Information Spamalot Movie: ANNOUNCED

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Spamalot.jpg


Monty Python's Spamalot is a musical comedy adapted from the 1975 film Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Like the motion picture, it is a highly irreverent parody of the Arthurian Legend, but it differs from the film in many ways. The original 2005 Broadway production, directed by Mike Nichols, received 14 Tony Awards nominations, winning in three categories, including Best Musical. During its initial run of over 1,500 performances, it was seen by more than two million people and grossed over $175 million.
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Synopsis

Before the show

A recording encourages members of the audience to "let your cellphones and pagers ring willy-nilly," and comments that they should "be aware there are heavily armed knights on stage that may drag you on stage and impale you." This was recorded by Eric Idle.





Act I

A historian narrates a brief overview of medieval England. In a miscommunication between the actors and the narrator, the actors sing an introductory song about Finland ("Fisch Schlapping Song"). The Historian returns, irritated, and tells the frolicking Finns that he was talking about England, not Finland. The scene immediately changes to a dreary, dark village with penitent monks in hooded robes chanting Latin and hitting themselves with books. King Arthur travels the land with his servant Patsy, who follows him around banging two coconut shells together to make the sound of a horse's hooves as Arthur "rides" before him, trying to recruit Knights of the Round Table to join him in Camelot. He encounters a pair of sentries who are more interested in debating whether two swallows could successfully carry a coconut than in listening to the king.

Sir Robin, a collector of plague victims, and Lancelot, a large, handsome and incredibly violent man, meet as Lancelot attempts to dispose of the sickly Not Dead Fred. Although a plague victim, the man insists that he is not dead yet and he can dance and sing. He completes a dance number, but is soon hit over the head with a shovel and killed by an impatient Lancelot. ("He Is Not Dead Yet"). They agree to become Knights of the Round Table together, Lancelot for the fighting, and Robin for the singing and the dancing.

Arthur attempts to convince a peasant named Dennis Galahad that he, Arthur, is king of England because the Lady of the Lake gave him Excalibur, the sword given only to the man fit to rule England. However, Dennis and his mother, Mrs Galahad, are political radicals and deny that any king who has not been elected by the people has any legitimate right to rule over them. To settle the issue, Arthur has the Lady Of The Lake and her Laker Girls appear to turn Dennis into a knight ("Come With Me"). Cheered on by the girls ("Laker Girls Cheer"), the Lady Of The Lake turns Dennis into Sir Galahad and together, they sing a generic Broadway love song ("The Song That Goes Like This"), complete with chandelier. They are joined by Sir Robin and Sir Lancelot, and together with Sir Bedevere and "the aptly named" Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Show (a knight resembling Don Quixote, who promptly apologises and leaves), they make up the Knights of the Round Table ("All For One").

The five knights gather in Camelot, a deliberately anachronistic place resembling Las Vegas's Camelot-inspired Excalibur resort, complete with showgirls, oversized dice and the Lady of the Lake headlining the Castle in full Cher get-up ("Knights Of The Round Table"/"The Song That Goes Like This (Reprise)"). In the midst of their revelry, they are contacted by God (a recording voiced by John Cleese of the original Monty Python troupe and Eric Idle in the version currently touring the UK) who tells them to locate the Holy Grail. Urged on by the Lady Of The Lake ("Find Your Grail"), the Knights set off. They travel throughout the land until they reach a castle, only to be viciously taunted by lewd French soldiers. They attempt to retaliate by sending them a large wooden rabbit in the style of the Trojan Horse; however, they realise after the fact that it was not as simple as leaving the rabbit and walking away – they should have hidden inside it. Defeated, they leave in a hurry when the French begin taunting them again, sending cancan dancers after them and throwing barnyard animals including cows at them ("Run Away!"). Arthur and his followers manage to run into the safety of the wings before the French catapult the Trojan Rabbit at them.
 
