Monty Python

Someone has sent me an email saying that the Macbeth production from the Met reminded him of Monty Python.

"You mentioned the Met's Macbeth production and its modern sets and costumes. I saw the PBS telecast, and thought it worked on its own terms.
But one thing struck me as unintentionally funny(or was it?). The witches reminded me of those deliciously wacky Monty Python sketches in which the fellows dressed as dowdy middle aged women and acted very silly. It wasn't scary; I couldn't keep myself from laughing."

I would like to suggest that the appropriate Monty Python opera would be Peter Grimes. All the female parts would be done in drag. Peter would be Eric Idle. There would need to be silly walks.

My favorite Monty Python is the one where a dessert turns into a tennis star, and at the end into a Scotsman. They called it a blancmange, (pronounced /bləˈmɒnʒ/). I recall in those pre-internet days doing extensive research to figure out what the hell they were talking about, what this amorphous blob holding a tennis racket could possibly be, I myself never having heard of a blancmange. I began to laugh and could not control myself for the entire half hour. You had to be there.