Censorship

         In our Western countries, formal censorship is generally limited. But it does not mean that censorship does not exist at all, for there are many ways in which the expression of ideas can be controlled. Censorship can obviously be the result of the statutory restrictions of the law or of the open activities of boards of film censors. But it can also be engendered by the action of large organizations or companies that refuse to produce or to market the means to convey the ideas. Thus, institutional censorship and commercial censorship are probably more important than formal censorship, only they do not operate openly. The Monty Python team have encountered those three forms of censorship and they have sometimes had to modify their ideas.

         Censorship is important in the sense that, by drawing the line between what can and what cannot be said, it in fact draws the line that defines the boundaries of a culture. The culture from which Monty Python sprang being distinctly British, they mainly had to face British censorship but they also experienced it in the various countries in which they exported themselves, especially in the United States.

         When Monty Python's Flying Circus appeared on the BBC in 1969, it came as the replacement for a religious programme. This programme was in fact the repeat, later in the night, of a discussion programme broadcast early on Sunday evenings, at the request of clergymen who were too busy at that time to watch it. But by 1969, it became clear to the BBC that hardly anybody was watching this programme. Consequently, the BBC moved this religious programme to Tuesdays and replaced it with  the Flying Circus, to compete with commercial television's The David Jacobs Celebrity Show.        

         As a result, Monty Python's Flying Circus earned its first hostile editorial even before it appeared on the screen : On August 25th, 1969, the Daily Telegraph criticized the BBC for giving priority to the audience ratings : "Is it a sufficient reason for dropping that programme with glee, and substituting comedy shows which the BBC announces as 'Nutty, zany and odd-ball'?"[1] This, if it was the first controversy the Pythons provoked, was far from being the last one. As we have already said, the Python performances were - without being in the lampoon style - always funny about something and frequently about figures of authority. Even if there was not necessarily a precise contemporary critical comment in what they chose to be funny about, it was always cutting enough to offend some people and provoke censorship.

                  a) Censorship within the BBC

         At the BBC, the only form of censorship the members of Monty Python had to submit to was self-censorship, at least at the beginning. Indeed, as they gained confidence, the Pythons became more and more daring, thus provoking more and more controversies.

         The notorious "Undertakers'" sketch marked a change in the relations the group had with the BBC. In this sketch, a man takes his dead mother to an undertaker who suggests cooking and eating her with french fries, broccoli and a horseradish sauce:

"Undertaker (Chapman):  Morning.

Man (Cleese):  Good morning.

Undertaker:  What can I do for you, squire?

Man: Well, I wonder if you can help me. You see, my mother has just died.

Undertaker:  Ah well, we can help you. We deal with stiffs.

Man:  What?

Undertaker:  Well, there's three things we can do with your mum. We can bury her, burn her or dump her.

Man (shocked):  Dump her?

Undertaker:  Dump her in the Thames.

Man:  What?

Undertaker:  Oh, did you like her?

Man:  Yes!

Undertaker:  Oh, well, we won't dump her, then. Well, what do you think? We can bury her or burn her.

Man:  Well, which do you recommend?

Undertaker:  Well, they're both nasty. If we burn her she gets stuffed in the flames, crackle, crackle, which is a bit of a shock if she's not quite dead, but quick, (the audience starts booing) and then we give you a handful of ashes, which you can pretend were hers.

Man:  Oh.

Undertaker:  Or if we bury her she gets eaten up by lots of weevils, and nasty maggots, (the booing increases) which as I said before is a bit of a shock if she's not quite dead.

Man:  I see. Well, she's definitely dead.

Voices In Audience:  Let's have something decent…it's disgusting…

Undertaker:  Where is she?

Man:  She's in this sack.

Undertaker:  Can I have a look? She looks quite young.

Man:  Yes, yes, she was.

Increasing protests from audience.

Undertaker (calling):  Fred!

Fred's Voice (Idle):  Yeah?

Undertaker:  I think we've got an eater.

Man:  What?