Last edited:

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Act II

Sir Robin and his minstrels follow King Arthur and Patsy into a "dark and very expensive forest" (Arthur later says they're in a "Dark and extremely expensive forest), where they are separated. King Arthur meets the terrifying but silly Knights who say Ni, who demand a shrubbery. King Arthur despairs of finding one, but Patsy cheers him up ("Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life") and they find a shrubbery shortly after.

Sir Robin, after wandering the forest for some time with his minstrels ("Brave Sir Robin"), encounters The Black Knight, who scares him off, but King Arthur, who happens on the scene, more or less defeats him by cutting off both his arms and legs, impaling his still-alive torso on a door, and leaving to give the Knights their shrubbery. The Knights accept it, but next demand that King Arthur put on a musical and bring it to Broadway (in the United Kingdom, this became a West End musical; on the tour, they must put on a "Broadway musical"), implying that it need only be Broadway-style, "but not an Andrew Lloyd Webber". The mere mention of his name causes everyone to cover their ears and scream in pain. Sir Robin, who has found Arthur by this point, insists that it would be impossible for them to accomplish this next task, since you need Jews for a successful Broadway (or West End) musical ("You Won't Succeed On Broadway"), and proves his point in a wild production number filled with Fiddler on the Roof parodies, including a bottle dance with Grails instead of bottles. King Arthur and Patsy promptly set off in search of Jews.

(In countries that don't have a tradition of Jews in the theatre, the lyrics of "You Won't Succeed on Broadway" are sometimes changed to instead describe the high production standards and acting talent needed to stage a successful musical in that country. For example, in the South Korean version, Sir Robin sings about recent successful musicals that were staged in Seoul during the previous decade. Meanwhile, members of the ensemble appear onstage dressed as various characters from those musicals. Among these characters are a cat from Cats, Kenickie from Grease, Kim from Miss Saigon, The Phantom from The Phantom of the Opera, and Velma Kelly from Chicago. As with the original version of the song, Sir Robin and the entire ensemble end the number with a song and dance routine.)

While the Lady Of The Lake laments her lack of stage time ("Whatever Happened To My Part?"), Sir Lancelot receives a letter from what he assumes is a young damsel in distress. He is very surprised to find that the "damsel" is actually an effeminate young man named Prince Herbert ("Where Are You?"/"Here Are You") whose overbearing, music-hating father, the King of Swamp Castle, is forcing him into an arranged marriage. As Herbert is asking Lancelot to help him escape, the King of Swamp Castle cuts the rope that he is using to climb out of the window, and Herbert falls to his apparent death. Lancelot is a bit puzzled at the king's actions, but it is revealed that Herbert was saved at the last minute by Lancelot's sidekick, Concorde. The King asks his son how he was saved, exactly, to which Herbert replies happily with a song. But the king charges at his son with a spear, preparing to kill him. Lancelot steps in to save him, then gives a tearful, heartfelt speech about sensitivity to the king on Herbert's behalf, and Lancelot is outed as a homosexual in the process, an announcement celebrated in a wild disco number ("His Name is Lancelot").

King Arthur begins to give up hope of ever putting on the Broadway musical and laments that he is alone, even though Patsy has been with him the entire time ("I'm All Alone"). The Lady Of The Lake appears and tells Arthur that he and the Knights have been in a Broadway musical all along (in some productions she also points out Patsy's presence, to which Arthur claims that he sees Patsy as "family" and thus doesn't always consider him a separate person). Patsy also reveals he is half Jewish, but didn't want to say anything to Arthur because "that's not really the sort of thing you say to a heavily armed Christian." All that's left is for King Arthur to find the Grail and marry someone. After picking up on some not-too-subtle hints, Arthur decides to marry the Lady Of The Lake after he finds the Grail ("Twice in Every Show").

