Monty Python and the Holy Grail Monty Python and the Holy Grail Monty Python and the Holy Grail is a 1975 British independent slapstick comedy film concerning the Arthurian legend, written and performed by the Monty Python comedy group of Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin, and directed by Gilliam and Jones. It was conceived during the hiatus between the third and fourth series of their BBC television series "Monty Python's Flying Circus". In contrast to the group's first film, "And Now for Something Completely Different", a compilation of sketches from the first two television series, "Holy Grail" draws
Monty Python performers collaborated with their stunts to perform a combined set of acts. Differing, somewhat confusing accounts are given of the origins of the Python name, although the members agree that its only "significance" was that they thought it sounded funny. In the 1998 documentary "Live at Aspen" during the US Comedy Arts Festival, where the troupe was awarded the AFI Star Award by the American Film Institute, the group implied that "Monty" was selected (Eric Idle's idea) as a gently mocking tribute to Field Marshal Lord Montgomery, a legendary British general of World War II; requiring a "slippery-sounding" surname, they