“When they say, ‘Where do your ideas come from?’ the honest answer is, ‘From my unconscious.’”
By Nick A. Zaino III Globe correspondent,Updated June 5, 2024, 11:13 a.m.
Nearly 50 years after the debut of “Monty Python and The Holy Grail,” one of its stars and writers — John Cleese — will return to the Chevalier in Medford for a screening of the endlessly quotable comedy, followed by a conversation and Q&A session. Guests are encouraged to come with “absurd and/or ridiculous questions,” which shouldn’t be difficult considering the film’s dynamite rabbit, indefatigable yet limbless knight, and debate over migratory swallows.
There’s one question the Python faithful might want to avoid: “Where did that idea come from?” Cleese has heard this one a lot and made up some joke answers for it, but he’s not really sure. “Most of the time when they say, ‘Where do your ideas come from?’ the honest answer is, ‘From my unconscious,’” says Cleese. “I don’t know how my unconscious works.”
That explanation is not always enough for Monty Python fans, who are an obsessive lot. They memorize and repeat lines from the BBC show “Monty Python’s Flying Circus” and all of the Python movies as shorthand to recognize other enthusiasts with the same sense of humor. They study the texts and develop their own theories. That will create an occasional myth, like the one for the “Holy Grail” scene when Cleese introduces his Tim the Enchanter character.
“Somebody says, ‘Oh, you took a big pause before you said Tim, and everyone says it was because you forgot your words,’” says Cleese. “The answer is no. I built it up because Tim is such a feeble name and it needed a big buildup to create anticlimax. But people will talk about this as if it actually happened.”