Reunited with his Knights, Arthur meets Tim the Enchanter who warns them of the danger of a killer rabbit. When the rabbit bites a knight's head off, Arthur uses the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch against it, knocking down a nearby hill and revealing that the "evil rabbit" was actually a puppet controlled by a surprised puppeteer. A large stone block showing a combination of letters and numbers is also revealed. (The letters are based on the seat numbering system used by each theatre. They are changed from performance to performance to discourage audience members from intentionally booking any of the possible seats. The seat is typically on the aisle in one of the first few rows nearest the orchestra. In the Broadway production and on the tour it is either A101, B101, C101 or D101; i.e., Seat 101 – which is house right of the center aisle – of Rows A, B, C, or D.[2] In the West End Production a word is revealed – DONE, CONE or BONE, referring to D1, C1 and B1 respectively.) After pondering the final clue, Arthur admits that they're "a bit stumped with the clue thing" and asks God to "give them a hand". A large hand points to the audience and Arthur realises that the letters and numbers refer to a seat number in the audience. The grail is "found" (with some sleight of hand) under the seat and the person sitting in the seat is rewarded with a small trophy and a polaroid photo. ("The Holy Grail"). Arthur marries the Lady of the Lake, who reveals that her name is Guinevere; Lancelot marries Herbert (who finally has a chance to sing); and Sir Robin decides to pursue a career in musical theatre. Herbert's father attempts to interrupt the finale and stop all of the "bloody singing", but is hit over the head with a shovel by Lancelot, a nod to "He is Not Yet Dead". ("Act 2 Finale/Always Look on the Bright Side of Life (Company Bow)").

The overall duration of the show is about two hours plus interval time.
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Musical numbers

Eric Idle wrote the musical's book and lyrics and collaborated with John Du Prez on the music, except for "Finland", which was written by Michael Palin for Monty Python's Contractual Obligation Album; "Knights of the Round Table" and "Brave Sir Robin", which were composed by Neil Innes for Monty Python and the Holy Grail; and "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life", which was originally written by Idle for the film Monty Python's Life of Brian.

Act I
  • Overture – Orchestra
  • "Fisch Schlapping Song" – Mayor, Villagers, Historian
  • "Monk's Chant" – Monks
  • "King Arthur’s Song” – King Arthur, Patsy**
  • "He Is Not Dead Yet" – Not Dead Fred, Sir Lancelot, Sir Robin, and Bodies
  • "Come With Me" – Lady Of The Lake
  • "Laker Girls" – King Arthur, Patsy, Laker Girls
  • "The Song That Goes Like This" – Sir Galahad, Lady Of The Lake
  • “He Is Not Dead Yet (Playoff)” – Sir Lancelot and Ensemble
  • "All For One!" – King Arthur, Patsy, Sir Robin, Sir Lancelot, Sir Galahad, Sir Bedevere
  • "Knights of the Round Table" – King Arthur, Patsy, Sir Lancelot, Sir Robin, Sir Galahad, Sir Bedevere, Lady Of The Lake, Camelot Dancers
  • "The Song That Goes Like This (Reprise)” – Lady Of The Lake, Ensemble
  • "Find Your Grail" – Lady Of The Lake, King Arthur, Patsy, Sir Robin, Sir Lancelot, Sir Galahad, Sir Bedevere, Knights, Grail Girls
  • "Run Away" – The French Taunter, French Guards, King Arthur, Patsy, Sir Robin, Sir Lancelot, Sir Galahad, Sir Bedevere, French Citizens
Act II
  • "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" – Patsy, King Arthur, Sir Lancelot, Sir Robin, Sir Galahad, Sir Bedevere, The Knights of Ni
  • "Brave Sir Robin" – Sir Robin, Minstrels
  • "You Won't Succeed On Broadway" – Sir Robin, Ensemble‡
  • "The Diva's Lament (What Ever Happened To My Part?)" – Lady Of The Lake
  • "Where Are You?" – Prince Herbert
  • "Here You Are!" – Prince Herbert
  • "His Name Is Lancelot" – Sir Lancelot, Prince Herbert, Ensemble
  • "I'm All Alone" – King Arthur, Patsy, Sir Lancelot, Sir Robin, Sir Galahad, Sir Bedevere
  • "The Song That Goes Like This (Reprise)" – Lady Of The Lake and King Arthur
  • "The Grail" – King Arthur, Patsy, Sir Lancelot, Sir Robin, Sir Galahad, Sir Bedevere
  • "We Are Not Yet Wed (Reprise)" – Girls, Sir Lancelot, Sir Robin, Sir Galahad, Sir Bedevere, Ensemble
  • "Always Look On The Bright Side of Life (Company Bow)” – Company
**Does not appear on the Original cast album.

