Around
the States in Eighty Days
Being an irregular and erratic account by the
Greedy Bastard himself as he sets out to traverse America on
a comedy tour.
Day
Twenty One. The Boston Ni Party.
Monday,
October 20, 2003
Boston,
the home of the worst tea party ever. And you Yanks have been
making bad tea ever since. You seem to think it has something
to do with chucking tea bags into cold water.
Cranky with everyone at rehearsal. Must be careful. There
is an awful lot to do today but everyone needs their time
and I have to watch it. Don't want to end up like Captain
Bligh on this voyage. First I snap at Peter for asking me
for the 6th time to put the Money Song before the Penis Song.
He is quite wrong and I am quite tired of explaining why but
there's no reason to go outside the boundaries of civilized
discourse. Then I go off at Gilli when she reasonably wants
to tell me what lighting areas to get into. Snappy snappy
snappy. Must be having feelings of abandonment. Quite easy
to do when you've been abandoned. I apologize later to both
but that's not fucking good enough is it? Back to being the
10th nicest Python. However, we do get a lot done in the allotted
90 minutes of rehearsal and we sharpen the show and polish
some things which were getting sloppy, and it's just as well,
because it is a Sunday night in Boston, we are not full and
though they are joyous and noisy we need to go after them
and grab them. By the end we have made them as happy as they
can be and they stick around for an hour buying stuff. The
Encore Bucket is busy from the start. I actually have to stop
people coming up on stage before I can get on with the show.
It feels like comedy lap dancing.
 There
are a dozen eBay winners in the audience tonight who have
been conned by the Greedy Bastard Promoters into bidding outrageous
sums for front row seats, free merchandize and "special
opportunities." These usual involve some kind of backstage
"meet and greet" and are currently all the rage
in showbiz. I don't know why they don't just go all the way
and let them buy tickets to fuck us. [Because who would
pay for you, you geriatric old bastard? Ed.] I decide
to bring them up at the end of the Bruces, and have the audience
abuse them. This is jolly good fun. The audience get right
in and yell abuse at these poor innocent folks who have paid
so much more to be here. Then to give them a break I get them
all to sing the Bruces' song, which they join in heartily.
Jen takes a picture of them all on stage. Then I release the
tiger. Kidding.
The Estrogen Brigade (http://www.timtom.co.uk/)
have sent a beautiful representative, and clearly the estrogen
is working as she is heavily impregnated. She begs me to go
visit their web site but hons, a) I'm not sure it's entirely
healthy and b) I have no time. Can't you follow my
web site? What more can I tell you about myself?
The radio jocks always ask "Don't you get tired of people
coming up and repeating old sketches at you?" Actually
no. Mostly I miss their references. They'll mutter something
from an obscure skit thirty years ago and then expect me to
remember the next line. I stare blankly at them, desperately
searching for something to say. People forget that we are
not Python fans. We are the people who did the show.
It's not the same you know. If we were fans of our
own work we would be simple, sick, sad and sorry bastards.
[What's your point? Ed.]
My least favorite moment is when someone comes up and says
"Mr. Idle, I have followed your work with great attention
for the last 2,000 years and now this is my chance to give
you something in return." Oh no. You know that they are
about to fork over some precious home-made CD or tape. That
or there is a note saying "I have written this movie
script with you in mind, please turn it over to a major studio
and contact me." Let me make this simple, we are not
allowed to listen, watch or touch any material, script or
artifact that you may submit. This is for obvious legal reasons.
"One minute I gave him my tape and the next he was opening
Spamelot on Broadway your Honor." Even if I had
the time, which I don't, I am not allowed to. So spare
us both the blushes. If I knew how to get your career going
I'd be an agent instead of a selfish bastard.
We have come a long way already. Over two and a half thousand
miles. Here's the mileage provided by Lish.
| Boston
to Rutland, Vermont |
184
miles |
| Rutland
to Toronto |
486
miles |
| Toronto
to Belleville, Ontario |
233
miles |
| Belleville
to Kitchener, Ontario |
142
miles |
| Kitchener
to Ottawa |
287
miles |
| Ottawa
to London, Ontario |
395
miles |
| London
to Montreal |
461
miles |
| Montreal
to Burlington Vermont |
109
miles |
| Burlington
to Poughkeepsie, NY |
354
miles |
| Poughkeepsie
to New Haven |
140
miles |
Running
Total |
2,691
miles |
We're
almost a quarter of a way through the journey but we have
much longer legs to face. I think we're going to be up in
the teens of thousands of miles before the exhausted survivors
pull in to LA in December. I have a sudden vision of myself
as Ulysses, the ancient warrior trying to return home. Didn't
he have an injured foot too? [Yeah right, and he sang Sit
On My Face every night. Ed.]
At the post show signing, a man said to me "Thank you,
because I don't think you'll be coming back." And that
sounded right to me. I don't want to be an old drama queen,
and start with the farewell tour, and a last chance
to see bullshit, but on the Prednisone Night, the night I
felt off, I glanced in the mirror and had a sudden vision
of myself as Archie Rice, a character in a John Osbourne play
The Entertainer. Archie Rice is a sad old music hall
entertainer condemned to a declining life on the circuit endlessly
repeating his old jokes. Magnificently and memorably played
by Olivier in the movie, this vision was chilling enough to
make me realize that I never want to get to near there. At
the moment this show is still new for me, and elevating, and
uplifting, thanks to the audience. But there is that specter
in the mirror, an old man with too much make up. So yes, I
think he's right. I probably won't be coming back. In any
case I think this voyage is for me. It's about turning sixty,
about nostalgia, about remembering old friends and getting
out and seeing the world before it's too late. A teenage DJ
from the Yale radio station told Peter "I think I'll
wait for them all to come out." Yeah. Right. If I thought
there was even the remotest chance of that I wouldn't be here
duckies. There will never be another Python live stage show.
People don't want to do it. It's that simple. That's why I
feel free to sing my songs and do my thing. And this singing
swan will be ducking out soon…. So hurry hurry, last
chance to see aging semi-legend on stage. Get your tickets
to tickle his ass with a feather. Get your meet and greets.
Buy your souvenir underwear…
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