Another undertaker pokes his head round the door.

Fred:  Right, I'll get the oven on. (goes off).

Man:  Er, excuse me, um, are you suggesting eating my mother?

Undertaker:  Er…yeah, not raw. Cooked.

Man:  What?

Undertaker:  Yes, roasted with a few french fries, broccoli, horseradish sauce…

Man:  Well, I do feel a bit peckish.

Voice From Audience:  Disgraceful! Boo! (etc.). […]"[2]

         It is clear that this very black humour was likely to be offensive to anyone who could not see it as such. Ian MacNaughton himself, as the producer of Monty Python's Flying Circus, started to feel that the responsibility for such a sketch was too heavy to bear for him and he preferred to refer the script upwards. Michael Mills, the Head of Comedy considered on reading the script that it was all right  and that the audience could turn the set off or change the channel were it offended by the sketch.

         The "Undertakers'" sketch was transmitted on December 22nd, 1970. The following day, the senior management of the BBC held a controllers' meeting. Looking at the minutes of this meeting, it appears clearly that the management felt rather uncomfortable about the entire show :

""Monty Python's Flying Circus" (BBC-1)

Aubrey Singer (H.F.G.Tel.)[3] said that he had found parts of this edition disgusting. CBBC-1[4] said the programme was continually going over the edge of what was acceptable: this edition had contained two really awful sketches; the death sequence had been in appalling taste, while the treatment of the national anthem had simply not been amusing. […] M.D.Tel.[5] said it must be recognised that in the past the programme had contained dazzle and produced some very good things; but this edition has been quite certainly over the edge, and the producer Ian MacNaughton, had failed to refer it when he should have done so."[6]

         Some people such as Stanley Reynolds have argued that the BBC superiors were surprisingly unaware of the success of Monty Python. It is important to realize that having been already criticized for its liberalizing attitude throughout the Sixties, the BBC naturally became more and more concerned with avoiding any possible offense to the people in authority but also to its audience.

         Not only had the scripts of the third series to be read in advance and all the recordings previewed, but Lord Hill, chairman of the BBC Board of Governors, also created controls in the instance of the Advisory Group on the Social Effects of Television or the BBC's Audience Reserch Unit :

"Reaction Profile (based on 199 questionnaires completed by 21% of the Viewing Panel).

Viewers were asked to rate the broadcast on four dimensions defined by pairs of adjectives or descriptive phrases. Their selection of one of five scale positions between each pair resulted in the following reaction profile:[7]

         The reaction profile shows strong contrasts in the sample's response, although more viewers were entertained than not. Anyway, by the time the recordings of the third series were completed, the pressure between the BBC and the Pythons was coupled with a considerable tension within the group itself. John Cleese considered they were now exploiting the strange and the violent rather than the funny and the BBC's Audience Research Unit tended to confirm this feeling. However, in three years Monty Python had moved from minority cult to acknowledged mastery of the school of British nonsense.

         Censorship began to tighten up especially over the question of bad language. For the first time, the BBC clearly demanded that some sketches or even just words be removed from the shows in the third series. This particularly applied to the "All England Summarize Proust Competition" show. In the first sketch, Graham Chapman, on being asked his hobbies, answered : "Golf, strangling animals and masturbation". The Pythons had to attend a special meeting to be told that such words were not to be used in TV comedy shows. In fact, quite a large number of cuts were demanded by the Head of Comedy. Eventually some cuts were agreed, though on a much smaller scale than originally demanded. Similarly, in the fourth series, the word "condoms" had to be removed and did not even go to the recording stage.

