Life *is* Pain, Princess... The Princess Bride, Almost 25 years Later.

I'll just come right out and say it. Like so many others, The Princess Bride is one of my all-time favorite films. In fact, on my personal top 10, it beats out The Empire Strikes Back, any of the Lord of the Rings films and Ghostbusters. I put it at a solid third place, only behind Raiders of the Lost Ark and Casablanca. I've never been much for purchasing DVDs, and in the last few years I've just about completely forsaken them in favor of streaming, yet I find that it bothers me that I don't know where my copy of this movie is.  I've done stage fighting choreography directly ripped off from the non-acrobatic portions of the duel between Westley and Inigo, and like so many others I've quoted this film enough over the years to be thoroughly annoying. As a huge fan, I was excited to see many of the surviving cast reunited this week for interviews and a photo shoot with Entertainment Weekly for their annual reunions issue. After all these years, Billy Crystal and Carol Kane almost don't need makeup to play Miracle Max and Valerie anymore, and in contrast, I firmly believe that Cary Elwes has a painting in his attic somewhere (dude seriously hasn't aged since the 1980s.)  

Some of the surviving members of the cast, gathered to talk to
Good Morning America. Billy Crystal is wearing the original Miracle Max hat.

The movie, released in 1987, is a loose adaptation of the William Goldman (who also wrote Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid) novel of the same name, published in 1978. I've read the book, and this is one of those amazing instances where there are really very significant differences between a source novel and its screen adaptation, but both are very, very good. The book contains elements that could only have really worked on the page, as the framing story of Goldman's Grandfather is there, but the book presents itself as a writer trying to re-tell a story the way his grandfather told it to him. As an adult, he realizes that the actual book his grandfather read to him from wasn't very good, it was a dry political satire disguised as a fairy tale, and he explains at points where the "original" deviates from the story the way he knows it. By the end of the retelling of the fictional original work that Goldman is "translating," we have a story that is hilarious and bittersweet, with nostalgia, love and the sadness that comes with life not turning out the way you wanted it to by the ending.

The film is an expert blend of comedy, adventure and romance, with the story of a Grandfather reading to a young boy remaining as the framing device. The classic story of Westley the stableboy and his love, Buttercup has pirates and conspirators, duels, monsters, a miracle maker, a six-fingered man and a giant from Greenland. I've found that there is no single other film with quite as many lines I routinely quote without even thinking about it anymore. It was marginally profitable upon release, but not a mega-hit at $30.8 million on a $16 million budget. The studios had no idea how to promote it as it didn't fit neatly into a single category that could be distilled into a short trailer. Director Rob Reiner said at the time that he didn't want to make a "Wizard of Oz," a film that, while venerated as a classic, was underappreciated commercially in its own time. Despite this, The Princess Bride really came into its own as a cult classic in the years following its release and is now recognized as one of the great films of the 1980s.

Please, quote responsibly. I love this film, but even I roll my eyes when
someone says "Anybody got a peanut?" whenever two words happen to rhyme.

In interviews given with the reunited cast, interesting and obscure facts concerning the production came to light. Robin Wright, who played Buttercup, spoke fondly of Andre the Giant, who passed away in 1993. She mentions that when filming outdoors in cold locations that the exceptionally large man helped keep her warm by literally palming her head in his gigantic hand. Wallace Shawn had his career defined by his role as the Sicilian criminal mastermind Vizzini, but he filmed the movie in fear that he'd be fired because Danny DeVito, who was Reiner's first choice for the part, would become suddenly available. Among the actor injuries on the set were Mandy Patinkin who literally hurt himself trying not to laugh at Billy Crystal, whose mostly improvised performance as Miracle Max had to be continually reshot because the other actors would break character, unable to control their laughter. Cary Elwes also had to be hospitalized when he told Christopher Guest to hit him for real in a scene where Count Rugen knocks Westley out, and he suffered a very real head injury.

The story was being developed for a possible stage adapation as a musical by Tony Award-winning composer Adam Guettel in 2006, but unfortunately the project was abandoned by 2007. William Goldman and Guettel had a falling out which broke the deal apart, though some of the completed music has survived. People close to William Goldman say that he was dissatisfied with the pace of completed work and the lack of progress after a year's time on the project. Other sources close to Adam Guettel say that the real reason the musical didn't happen was simpler, it was all about the money. Despite Guettel writing all the music and lyrics, and Goldman's contributions being slight aside from his writing for the book and film, the deal finally broke down when William Goldman demanded a 75% share of the revenues for writing. This was bad news for fans who were awaiting a show in the same vein as "The Producers" or "Spamelot," both stage musicals adapted from classic comedy films. At the end of the day, the story concerning the production of any new Princess Bride material matches the bittersweet notes in the book's ending, and we're reminded of something the film told us explicitly. "Life is pain... anyone who tells you differently is probably selling something."