‡The song 'You Won't Succeed On Broadway' was changed to 'You Won't Succeed in Showbiz' for the London production and later replaced with the 'Star Song' in the UK tour.
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Characters

The Court of Camelot
  • King Arthur of Britain
  • Sir Lancelot the Homicidally Brave
  • Sir Robin, the Not-Quite-So-Brave-as-Sir-Lancelot
  • Sir Dennis Galahad, The Dashingly Handsome
  • Sir Bedevere, The Strangely Flatulent
  • Patsy: King Arthur's trusty servant/steed and constant companion.
  • Concorde: Lancelot's trusty servant/steed.
  • Brother Maynard: Camelot's clergyman
  • Sir Bors
  • Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Show: Dressed as Don Quixote.
Other characters
  • The Lady of the Lake
  • Not Dead Fred
  • Robin's Lead Minstrel
  • The King of Swamp Castle (aka Herbert's Father)
  • Prince Herbert
  • French Taunter
  • The Black Knight: A psychotic, "invincible" knight who will insist on fighting even after all his limbs have been cut off.
  • The Head Knight who says "Ni!": The very tall leader of the most feared cult in the land: the dreaded Knights who say Ni.
  • Tim the Enchanter
  • Mrs. Galahad
  • The Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog
  • Swamp Castle Guards
  • Two Sentries
  • Historian: the Narrator.
  • The Laker Girls: The Lady of the Lake's backup dancers/cheerleaders.
  • Knights of the Round Table
  • Robin's Minstrels
  • God
  • Holder of the Holy Grail: Whoever happens to be sitting in a certain seat at that performance.
In tribute to the film, where six actors played the majority of the male parts (and a few female ones), several actors play multiple roles; the only major characters not doubling are Arthur and the Lady of the Lake. In the Broadway production, the following doubling is used:

  • Lancelot/2nd Sentry/The French Taunter/Knight of Ni/Tim the Enchanter
  • Robin/1st Sentry/Brother Maynard/2nd Guard
  • Galahad/King of Swamp Castle/Black Knight
  • Patsy/Mayor of Finland/1st Guard
  • Bedevere/Mrs. Galahad/Concorde
  • The Historian/Prince Herbert/Not Dead Fred/Lead Minstrel/The French Taunter's Best Friend
Sara Ramirez was intended to double as a witch but this part was cut from the final script.[citation needed] Several pairs of characters originally played by the same Monty Python member were reduced to one: the Dead Collector and Sir Robin (Idle), the Large Man with a Dead Body and Sir Lancelot (Cleese), and Dennis the Politically-Active Peasant and Sir Galahad (Michael Palin).
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Notable Broadway cast replacements included:

Notable West End cast replacements have included Peter Davison and Bill Ward in 2007 and Marin Mazzie, in early 2008.[3] Sanjeev Bhaskar (King Arthur), Michael Xavier (Sir Galahad) and Nina Söderquist (Lady of the Lake) were part of the closing cast.
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Title

Book-writer and lyricist Eric Idle explained the title in a February 2004 press release:[36]

I like the title Spamalot a lot. We tested it with audiences on my recent US tour and they liked it as much as I did, which is gratifying. After all, they are the ones who will be paying Broadway prices to see the show. It comes from a line in the movie which goes: "we eat ham, and jam, and Spam a lot."
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Reactions by Monty Python members

“ "I'm making them money, and the ungrateful bastards never thank me. Who gave them a million dollars each for 'Spamalot'?" ”
— Eric Idle

The show has had mixed reactions from Idle's former colleagues in Monty Python.

