Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar earlier version, Robin Hood good-humoredly refuses further combat; in both earlier and later versions Robin invites him to join the band. Howard Pyle used this tale in his "The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood" as part of the tale of Alan-a-Dale: Robin needed a priest who would perform the wedding ceremony in defiance of authority, and Will Scarlet proposed Friar Tuck. The Percy Folio version of the ballad begins with the stanza: Robert Graves in his "English and Scottish Ballads" used this stanza to support his argument for pagan survivals in the Robin Hood legend, and for the popular survival
Robin Hood: Men in Tights gave the film half of one star out of four and called it "a most disappointing Mel Brooks movie parody that suggests that the once hilarious Brooks has lost his way. The pacing is agonizingly slow, and many of the jokes are recycled from his earlier, better work." Rita Kenmpley of "The Washington Post" called it "a pointless and untimely lampoon of 'Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves' from the increasingly creaky spoofmeister Mel Brooks." Peter Rainer of the "Los Angeles Times" was mixed, writing that "what's enjoyable about the best parts of 'Men in Tights' is its grab-bag, throwaway style,"