Dead Parrot sketch appearance on "The Muppet Show", Cleese appears as a pirate attempting to take over a spaceship during a "Pigs In Space" sketch. At the end of the sketch, he demands of the smart-mouthed talking parrot on his shoulder, "Do you want to be an ex-parrot?" In 1989's "The Secret Policeman's Biggest Ball", a benefit for Amnesty International, the sketch opens similarly, but ends very differently: In a 1997 "Saturday Night Live" performance of the sketch, Cleese added a line to the rant: "Its metabolic processes are a matter of interest only to historians!" In an interview on NPR's "Fresh Air",
Cape parrot Cape parrot The Cape parrot ("Poicephalus robustus") or Levaillant's parrot is a large, temperate forest dwelling parrot of the genus "Poicephalus" endemic to South Africa. It was formerly grouped as a subspecies along with the savanna-dwelling brown-necked parrot "(P. fuscicollis fuscicollis)" and grey-headed parrot "(P. f. suahelicus)", but is now considered a distinct species. The Cape parrot is a short-tailed moderately large bird with a very large beak used to crack all sorts of hard nuts and fruit kernels, especially those of African yellowwood trees ("Podocarpus" spp.). This contrasts with the closely related savanna species ("Poicephalus fuscicollis") which feeds on