Opening night. Jupiter’s Casino Gold Coast.
We are far too relaxed. This is the opening night of a tour and we ought to have been a little more tense. It’s good to be a bit scared before you start, but we’re not. We haven’t yet played any Australian audiences and before the curtain goes up at Jupiter’s Casino they are strangely quiet. Usually in America they are rowdy with expectation. Not so here. You can hardly hear them from backstage and this concerns me. We do get them a bit at the opening but then we make the mistake of putting another little film in about cats being scared by cucumbers, funny enough in itself but after our highlight reel way too much of us not being on stage. We’ll fix this by Brisbane on Saturday of course. Also we run long, a definite mistake in comedy.

When we come on we usually start by both talking at the same time but tonight for some reason John doesn’t speak at all, which leaves me high and dry, and so we confuse them. Eventually I welcome us to the Old Coast, which John corrects me is the Gold Coast, and we pick it up quickly enough but we’ll have to fix the front of the show, and we will. One of the things I love most about working with John is we almost entirely agree on everything and in about five minutes at the end we have it sorted. Personally I blame an enormous picture of Michael Bolton outside my dressing room door. He has the look of a man who isn’t quite sure he should have cut off most of his hair.

The show warms up as we get into it, and particularly once we start performing sketches. And the film clips work. There is some good stuff in here. Then again it is The Gold Coast and we I won’t know what that means until we have played Not The Gold Coast. Are they old, are they sober? Are they drunk? Not drunk enough? Too hot? Too cold? Don’t get me wrong, the show goes very well, the Promoters are very happy, we get a standing ovation, and we do an encore, and as Simon reminds me it’s way better than Sarasota where we started our Florida Tour, but we’re supposed to know what we’re doing by now. Incidentally Sarasota had one of the funniest questions when someone asked from the audience what it felt like to be two of the youngest people in Sarasota. They weren’t kidding either..

As if to make up for the slow start we end strongly, and John is particularly funny in the Q and A section, going on a rant about hotels folding toilet paper into little triangles, which he wonders might be some kind of Masonic thing, which is very funny and then another rant abusing Australians for having far too many Prime Ministers one of which was taken by a shark. Personally I think more politicians should be eaten by sharks, usually it’s them that are the Sharks. I think John is at his best when he goes off on rants like this. From somewhere out of the dim recesses of my mind comes the name Ainsley Gotto, who was blamed for the politicans demise: “It moves, it’s shapely and it’s name is Ainsley Gotto…”

Right off the bat in the Q and A John asks me if I know any poems, which is good as I like being put on the spot and I do know The Owl and The Pussycat which I do a bit of. He does Ogden Nash and I mean to follow up with my Australian mother in law’s (Madge Ryan) Ogden Nash favourite:

Shake and shake the ketchup bottle

First’ll come a little, then a lot’ll…

But I get sidetracked and go off somewhere else. This part of the show is always different every night and is dependent to a certain extent on the questions, one of which asks John for consensual sex with a 19 year old, but doesn’t mention the sex.   At this age, I say, who cares….

It turns out to be George Harrison’s birthday so starting off with a clip of him appearing on my old show Rutland Weekend Television goes over well, and I follow with another story of him, but on the fly I shorten some of what I was going to do in my solo spot as it’s getting late. There are far too many rude songs so I lose one. Olivia Harrison said of George’s appearance on that RWT show that she thought it was the bravest thing he ever did. Sadly I’m missing her and Dhani at George Fest in LA, though Tania and Lily are there and text me that it is a fabulous evening: a film Dhani has made of other people singing George songs with him. Hope I can get to see it soon.

I spent most of the day by the pool at the hotel getting relaxed for the evening. They have two pools, one of which has sand, and sea water and real fishes in a reef. This Marriot is a nice hotel and I’m glad I’m not commuting from Brisbane. It even has a circular bathtub in a triple window, where I sit running over my lines. But I don’t shave my legs. Or my chin actually as now I have a beard, which brilliantly saves me from having to use make up on stage. It’ll have to go of course when the wife gets here. She can’t stand it.

One of my regular tweeters – a Jonathan Trevithik – turns up and is very pleasant. He is a total fan, having been to O2 in London three times, and he is very happy with the show but also interesting, and it’s good to get a take from the audience. One over-ardent fan does not show up however. Some young lady has been faking letters from the Promoter to the venue, trying to get herself onto a Guest List with four backstage passes, pretending to represent us and even claiming to be driving us to the gig. Luckily various inconsistencies were spotted between the Promoter, the Tour Manager and the Casino security, as she made one or two mistakes, but she created false email addresses and false phone numbers and wrote to the Promoter and the theatre and they were all more than a little pissed off and concerned enough to contact the Police, so I hope this ardent con gal has learned her lesson and keeps her head down. I’d hate the plod to be knocking down her door.

