Monty Python founding members Eric Idle and John Cleese seem unsure of how to unravel their movie company.
After making brilliant films like “The Life of Brian,” and “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” and “And Now for Something Completely Different,” not to mention their legendary TV series and the worldwide hit musical, “Spamalot,” the octogenarian Pythons are not communicating well.
A fan wrote to Idle on Twitter saying he’d seen a notice about the ending of Monty Python Productions. Idle responded: “Nah it’s dead. The Parrot is to blame”
Cleese responded in his own obtuse way. He wrote: “Eric Idle has been complaining again that Python communications to him have been delayed. Fans may be interested to know that this could be because he refuses to accept any communictions [sic] that are sent to him, except through his lawyers. That slows it down a bit.”
Idle and Cleese founded the comedy troupe with Michael Palin, Terry Gilliam, Terry Jones, and Graham Chapman in 1969. They became such an overnight sensation that they were compared to the Beatles, and Idle started his own fake satirical music group called The Rutles.
Chapman died in 1989, Jones in 2001. Idle, Cleese, Palin, and Gilliam have had substantial individual fame over the decades. But Idle and Cleese are probably the two most diametrically opposed philosophically. That they’re still not getting along in 2025 is kind of sad.
Maybe they can get their communications ironed out soon. By the way, Palin had a successful one man tour a year ago in Britain. This fall, Idle will have one, while Cleese tours the US.
Gilliam, the lone American, went on to make such sensational films as “Brazil,” “12 Monkeys,” “Time Bandits,” and “The Fisher King.” He’s plotting one more, “The Carnival at the End of Days,” with Jason Momoa, Jeff Bridges, Johnny Depp, and Adam Driver.
Nah it’s dead. The Parrot is to blame. https://t.co/x0YMaR6jY8
— Eric Idle (@EricIdle) August 13, 2025
Eric Idle has been complaining again that Python communications to him have been delayed
Fans may be interested to know that this could be because he refuses to accept any communictions that are sent to him, except through his lawyers
That slows it down a bit
— John Cleese (@JohnCleese) August 13, 2025