Terry Gilliam, in an audio interview,[38] describes it as "Python-lite". He later told the BBC News, "It helps with the pension fund, and it helps keep Python alive. As much as we'd like to pull the plug on the whole thing it carries on – it's got a life of its own."

Terry Jones – who co-directed the original film with Gilliam – expressed his opinions forthrightly in May 2005: "Spamalot is utterly pointless. It's full of air…Regurgitating Python is not high on my list of priorities."[40] However, when asked whether he liked Spamalot during an interview with Dennis Daniel on 98.5 WBON-FM The Bone shortly after the musical's opening on Broadway, Jones said, "Well, I thought it was terrific good fun. It's great to see the audience loving it. I suppose I had reservations as far as…well…the idea of doing scenes from a film on stage. I just don’t get the point of it. They do them terribly well…I mean, they really are good…but I just quite don’t understand what that's about. It isn’t really 'Python.' It is very much Eric." Jones went on to say, "...I think the best parts of the musical are the new things. For instance, when they do the Andrew Lloyd Webber take-off and this girl comes in and sings 'Whatever Happened to My Part' since she hasn’t appeared since the opening number and she's really furious! That is one of the great moments where the show really comes alive for me."

In an October 2006 interview, Michael Palin said, "We’re all hugely delighted that Spamalot is doing so well. Because we’re all beneficiaries! It's a great show. It's not ‘Python’ as we would have written it. But then, none of us would get together and write a ‘Python’ stage show. Eric eventually ran out of patience and said, ‘Well, I’ll do it myself then.’ He sent us bits and songs and all that and we said, ‘Yeah, that's all right, have a go.’ But its success is so enormous that it took us all by surprise, including Eric, and now we’re just proud to be associated with it, rather pathetically."

When asked by a Las Vegas Review-Journal reporter in 2008 if he had to be persuaded to provide the recorded voice of God in the musical, John Cleese said, "Yeah, that's right. And in the end I think Spamalot turned out splendidly. It's had a tremendous run. I defy anyone to go and not have a really fun evening. It's the silliest thing I’ve ever seen and I think Eric did a great job."[43]

The last verse of the "Finland"/"Fisch Slapping Dance" was incorporated into Spam sketch for the 2014 reunion show Monty Python Live (Mostly).
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Critical reception and box-office

The original production has been both a financial and critical success. Variety reported advance ticket sales of $18 million, with ticket prices ranging from $36 to $179. The advance made Broadway box office history.[citation needed]

The show proved to be an early success when moving to London's West End. After high advance ticket sales the show's run was extended by four weeks, four months before the run commenced.[44] The play makes many references to the film and other material in the Python canon, including a line from "The Lumberjack Song", nods to "Ministry of Silly Walks", the "Election Night Special" and "Dead Parrot sketch" routines, a bar from "Spam" worked into "Knights of the Round Table", a rendition of the song "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" from the film Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979), and the "Fisch Schlapping Song" which is a reference to both "The Fish-Slapping Dance" and the song "Finland". Another reference is actually part of the Playbill of the show; there are several gag pages about a musical entitled "Dik Od Triaanenen Fol (Finns Ain't What They Used To Be)". This gag programme was written by Palin, and echoes the faux-Swedish subtitles in the credits of the original Grail Python film.

Broadway musical fans appreciate its references to other musicals and musical theatre in general, such as: "The Song That Goes Like This" (a spoof of Andrew Lloyd Webberproductions and many other Broadway power ballads); the knights doing a dance reminiscent of Fiddler on the Roof, and another reminiscent of West Side Story (including the music); Sir Lancelot's mimicking of Peter Allen in "His Name Is Lancelot"; the character of Sir Not Appearing in This Show being Man of La Mancha's Don Quixote; a member of the French "army" dressed as Eponine from Les Misérables; and a line pulled from "Another Hundred People" from Stephen Sondheim's Company by the "damsel" Herbert. The song "You Won't Succeed (On Broadway)" also parodies The Producers and Yentl.

