There were, as we all know, 45 half-hour episodes of Monty Python's Flying Circus produced for the BBC between 1969 and 1974. If you're the kind of person who enjoys this website, I have a feeling you've seen them all. You may even, like me, have purchased the DVD sets of all 45 episodes. (If you did and you thought, "Now I have them all and I never need to buy them again"…well, you should know better than that by now. I'm told by several sources that a new complete set is in the works…and it'll not only be in hi-def but it'll be more complete than the previous complete set. Just think of it as yet another salvo in the W.W.C.T.G.Y.T.B.N.C.O.S.Y.A.O (the World Wide Conspiracy To Get You To Buy New Copies Of Stuff You Already Own).
Anyway, if and when there's another set, it may or may not contain the sketch that is today's video link. It's kind of a "lost" bit from the Python TV show. As near as I can piece together the sequence of events, it goes like this…
This routine was the opening sketch of Episode #38. It was in the show as it was originally broadcast both in the U.K. and here in the States. At some point, the BBC cut it out of a rebroadcast, reportedly because it depicted Prime Minister Edward Heath in a tutu. The rebroadcast was just before an election and it seemed inappropriate just then. Alas, no one ever thought to restore it and later, when copies of the show were made for worldwide syndication purposes, they were made from the tape that was missing the sketch. There seems to be some question as to whether a pristine copy of it even exists today so maybe it won't be on any forthcoming complete sets.
I e-mailed Python authority Kim "Howard" Johnson to ask if he could tell me anything more about the sketch you're about to see. He notes that "It's interesting that this isn't a 'censored' sketch, but one that was cut and never restored again due to BBC error." He also wrote the following which I thought was too intriguing not to pass on here…
One frightening fact: if Python had begun 2 or 3 years earlier than it did (in October 1969), it would have been in black and white, and therefore, never saved by the BBC, which didn't want to waste the videotape on silly comedy shows (which is why most of Spike Milligan's shows are long gone). And I would have gone into another line of work…
A frightening thought, indeed…not that Kim would have needed to find an honest job but that Monty Python's Flying Circus might have been lost to us. Let's give thanks that they still exist and let's savor this little nugget that hasn't been seen much. And while you're at it, thank Eric Gimlin who suggested this clip to me.