And Now For Something Completely Different. - Monty Python for Geeks.

I woke this morning to check my usual routine of e-mail and social media sites, and noticed something... odd... on Facebook. Many friends, from many different walks of life, had quotes published to their respective statuses that were oddly familiar. With a little food in me and some of the morning fog cleared from my head, I made the connection. All the various statements and unusual quotes were from Monty Python's Flying Circus, or one of the Python films. The majority of the geeks I've met in my time, aside from the odd perpetual contrarian, have a deep abiding love for the British Comedy Troupe. Gamers, in particular, are capable of quoting large sections of “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” verbatim.

In college, I videotaped a marathon of the entire series, and never watched it again (at least on VHS.)

The Monty Python Comedy Troupe, formed in 1969 by five British men and one American expatriate, in large part defines British Comedy to American audiences. The mixture of dry intellectual wit with surrealist slapstick and non-sequiturs characterizes a style of humor that not everyone appreciates, or even understands. The troupe consisted of Michael Palin, Graham Chapman, Eric Idle, John Cleese, Terry Jones, and Terry Gilliam (the animator and aforementioned American.) The sketch comedy show “Monty Python's Flying Circus” ran from 1969 through 1974 for three and a half seasons, with John Cleese absent from the fourth abbreviated season. It was during the run of the television show that the first Python Movie: And Now For Something Completely Different was released, made up of sketches from the show and marketed towards exposing Monty Python to American audiences (which it did not.)

The end of the television program and the years immediately after had some of the greatest impact on geek culture because of two things, the discovery of Douglas Adams, and the first post-Flying Circus Film, Monty Python and the Holy Grail. The man who would go on to write the Sci-fi comedy epic series “The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy”, was discovered by Graham Chapman originally, and he was one of only two people not a part of the troupe to ever get a writing credit for the TV show. He also appeared in several episodes, the first of which was episode 42 (a number which would have some significance in his work later.) The Holy Grail retold the legend of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round table in a frequently silly and over-the-top typical Python style.

One of the very first DVDs I ever bought.

Something set in a medieval adventure setting with knights, horses and even a fire-throwing wizard all cast in the British comedy style was something that geeks world wide could get into. In America in particular, by 1975 when the film was released, Tolkien's Lord of the Rings was undergoing a major revival, and Dungeons and Dragons games were starting to pop up across the country. The Knights who say Ni!, Tim the Enchanter and the dread rabbit of Caerbannog have appeared in games, comics and novels in one form or another ever since, where ever a geeky fan has wanted to pay homage. For years, one of the more popular themes for early versions of Windows was a pack including graphics and Python quotes, most from The Holy Grail.

The next feature film came from an inside joke, as whenever the press would ask the members of the troupe about their next feature film, even though they hadn't even decided on making one, the stock answer to shut them up was “Jesus Christ – Lust for Glory”. This joke developed into a serious idea for giving the Bible's New Testament the Python treatment in making The Life of Brian, and led to the film that was the group's most controversial as well as highest rated by film critics. The controversy over the film was in spite of the fact that Christ himself was treated with respect throughout, while the story focused on a similar infant born one manger over whose life took a series of parallels to Jesus' own worthy of comic lampooning attitudes and actions of the times. Both times Christ himself is portrayed in the film (briefly) the character is played straight.

All 6 members of one of the greatest comedy teams ever.

The last two films, Live at the Hollywood Bowl, and The Meaning of Life were a return to sketch comedy in the style of the early television work, and the troupe broke apart as a team following the 1983 production of the latter. Over the next six years, solo projects and collaborations of several of the members followed, with Terry Gilliam in particular enjoying success as a film director. The final reunion of all six members was for the 20^th anniversary special “Parrot Sketch Not Inlcuded.” The eve of the actual 20^th anniversary in 1989 closed the book on official Monty Python projects with the death of Graham Chapman.

The years post Monty Python have seen the troupe's influence continue on geek culture as the surviving members have lent their ideas and voices to many video games, including several games directly based on the troupe's earlier work for the PC (Flying Circus - 1990, Complete Waste of Time - 1994, Quest for the Holy Grail -1996 and Meaning of Life – 1997.) John Cleese is a regular contributor to science fiction projects, continues to act and lends his talents as a voice actor, most recently in Fable 3. The computer world named unsolicited e-mails “spam” based on a classic Python sketch, and the Python computing language got its name from the troupe.

Did *you* know that the concept of Spam, and Spam-filtering all
came from a comedy sketch with a diner full of vikings?

Personally, I'll always have a special place for this body of work, as it introduced me to a style of humor that has stuck with me throughout the years. Anyone else have any memories of Python comedy, maybe some of my younger readers hadn't heard much or (gasp) anything about these guys, and will be inspired to check it out. Let me know.