         When Monty Python's Flying Circus went to American television, it also received modifications as Kim "Howard" Johnson pointed out :

      "Of course, there were obvious cases of censorship by the BBC, by American television (particularly the 1976 case in which the six shows of the fourth series were severely edited by ABC-TV), and even by individual group members themselves."[8]

         But on the whole, it would be dishonest to claim that this censorship was purely arbitrary. It is fully understandable that a television corporation such as the BBC should have the right to control what is said and shown on its channels. It is even a duty, and there is therfore nothing one can accuse the BBC of, except maybe, of having been a little bit too conservative and prudent in certain cases. In any case, this censorship was in no way comparable with the one that would later ban The Life of Brian in various places.

                  b) The Life of Brian [9]

         Of all the Pythons' films, The Life of Brian was , by far, the one that engendered the greatest controversy, and this, not only in Great Britain and in the United States but in almost each and every country where it was shown. The film was given its world premiere on August 17th, 1979 in New York. The film was distributed by Warner Communications and Orion Pictures, and there was no real expectation of censorship from the Pythons for freedom of expression is established in the first amendment of the Constitution:

      "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free excercise thereof ; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press ; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for the redress of grievances."

         And indeed, there is no direct film censorship in the United States. The Classification and Ratings Administration only rates the films voluntarily submitted to it on a fourfold scale ranging from "G" to "X", but this rating is only advisory. The Life of Brian was originally rated "R" which stands for restricted. This meant that children under the age of 17 should be accompanied by an adult. Therefore, the film was - a priori - not presenting any controversial or blasphemous character.

         However, two days only after the premiere, the President of the Rabbinical Alliance of America, Rabbi Benjamin Hecht, made the first protest. He claimed to represent 1,000 rabbis and half a million Jews,

and denounced Brian as sacrilege and blasphemy: "This film is so grievously insulting that we are genuinely concerned that its continued showing could result in violence."[10]

         Hecht's protest was soon joined by Robert E.A. who spoke for the Lutheran Council, commenting on the film on a thousand radio stations across the country that the film was "crude and rude mockery, colossal bad taste, profane parody" and "a disgraceful and distasteful assault on religious sensitivity"[11]. The Roman Catholic Archidiocese of New York also declared that Brian held the person of Christ up to comic ridicule and was, for Christians, an act of blasphemy.

         Meanwhile however, the religious groups that condemned Brian were themselves criticized by other people. Dr William Fore, Chairman of the National Coalition Against Censorship declared: "There has been no protest here, and we are not contemplating any".[12] In the meantime, those against the film formed the Citizens Against Blasphemy Committee, and though they did not succeed in bringing a prosecution against the film, demonstrations led by various representatives were organized in several places, especially on 16th September outside the Warner Communication building. on this occasion, Reverend Roger Fulton from the Protestant Church made a speech explaining the motives of their protest:

Address of Rev. Roger Fulton

(Pastor, Neighborhood Church, NYC)

At the Citizens Against Blasphemy Raily

In front of Warner Communications Bldg

Sunday, September 16, 1979.

EXACTLY WHY WE OBJECT TO THE "BRIAN" FILM

      […] From the notes I wrote in large letters on a scratch pad in the dark movie house, I have prepared four lists representing four categories of outrageously objectionable material in "The Life of Brian". I'm certain there is widespread agreement among many of us here today concerning the great majority of these points. Let me share them with you.

      The first category is Immoral Aspects of the Film.

      The mother of Messiah (Brian) is in woman's clothing, in direct violation of the Holy Scriptures.

      The film blatantly tosses about almost every vile four-letter word known in gutter English.

      The mother of Messiah reports that she was raped and eventually found it pleasant.

      Several times male desires to change into a female are expressed.

      Patriots are pictured crawling through a hole in a private bodily area shown in a large mosaic, supposedly to reach the quarters of Pontius Pilate's wife and murder her. […][13]

          It is clear that, in 1996, most of those aspects would not engender such indignation. Already at that time, some people took the defence of the Pythons, for instance Nigel Andrews who commented about the film in the Financial Times, November 9th, 1979 :

     "Yet the blasphemy-invoking fuss that surrounded the film in America is for fishers of red herrings only. The Python

team have never specialised in made-to-shock "bad taste", and they do not do so here. That kind of inverted evangelicism […] is way wide of mark in viewing their any-grist-to-the-mill surreal comedy."[14]

         But in 1979, the least that one can say is that Brian did not easily establish itself in the big cities like New York or Los Angeles. Yet, the real test was to come, when Brian would be shown across the whole country. It came as no surprise that the South-Eastern states of the so-called Bible Belt did not welcome the film. Brooklyn and Charlotte were the first to cancel the showing. The local Baptist minister who took the decision had not even seen the film, which shows how bad the reputation of Brian was.

