Diaries 1969-1979_ The Python Years - Michael Palin [78]
That evening we were taken to a British High Commission-sponsored party at an apartment block. Some classic English stereotypes, including a man with a red face and a bow tie who asked me rather peremptorily if I could find him some ginger ale, and then spent the rest of the evening apologising that he hadn’t recognised me. He kept coming up and remembering things I had done in the show and how marvellous they were.
Monday, June 11th, Ottawa—Calgary
A long travelling day. Owing to the selective strikes, we didn’t leave Ottawa airport until about 12.00, and then had to fly to Toronto to transfer to a plane to Calgary.
On the journey I started talking about Python, the States and the group itself to Graham, and it suddenly became very clear to us that if we all, apart from John, wanted to do another Python series, then we should do one. The reaction in Britain and Canada showed that there was a great demand for a new series, and John had stated his position vis-à-vis Python very clearly on Saturday night at the Chateau Laurier in Ottawa. Maybe a fourth Python series was born as we flew over the wheatlands of Saskatchewan.
Thursday, June 14th, Calgary–Edmonton
Up at 9.30 to travel to Edmonton. Should be exhausted, but couldn’t summon up the energy.
On the plane sat next to John C, and had a good long chat. He is still very anti our trip to the States – now saying that it will be a loss financially, despite Buddah Records taking care of the hotel bills. He hates chat shows, and feels that in doing them Python is going against all its principles.
We landed at Edmonton out of grey skies. Before even going to the hotel, Terry J, Eric, Carol and myself are whisked off to the Edmonton Press Club. When we arrived there, about thirty people were sitting around tables in a dark basement, drinking.
Slowly but surely, it became obvious that we could not get away without some sort of cabaret. Eric and Terry first took the microphone and, after some opening banter, asked for questions. A silence, then one wag chanced his arm. ‘I’d like to ask, as there are two of you up there, could one of you get me a Carlsberg.’ Laughter. Then Terry and Eric grabbed this unfortunate pressman, pulled him indelicately across the dance floor and poured beer over him. It’s quite amazing what Python has become.
Friday, June 15th, Regina, Saskatchewan
We have already cancelled our appearance in Saskatoon, owing to heavy travel costs and very low advance bookings. So we are here in Regina – Ordinary Town Canada, with its wheatmarket and its oil refineries and its RCMP headquarters, for two days, with almost no chance of making a profit.
Slept for two hours in the morning, a sleep broken only by a Tony Smith phone call, after I had been off for ten minutes, asking if I would appear on a lunchtime chat show, being recorded NOW. I told him I wanted my name right at the bottom of the list and, as I was the first person he’d rung, he was able to apply more heavily persuasive methods on the others. After I woke up, I had a shower, and ordered up some hot hors-d’oeuvres and a half-bottle of Chianti and a jug of coffee, watched Terry J, Terry G, and Graham on TV. Terry G very funny, slowly tying his mike lead around himself until he finished the interview totally trussed up and then died.
Saturday, June 16th, Regina, Saskatchewan
Terry and I had a lunchtime drink at the Red Lion Beverage Room, and played shuffleboard together, and then with a local. Canadians, as a whole, are about the most open, friendly people I know. There are none of the guarded, reserved, slightly resentful looks one sometimes receives when trying to meet the English. After lunch I lay on my bed, looked out over Saskatchewan and read Jane Eyre. I don