 So there we are, up and running, and tomorrow and Sunday we play Brisbane, at the same venue where we played Not The Messiah back in 2008. This time we won’t have an enormous orchestra and a full choir, so please do make some noise to make up for it….

Surfers Paradise.
This is rapidly turning into the Magical Luxury Tour. I go from the calm and peace of a cabin in the woods in the lovely rolling hills of the hinterland of the Sunshine Coast into a Louis The Four Star Palace in the sky.

I had not visited Surfers Paradise before but it’s somewhat like Miami, though the high rise buildings are more modernistic. Less Miami than Fort Lauderdale. And not a trace of Art Deco. (The most famous hair dresser in Miami.)

Not for the first time I bless the saintly Major Cleese for including me on this expedition. A journalist yesterday tried to get me to dump on him, and I genuinely couldn’t think of anything nasty to say. Anyway that’s their job. My job is to not read them.

From my enormous luxury bed I have the balcony windows wide open to catch the fresh air from the rolling breakers of the Pacific Ocean. Not a surfer in sight. It’s more a surfer free paradise. But they’re probably all still in bed with each other. Through the enormous luxury bathroom with hot tub and spa there is an enormous picture window that shows me the entire range of coastal hills. Two perfect balloons float gently by.

There are two pools here, one of which contains fresh sea water, has a beach and includes a reef with real fish, which they feed every morning. The fishy buffet was excellent last night although my son and I got stuck into the Caiparhino’s so we were in a pretty good mood to begin with.

No wonder they call it the Gold Coast. It must cost a ton putting us up here.

Luckily we’re sold out at Jupiters, which is where our tour opens tonight and which turns out to be a huge Casino undergoing refurbishment. John and I are also undergoing refurbishment as we try and remember what we are supposed to do on stage. It’s a gentle afternoon run through of our strange show, and our promoter tries not to look too panic stricken as we wander around on stage pretending we know what we’re doing.

The amazing Simon, who is not a magician, but close, makes everything perfect before we get there. Lighting, sound, guitars, video cues, all perfectly in place. He is our stage manager, a Canadian, whom John relentlessly teases and who is as good natured as could be.

My son Carey, who kindly drove me here, manfully sits through our stagger-through and is surprisingly encouraging. He may give both of us acupuncture before the Brisbane show…

What sort of show is it? Well it’s an odd beast, a feathered camel, a flying donkey, a floating piglet, an underwater eagle, gourmet spam, somewhere between Jerry Lewis and geriatric..… hard to describe, but quite fun to do. It’s never the same twice, or as John puts it “It’s never the same once.”

We have called it sit-down comedy, because there are large leather arm chairs in which we sprawl, but don’t worry, we do stand up from time to time, and we do try to make you laugh. It’s somewhere between a discussion, a clip show and a revue. There are a few sketches and I do a few songs, and that is why today’s entry will be very brief. I must work on my words. One of the sketches is a Memory sketch and for about the first two weeks of our Florida Tour people couldn’t tell whether we had genuinely forgotten our lines or whether it was part of the sketch. A very useful cover, because of course it was the former, but they laughed anyway believing it was the latter.

This time I’m trying something new in my solo slot – what, you’ll remember your words? No. I’m going to use a clip of George Harrison and sing along with him in the only song we ever wrote together. Comedy buffs will know what this is, but it is a genuine Harrison/Idle song and I won’t give away the joke. We each have a 20 minute solo slot in Act Two before we reunite for the Q and A. I asked if this time it could be T and A, but sadly it’s not that sort of show.

So now I genuinely must stop and rehearse. Well perhaps a swim, and then a huge breakfast, and then a massage,.. No I must be strong. You wouldn’t catch Michael Palin enjoying himself on his tours. I must prepare for my audience. The show must go on…. It all starts at 8!

Sphincters crossed.

    It’s dawn in the rain forest and all is clear and still except for the echoey calls of large birds, in the woodwind range, who natter and chatter around the still damp woods It’s not yet steaming hot. Screened windows open to the morning freshness.

It rained in the night. Huge gushing drops shredded through the leaves of the trees and ran down the tin roves into the gutters which collect the fresh rainwater and pour it into the cement water vats and the metal overflow vats.

I’m hiding in the hills. Sorry, holidaying, which for me is the same thing. I’m staying with my son who lives up here and it’s a dream escape into the hinterland hills inland from the Coast, away from the crowding mad. He has built a wonderful guest house in the bush and I get all manner of birds and calls and cries. I have named one The Buildabird because it sounds exactly like a near-by power drill, and I am very disappointed when my son tells me it is indeed a near-by power drill.

I have a few days off before the tour.

