Peter Sellers he also said that in Sellers's previous films he had "been at his worst recently". In 1969 Sellers starred opposite Ringo Starr in the Joseph McGrath-directed film "The Magic Christian". Sellers portrayed Sir Guy Grand, an eccentric billionaire who plays elaborate practical jokes on people. The critic Irv Slifkin remarked that the film was a reflection of the cynicism of Peter Sellers, describing the film as a "proto-Pythonesque adaption of Terry Southern's semi-free-form short novel", and "one of the strangest films to be shown at a gala premiere for Britain's royal family". The film, a satire on human nature, was
The Magic Christian (film) want it, here it is, come and get it'). Thunderclap Newman’s "Something in the Air" is also prominent in the film's soundtrack. Starr and Sellers became good friends during the shoot. British actor and dancer Lionel Blair was responsible for the film's choreography. A host of British and American actors have brief roles in the movie, many playing against type. Episodic in character, "The Magic Christian" is an unrelenting and often heavy-handed satire on capitalism, greed, and human vanities. Notable are the appearances of (pre-Monty Python) John Cleese and Graham Chapman (uncredited), who had jointly written an earlier version of