         South Carolina banned the film, which provoked counter protests from the citizens who felt that the First Amendment of the Constitution was being violated[15]. The film was also taken off in many towns of Louisiana. There, the cinemas were under the threat of prosecution for obscenity to discourage them from showing the film. Similar pressures operated in Mississipi.

         However, the Bible Belt was far from being the only area where the film encountered protests. Across the whole country, decisions were taken on a local level. The film was cancelled wherever the cinema managers considered the film was too provocative. Although there are no precise figures about it, one thing is sure ; the cancellations for fear of protest were far outnumbered by the cinemas where Brian was shown without any trouble.

         The controversy that the film created in America was inevitably reported in the United Kingdom and, even before the film was released there, opponents and supporters of Brian were already arguing over the terms of the British film censorship.

         The major opposition came from Mary Whitehouse, of the National Viewers' and Listeners' Association. She was taking part in the Nationwide Festival of Light[16], an organisation created on the suggestion of Malcom Muggeridge to defend decency. The irony is that ten years earlier, in 1969, Monty Python's Flying Circus had taken the place of a religious programme presented by…Malcom Muggeridge. The Festival of Light issued a letter explaining its position towards the film and warning against over-reaction to it for they realized that the publicity made by the controversy in the States had been rather counter-productive.

         Sure that the film would encounter protests, the film distributors decided to launch Brian in London in November and hold it there until Christmas so as to give it a chance to establish itself without any trouble. But although the film was withdrawn over Easter so as to avoid provocation, the real battle began, as in America, when the film went into the provinces.[17]

         In the late Seventies in Great Britain, power of censorship was not held by the British Board of Film Censors but by the three hundred and seventy or so local district councils. The BBFC only had an advisory role which meant that the councils may permit the viewing of a film rejected by the BBFC and vice versa. Out of the approximately three hundred and seventy district councils, seventy only seemed really concerned by what was shown on their local screens, and a dozen of them were known to be strict censors.

         The BBFC had rated Brian 'AA' but the producer decided they would refuse to show locally the film should it be rated 'X' by  any council. Therefore, local 'X' ratings prevented Brian from being shown in many areas including those where it was not banned outright. Although the Festival of Light had decided to avoid counter-productive publicity, media coverage proved to be inevitable. The best example of this is probably the television debate which opposed the Bishop of Southwark and…again…Maclcom Muggeridge on one side and John Cleese and Michael Palin on the other. In fact the debate proved somewhat pythonesque. Cleese and Palin had to face the virulent attacks of their opponents while trying to control the studio audience which showed signs of partisanship on their behalf. Consequently, the debate soon degenerated and nothing really came out of it.

         Some districts such as in Harrogate and West Yorkshire had banned the film without having seen it. As in the United States, such decisions were perceived by some citizens as a "denial of Liberty and a rejection of human rights"[18] and they argued that the film should at least be previewed.

         The absurdity of such local regulations was that people who lived in Harrogate and who wanted to see the film only had to drive seventeen miles south to Leeds or west to York.

         But the most thorough ban operated in the West country. Cornwall banned the film after a viewing session, whereas in East Devon, it was banned without preview. It did better in the south where, though banned at first, a debate was engaged and Brian was finally rated 'AA'.

         As for Scotland, the film met with no particular difficulty, except in Glasgow where it was rated 'X' because of the pressure of the militant Protestant Pastor Jack William.

