All this brings back memories as a teenager, in an era that if you weren't in front of the TV at certain time, you missed the show! For some reason the "I've come for an argument" joke never got tied. I played it on record over an over again. How many of you bought their "3 sided record" comedy album?
From Wikipedia:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Python
Quote:
"In the summer of 1974, Ron Devillier, the programme director for nonprofit
PBS television station
KERA in
Dallas, Texas, started airing episodes of
Monty Python's Flying Circus. Ratings shot through the roof, providing an encouraging sign to the other 100 PBS stations that had signed up to begin airing the show in October 1974—exactly five years after their BBC debut. There was also cross-promotion from
FM radio stations across the US, whose airing of tracks from the Python LPs had already introduced American audiences to this bizarre brand of comedy. The popularity on PBS resulted in the 1974 re-release of the 1972
...Completely Different film, with much greater box office success. The success of the show was captured by a March 1975 article headline in the
New York Times, “Monty Python's Flying Circus Is Barnstorming Here”.
[51] Asked what challenges were left, now that they had made TV shows, films, written books, and produced records, Chapman responded, “Well, actually world supremacy would be very nice”, before Idle cautioned, “Yes, but that sort of thing has got to be done properly”.
[51]
The ability to show
Monty Python's Flying Circus under the American NTSC standard had been made possible by the commercial actions of American television producer
Greg Garrison. Garrison produced the NBC series
The Dean Martin Comedy World, which ran during the summer of 1974. The concept was to show clips from comedy shows produced in other countries, including tape of the Python sketches "Bicycle Repairman" and "The Dull Life of a Stockbroker". Payment for use of these two sketches was enough to allow Time-Life Films to convert the entire Python library to NTSC standard, allowing for the sale to the PBS network stations which then brought the entire show to US audiences."
Piña Colada, anyone?