Yesterday’s we went hunting for opals at Opals Downunda off the Bruce Highway. The nice lady there asked me if I was Richard Attenborough. I thought it impolite to say poor Dickie has been dead a couple of years, and in any case I think she had me confused for Michael Palin and she had him confused for David Attenborough. That’s the best explanation I can offer I’m afraid.

One of the worst approaches to celebrities is “Are you who I think you are?”

I mean that’s just impossible to answer isn’t it. One can waste a lot of time coyly sorting that one out.

Usually I say “No I am not Kylie Minogue” which slows them down a little as they wonder how I could possibly imagine they had mistaken me for the plucky Aussie chanteuse.

If they say “Are you Eric Idle?” I usually say “occasionally” in the hope of delaying the inevitable selfie. John is brilliant at this. “Can I have selfie” they ask. “No,” he says “I don’t know you.”

 I usually pretend I have to hurry up to be with him and that of course normally I would stop for hours while they fumble with their I Things but just today I have to run and join John.

My son has been an assiduous guide taking me to a host of small places with improbable names. We passed a road sign outside Brisbane which said “Nudgee, Nudgee Beach”. We have been to a variety of Nambours and Mooloolabas and Caloundras. I am perpetually lost but my son dashes us around to unlikely places, where we meet very nice people.

We visited the Eumundi Saturday market, where a large lady all in pink was selling hula hoops. Elsewhere were hand made items and gems and rocks. I was tempted but I am rather overstocked with tie-died crocheted bikinis. It’s not a flattering look for me in the first place because sagging is a problem, and that’s just me. Once the crochet gets wet, well it’ll look like the last surviving oldie at a Burning Man festival.

There were however some nice comedy flags for sale, however, one of which is definitely worth nicking:

    “The trouble with political jokes is occasionally they get elected…”

I shall definitely ad lib that answer to any Donald Trump question on the tour.

There is an excellent bookshop too in Eumundi called Berkelows with plenty of lovely second hand books too heavy to haul on tour, but there in the window was Gilliamesque Terry Gilliam’s autobiographical attempt to turn himself into an abstract noun. It’s a nicely designed book with lots of his drawings and I couldn’t resist autographing it with my name and replacing it on the shelf. Was this an act of pure comedy vandalism or does it increase the value of the book? We shall see. I have a very rare copy of an unsigned Michael Palin book somewhere, but I doubt Terry G. will be down here to sign his. So I think I have done him a favour.

Then we visited Chinresig, a large Buddhist retreat (for large Buddhists) where the Dali Lama came to visit a couple of years ago. For that occasion my son and his pals built a shrubbery in our family name, complete with a plaque.

 I hope his holiness appreciated the joke.

 When John Cleese came face to face with the Dali Lama they both laughed heartily at each other for five minutes.

You can’t go very far in Australia without some example of humour. One ducks crossing we saw said “Slow down for ducks sake.” And a Church we passed said “Early Service 8. Not that early really..”

We leave this paradise Wednesday for the Gold Coast tomorrow and the real start of our tour. But this has been a sweet retreat, and a delight to see my lad. We have played guitar loudly till late at night, when one of the neighbors asked us to turn it up! They couldn’t hear properly they complained… We even make more noise than the flying foxes who are surprisingly vocal. I am assured they are bats but they don’t seem to have bat attitude, since they make a lot of noise communicating and go to roost at night. The very opposite of a good battitude. Perhaps David Attenborough will enlighten me.

Two nice moments of humour. I got a surprise Twitter note from Mark Gattis who said:

“You really suit that beard, maestro! X”

To which I replied: “it’s beginning to grow on me.”

And I was happy at the airport the other day to see that the very attractive young woman from the Telegraph had put in a gag I’d ad libbed which I’d forgotten.

“I’m having my dick cryogenically frozen, in case someone can revive it in a future life.”

Sydney Thursday February 18th

A glorious Sunset is casting golden light across the most famous harbour in the world, darkening the arc of the famous old bridge, and silhouetting the improbable clam shells of the most famous building in the world, the unlikely Sydney Opera House. Across the bay in which we are skimming at great speed in a big yellow water taxi, the sun is making fiery orange oblongs in the windows of a clutch of bungalows on a headland. We are heading to dinner at Catalina in Watsons Bay in the classic Sydney Harbour. The old city has changed a lot since I first came here 40 years ago, high rises everywhere and hardly a patch of waterfront with no new construction, dwarfing the older and more elegant waterside homes. North Sydney is a tall stand of highly coloured neon lit buildings clustered on a steep hill across the bridge. And there tucked in its armpit it is good to see the slightly menacing clown face of Luna Park, which with its current manifestation of neon white light rays has survived the many threats to tear it down. Its wide slightly menacing open mouthed clown has survived many incarnations. When I first came it was by Martin Sharp one of the first people I met here.

