monty python on TV - which bits are missing?

[Steven Sigel]

I didn't realize that there was more stuff missing -- One of these days I need to go through the other 16mm kinescopes I've got somewhere and compare them to the DVDs... I only came up with the Satan Animation footage because I almost sold it on ebay, and someone pointed out to me that there was potentially missing footage in the print... I also should try to track down the guy I knew who had some others ...

[RWels]

Yes, please!

[David Morgan]

For Ep. 25 the only discrepency is that in later broadcasts the audience laughter and applause when Che Guevara and Karl Marx are shutting out the light in bed at the end is cut, immediately switching to the copyright notice. Before, the lights went out and the audience laughter played over black.

Here's a rundown:

Ep. 2: Wacky Queen and Kargol and Janet were cut from initial U.S. broadcasts, but they're on the DVD; no sweat here... I doubt that David Frost's phone number survives, though.

That's the only Series I episode with a problem.

Ep. 19: "Cancer" was replaced with "Gangrene" on the Fairy Tale animation, but the sound still exists as evidenced by the "TG Personal Best DVD."

Ep. 22: Opening shots of girls in bikinis (including John Cleese) used to run over an off-screen panting Michael Palin; Now there is just lilting music, "A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody." I have the panting audio, though.
Same episode: pepperpots humming "Girl from Ipanema" are replaced with pepperpot humming "I Dream of Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair." Don't ask me why they remove one copyrighted song only to add in "Pretty Girl" (which must not be public domain) in the same show.

Ep. 23: "Undertaker" was removed in some repeats, replaced with Palin as the stripping prime minister ("My, isn't it hot in here!"). Undertaker got put back in, thanks to an NTSC copy being sold in the U.S.

Ep. 24: A line of John's from "Conquistidor Coffee" ("Finally these tasteless references to leprosy and terminal cancer.”) was cut, still missing.
Same Episode: Satan Animation.

Ep. 25: See above

Ep. 30: Graham singing "To-night, To-night, I'm getting pissed to-night!" was cut from initial U.S. broadcasts, but it's there now.

Ep. 31: Proust line was there, then it wasn't, then it was, then it wasn't. But also, a re-appearance of the Waving Loony at the end (after show fades to black) was missing as well - could simply be a technician already thought the show was over when they dubbed a copy and cut off too soon. I'm not sure if it's back in.

Ep. 33: Biggles line was dropped due to a glitch in the tape used in U.S. DVDs (text with >< : "Don’t call me >> senor! I’m not a Spanish person, You must call me Mr. << Biggles, or Group Captain Biggles, or Mary Biggles if I’m dressed as my wife, but never senor.”), but the complete tape does exist.

Ep. 35: Trees animation originally played under german narration and music, replaced with orchestral version of "We Love the Yangste." I have original sound.

Ep. 38: Entire opening sketch, Choreographed Conservative Party Speech," was cut (supposedely due to an impending election) and never restored; only video I have found was from an off-air recording from a Buffalo PBS station given by a Canadian fan, but there's a chyron burned into half the sketch so it's not suitable to edit back in. But I am following another lead!
Same episode: "Coming Attractions" at the end was missing from the U.S. DVD but it exists. However, in original broadcasts, when the "set' is switched off, the glowing dot on screen burns much longer than in the recent tapes.

4th Series: Way too complicated to list, not even counting the ABC edits.

[RWels]

David said:

4th Series: Way too complicated to list, not even counting the ABC edits.

Is it that bad in series 4?

David said:

Ep. 25: See above

Where would that be? I don't think we covered episode 25 yet. Which is particularly interesting because I know of a telerecording.

[Koen Br]

The cut line from ep. 24 survives on b/w tr, as evidenced here: home.mira.net/~kirseval/python24/index.htm

(No, I'm not that smart I would find that myself but it was referred to in the other current Python topic. )

And to expand on the tapes currently being used by Flamish VRT: the video looks as if it has had some restoration, and I think we can rule out a poor Flamish broadcaster would do that themselves for repeat showings of a foreign show that go out around midnight. Which brings me to the conclusion they are likely to have received brand new copies from the BBC.

BTW, does anyone actually *know* whether a broadcast quality copy of the ep. 38 opening scetch survives? I've been looking around a bit for info on more or less recent repeat screenings (and cuts made to them), but no luck this far. Does this mean Python hasn't had any decent repeat runs anywhere? That seems very hard to believe. Sure in the UK alone it must have been repeated a couple of times on UK Gold, no? (Don't know, just supposing.)

[David Morgan]

PBS in the U.S. is beginning a run, so it will be several weeks before they get to Series III episodes.

Ep. 25 I referenced in the very beginning of that same comment re: Che Guevera and Karl Marx.

The BBC shouldn't be selling Python episodes outside of the U.K. since Python owns those rights now. I'd be curious to know what, if any, copyright notice or distributor name is attached to the tape.

[David Morgan]

>> Is it that bad in series 4?


Lots of tiny little cuts, or narration shifted. And life is too short to put them all down. The episode is either s trimemd one or it isn;t, and one woudl know straight off the top whether it is. (i.e., in Mr. Neutron, does Palin's narrator speak OVER the postal box inaugurator, or AFTER (in the original)?

[RWels]

Oh yes, laughter during the black in 25. Well, that would be the least of our worries.

I think I said it before, but the transmissions still end with a BBC logo. No mention of Python (Monty) Pictures Ltd. If that is what you meant.

I don't known where Koen got the idea that these Flemish tapes had undergone any type of restoration. They certainly did not make that impression on me.
Looks to me like this Flanders public TV station still had the tapes they used when the show first came there. (I don't know when.) Hence the whole thread.

But I have the NTSC DVD set and will compare quality next time, just to make sure.

[Deleted]

Just out of curiosity, which of the VRT channels is showing Python? Is it één or Kanvas?

[RWels]

Canvas, yes.

[Martin OGorman]

David said:

Here's a rundown:

Ep. 2: Wacky Queen and Kargol and Janet were cut from initial U.S. broadcasts, but they're on the DVD; no sweat here... I doubt that David Frost's phone number survives, though.

That's the only Series I episode with a problem.

That's jolly interesting stuff, David - never knew about the "panting" edit - presumably the original ran like the re-shot version in "And Now For Something Completely Different"?

One other Series 1 glitch, though - there's a piece of animation in show 2 (Mouse Problem) that has gone missing from most repeats. It's mentioned at the bottom, here:

web.ukonline.co.uk/sotcaa/pythonpages/python_tv_10.html

It wasn't present when the show was repeated in 1986 (I still have the tape!), nor in 1989 and I've only ever seen it on a UK Gold repeat where it flew by so quickly I thought I'd hallucinated the whole thing... is that a picture of Gerald Nabarro?

Did we mention the "stray" version of Series 2, Ep 7 that ditches the Take Your Pick parody for Neville Shunt from Show 11?

[RWels]

Interesting. An animation as part of the Mouse Problem? Could you be a little bit more precise what the animation was about?
I could then compare the dvd to the episodes as broadcast at the moment.

[David Morgan]

No, the animation preceding Mouse Problem is still there.

[Charles Roberts]

I also heard something about Nazi graffiti that was edited out. Although that may never have been in the original version?
By the way were about in the series are the reruns that were originally mentioned?

[RWels]

Not very far yet. Yesterday episode 12. This thread merely attracted a lot of response in a short time. Proof that a proper edition should be released, I think.

There isn't a single python dvd that could not have been better. It's been said many times before, but when every mindless action flic from hollywood gets its own special edition with tons of uninteresting extras, why oh why do the famous comedy series of the past never get this kind of treatment?