it and seemed genuinely impressed that I could drive like that! I know John can only drive automatics, but I didn’t know he couldn’t go round corners.
Diaries 1969–1979 The Python Years Page 67