John is fairly silent. We have been talking all day to the Press and TV and Radio. But the warm wind is blowing away the cobwebs and we are looking forward to our dinner.
“Are you the suckling pig?” asks the waitress
“Please don’t call him pig “ I say.
The mood is good, the food excellent and our hosts, our Promoter Adrian and his son Sebastian, are kindly and considerate. We dine on a terrace facing the darkling bay, but there is no wind and it is perfectly lovely.
“Ah there’s Jupiter” I say, watching a bright light in the sky above the city.
“Actually that’s Quantas AF 34 to Melbourne” says our Promoter pointing his I phone at it. Imagine an App which identifies every plane in the sky!
Later on the way home we do see Jupiter rising and it is magnificent and huge.
“There’s that Qantas flight again” says Sebastian gently mocking me.
I’m happy to be mocked, full of fine food and finer wine.

The day started at dawn as I looked Eastwards across the bay to the heads of the harbour.. From my high eyrie perch on the 33rd floor I can the blackened silhouette of the Opera House, which looks like a clutch of nuns from this direction. I played there two nights in 2007 in Not The Messiah. This time we’ll be playing at the lovely old State Theatre, but not for almost a month.

It’s 7 a.m. and the unmistakable tall figure of the now white haired John enters the lobby. He is looking fit and well after ten weeks in Mustique, though he has just come in from bone freezing Minnesota from a speech and then via Dallas to Sydney on what is billed as the longest flight in the world, sixteen hours.

He gives me a big kiss and a hug and envelopes Diane O’Neill our inexhaustible publicist with a a big bear hug and we head off to Channel 7. He will rib her mercilessly all day. They have worked together before and she tolerates his abuse with a wry smile and a nudge in the direction she wants us to go next.

We are on Sunrise first. Live on the breakfast show with Kochie and Samantha. Kochie a tall man who will later perform a surprisingly effective silly walk, says afterwards it’s the best interview he’s ever done. We behave suitably inappropriately. It’s surprisingly easy to be funny next to John and we’ve had some experience to say the least. They are all happy, and then three quick breakfast radio interviews, one live to Melbourne and we are heading back to the hotel where various camera crews have taken over the Executive Club and are setting up. Even radio interviews these days have cameras, which pop up on their web sites.

We speak to the Daily Telegraph, ABC late night TV, the Sydney Morning Herald, the Australian, ABC Radio, Radio National…, every fifteen minutes we are shuttled to a new set up and a new questioner.

Quite good discussions break out, perhaps the best being a radio show which is a music show which discusses the music of Python. It’s intelligent and fresh and I don’t remember discussing this before. It is enjoyable and fascinating, and some of the other journalist cluster round to listen in. It’s almost a shame to stop. Radio is still the best for talk.

John demands people ask us ruder questions in the shows. He’s tired of the boring old ones, and indeed we do chuck away all those that ask how we got the name Monty Python. He wants more and nastier ones….

From this morning’s hilarious Sunrise Show he has already been attacked by The Daily Fail for touching a blonde woman. Why do they bother? I ask him why he doesn’t just ignore them. He quotes Mark Twain which is impressive and then adds “Besides I rather enjoy it. They are such dicks they always make mistakes.” Today they have identified his daughter as his ex- wife (deceased these two years) etc etc. He suggests the writer had had too much whiskey, a tipple he is apparently over fond of.

Our schedule promises we’ll be done by 12.25 but it’s an hour later before we finish the last of them and head downstairs for a lunch. I’m starving. It’s a couple of glasses of white wine before I calm down. I’m heading for a nap as we have one more show to do at five thirty, an as-live interview down the line to Melbourne for The Project, which has a panel of four and is hilarious.

The main question of the day has been political correctness and its limitations on comedy.
I’m reminded of a couplet from Spamalot which didn’t make the final lyric but of which I was fond.

Your political correction
May give Lenin an erection
But I’m sad to bring you this sad news
You won’t succeed on Broadway, you just don’t succeed on Broadway
If you don’t have any Jews.

I think it was David Hyde Pierce who came up with the delightful alternative
There’s a very small percentile
Who enjoy a dancing gentile…..

Nobody remembers that Political Correctness is Marxist thinking. What on earth is incorrect thinking anyway?
John skirts the lurking dangers of this loaded question, while managing to gently stick the boot in.

As we are leaving lunch the tall unmistakeable figure of Camilla Cleese comes across. Sadly she won’t be joining us for dinner as she has two stand up gigs tomorrow.

An email from our Promoter proves the value of all this. We sold 1500 tickets yesterday and now only the second house at Brisbane next week still has a ton of tickets to sell.
I suggest we announce a special attraction to entice the Brisvegans from their homes on a Sunday night.
John suggests a stripper.
I suggest a semi naked roller skating model……

We’ll see.
Over to you Brisvegans….