The show has not escaped criticism. In Slate, Sam Anderson wrote, "Python was formed in reaction to exactly the kind of lazy comedy represented by Spamalot — what Michael Palin once described as the 'easy, catch-phrase reaction' the members had all been forced to pander in their previous writing jobs... Spamalot is the gaudy climax of a long, unfunny tradition of post-Python exploitation – books, actions figures, video games – that treats the old material as a series of slogans to be referenced without doing any of the work that made the lines so original in the first place."[45]

The West End version opened to rave reviews. "It's a wonderful night, and I fart in the general direction of anyone who says otherwise", wrote Charles Spencer in the Daily Telegraph(echoing a joke from the show).[46] According to Paul Taylor in the Independent, "it leaves you that high and weak with laughter, thanks not just to the Python provenance of the basic material but to the phenomenal speed, wit, cheek and showbiz knowingness of the direction, which is by the great veteran, Mike Nichols".[47] Michael Billington in the Guardian was less enthusiastic, though, stating "while I'm happy to see musicals spoofed, the show's New York origins are clearly exposed in a would-be outre number which announces "we won't succeed in show business if we don't have any Jews": a Broadway in-joke that has little purchase this side of the Atlantic." Billington adds, "With hand on heart, I'd much rather watch Lerner and Loewe's Camelot than Eric Idle's smart-arsed Spamalot."[48]

The Las Vegas production was awarded the Number 1 show of 2007 by the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Coconut orchestra world record

On 22 March 2006, to mark the first anniversary of the official Broadway opening, the "World's Largest Coconut Orchestra", 1,789 people clapping together half coconut shells, performed in Shubert Alley, outside the theatre. The claim was officially recognised by the Guinness Book of World Records. This record was broken by 5,567 people in Trafalgar Square at 7 pm on 23 April 2007, led by the cast from the London production, along with Jones and Gilliam, with the coconuts used in place of the whistles in "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life". This formed part of London's St George's Day celebrations that year and was followed by a screening of Monty Python and the Holy Grail
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Television

A special edition of The South Bank Show was a television documentary on the history of Spamalot. It features numerous segments with Eric Idle and John Du Prez explaining the process of writing the songs, plus interviews with UK and US cast members. It included scenes from the rehearsal of the West End show, and was first broadcast on 15 October 2006.

Film adaptation

In May 2018, 20th Century Fox announced a film adaptation is in works with Idle writing the script and Casey Nicholaw attached to direct. The film is reportedly being fast tracked with casting announced soon and shooting to begin Spring 2019.[52]

Lawsuit

In 2013 the Pythons lost a legal case to Mark Forstater, the producer of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, over royalties for Spamalot. He was paid 1/14 of the portion of the profits paid to the Pythons. The court ruled that he was a full Python partner and was to be paid 1/7 of the portion paid to the Pythons. They owed a combined £800,000 in legal fees and back royalties to Forstater, prompting them to produce Monty Python Live (Mostly).
 

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
Fox Plans A Film Version Of “Spamalot”


fox-plans-a-film-version-of-spamalot-696x464.jpg


20th Century Fox has picked up the film rights to “Spamalot,” the Tony-Award winning Broadway musical comedy production based on the acclaimed 1975 feature “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”.

A parody of the Arthurian legend, Tim Curry, Hank Azaria and Christian Slater starred in the play’s original run which became one of the highest-grossing plays of all-time – pulling in over $175 million.

“Monty Python” alum Eric Idle, who also co-wrote the play, will pen the script for the film which Casey Nicholaw (“The Book of Mormon”) will direct.
 
Top