The Monty Python almost-reunion is almost a go

By Sean O'Neal | January 27, 2012 | 3:30pm

Aux Features Film

The very silly and yet also very spiteful persons in Monty Python are edging closer to reuniting for another film, with Terry Jones confirming to Variety that he has signed John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, and Michael Palin—i.e. the troupe members who still like each other—to reunite for the upcoming Absolutely Anything. Jones has been talking up the live-action/CGI film for a couple of years now, although he’s let a few more details slip recently: According to the latest synopsis, the Pythons will be heard and not seen [PAUSE FOR GIDDY RECITATION OF “HOW NOT TO BE SEEN,” WHILE PEOPLE WHO DON’T LIKE MONTY PYTHON, SUCH AS THE MAJORITY OF WOMEN, QUIETLY JUDGE YOU] by starring as aliens who give an earthling unlimited power, just to see how badly he’ll screw it all up. When the project was first announced, said earthling was to be played by The Daily Show’s John Oliver, although his name isn’t mentioned in this latest report. Still along for the ride, however, is Robin Williams as a talking dog, because otherwise audiences would have the intangible feeling that something was missing, an unknown elation lying just beyond their reach.

Fortunately, Robin Williams will yammer into a cartoon dog, and Variety adds that he’s now also being pursued to play “a pompous Frenchman reminiscent of Inspector Clouseau,” so that all the possible varieties of comedy will be dutifully represented. And yet, despite all that, Eric Idle remains the sole holdout, primarily because Eric Idle is always the sole holdout, and he and John Cleese seem to hate each other right now—perhaps even too much to come and record a CGI alien separately. And that’s in addition to Graham Chapman, of course, who remains selfishly dead.