Tuesday, November 25, 1975

{ABC in America had bought Python’s fourth series and reorganized it into two specials. This was Michael Palin’s first look at the proposed edits.}

It started well, with ‘The World’s Most Awful Family,’ which works a treat after the smooth and glossy ABC packaging of the show, but then the cuts begin. The cat-in-the-wall bell push (a big laugh in the studio) is cut . . . In the ‘Montgolfier Brothers’ the words ‘naughty bits’ are bleeped out!

. . .

. . . anything, as Douglas Adams put it, ‘to do with life,’ was single-mindedly expunged.

The cuts which seemed most remarkable to me were in the ‘Neutron’ sketch, when I played the US Bombing Commander who had personal odour problems. The character was in, but every appearance was topped and tailed to avoid all reference to his bodily hygiene. As that was the only original and Pythonesque twist to the character, he just came out as a below-average imitation of George C. Scott.

. . .

The first step as far as we’re concerned is to let as many people in America as possible know that we dissociate ourselves from the ABC sale and, better still, to let as many people as possible know the reason why.

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Saturday, Nov. 25th, 1978

Embark for George Harrison’s in the Mini.

Arrive at Friar’s Park as the sun has just set. It must be two years since I came here with Eric to complete the mixing of ‘Lumberjack Song’ (or was it three?)

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Sunday, Nov. 25th, 1979

Take my mother to see Life of Brian. The Plaza is packed. A sell-out. I think she enjoyed it, except for a few qualifications about the ‘Crucifixiion’ ending. . . . Remain virtually incognito and afterwards we slope off to the Dean Street Pizza Express.

— Michael Palin, Diaries 1969 – 1979: The Python Years