         The case of The Life of Brian brought to light the complexity and sometimes the absurdity of local censorship regulations in Great Britain. This led to a report by the Committee on Obscenity and Film Censorship under the chairmanship of Professor Bernard Williams. The Committee recomended that the system of local censorship should be ended and replaced by the establishment of a statutory body to take over the functions of the BBFC.

         Monty Python's Life of Brian encountered little difficulty in the rest of the world in comparison with the United States and Great Britain. The film was shown in thirteen other countries. France, Belgium and Spain accepted the film without any protest despite the strong traditional influence that the Roman Catholic Church has in those countries. Even if the film was not seen in Italy, it seems to be due to the language problem rather than any caution concerning the opinion of the Vatican.

         Nevertheless, the film was not shown in Ireland and no attempt was even made to get the film past the strict Film Censorship Act of the Irish Republic. The film was sure to cause riots there as had proved the numerous accusations of blasphemy against it and the ban that censored the LP featuring the soundtrack of Brian although the Republic's Censorship of Publications Board does not normally deal with records and tapes.

         In South Africa, films as well as any kind of publication are subject to the restrictions of the Publication Act, established in 1974. Nonetheless, books are able to circulate in the country until the ban is actually decided. Thus Monty Python's Big Red Book, Monty Python's Brand New Papperbok  and The Scrapbook of Brian of Nazareth were distributed for a short time before being placed on the Jacobsen's Index of Objectionable Literature. Monty Python was already considered prejudicial to the state of South Africa and Brian had therefore no chance of being accepted.

         Other countries such as Greece, Israel, Austria, Switzerland, Holland, West Germany, Denmark and Sweden accepted the film without any comment. On the contrary, in Norway, the film was submitted to the Norwegian censors, a board of civil servants working for the Ministry of Justice. They unanimously decided to ban Brian. It was the first time a comedy was banned in Norway and as a result, the film went on release in Sweden with the warning : "This film is so funny that it is banned in Norway".

         It might be interesting to keep in mind that this general controversy was provoked by a film primarily designed to be funny and entertaining.

         Many of the countries or districts that decided to ban The Life of Brian explained that the mass crucifixion that occurs at the end of the film, with the victims singing "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life"[19] is very offensive to the Christians who consider Christ's death as a statement of sacrifice and redemption : 'He died that we might live'"[20]. The Pythons always responded that the mockery was not about religion itself but death. And this, in my opinion, may precisely be the real trouble with the film. An atheistic or agnostic consideration of religions in general may come to the conclusion that religion is an invention of man to exorcise his fear of death and of the unknown. Deriding death is therefore inevitably felt as blasphemous.

         The Pythons have declared on several occasions that their aim was never to challenge deliberately one convention after another nor to shock the audience. still, it is doubtful if the Pythons were not aware of the offending potential of their production. What is more, Terry Gilliam once admitted in Playboy : We've got to maintain a certain level of offence ; otherwise, we're just entertainers. John Cleese would probably not agree with this assertion, and this divergence of opinion is certainly partly responsible for the fact that John Cleese left the group at the end of the third series of the Flying Circus. Indeed, he went on to write Fawlty Towers, a series using essentially farcical comedy, slapstick, situation and character comedy, with absolutely no underlying message whatsoever. He would probably answer Terry Gilliam that to be an entertainer is precisely all that he wants to be, nothing more.

         Nevertheless, the original aim of the Pythons was probably to force back the limits of the acceptable and the unacceptable as a mean of increasing people's freedom. In fact, as we already mentioned, many of their admirers claimed that the kind of humour performed by the Pythons was useful and even essential to the working of a democracy. Eric Idle wrote :

     "At least one way of measuring the freedom of any society is the amount of comedy that is permitted, and clearly a healthy society permits more satirical comment than a repressive, so that if comedy is to function in some way as a safety release then it must obviously deal with these taboo areas. This is part of the responsibility we accord to our licensed jesters, that nothing be excused the searching light of comedy. If anything can survive the probe of humour it is clearly of value, and conversely all groups who claim immunity from laughter are claiming special privileges which should not be granted."[21]