John Cleese did present
the following opening speech
at the Chapman tribute, two months after Graham's death: 
"Graham Chapman, co-author of the
'Parrot Sketch,' is no more.
He has ceased to be,
bereft of life, he rests in peace, he has kicked the
bucket, hopped the twig, bit the dust, snuffed it, breathed
his last, and gone to meet the Great Head of Light Entertainment
in the sky, and I guess that we're all thinking how
sad it is that a man of such talent, such capability
and kindness, of such intelligence should now be so
suddenly spirited away at the age of only forty-eight,
before he'd achieved many of the things of which he
was capable, and before he'd had enough fun.
Well, I feel that
I should say, "Nonsense. Good riddance to
him, the freeloading bastard! I hope he
fries. "
And the reason I think
I should say this is, he would never forgive me if I
didn't, if I threw away this opportunity to shock you
all on his behalf. Anything for him but mindless
good taste. I could hear him whispering in my
ear last night as I was writing this:
"Alright, Cleese, you're very
proud of being the first person to ever say 'shit' on
television. If this service is really for me,
just for starters, I want you to be the first person
ever at a British memorial service to say 'fuck'!"
 You see, the trouble is, I can't. If he were
here with me now I would probably have the courage,
because he always emboldened me. But the truth is, I
lack his balls, his splendid defiance. And so I'll have
to content myself instead with saying 'Betty Mardsen...'
But Bolder and less
inhibited spirits than me follow today. Jones and Idle,
Gilliam and Palin. Heaven knows what the next hour will
bring in Graham's name. Trousers Dropping, blasphemers
on pogo sticks, spectacular displays of high-speed farting,
synchronised incest.  One of the four is planning to stuff a dead
ocelot and a 1922 Remington typewriter up his own arse
to the sound of the second movement of Elgar's cello
concerto. And that's in the first half.
Because you see, Gray
would have wanted it this way. Really. Anything for
him but mindless good taste. And that's what I'll always
remember about him---apart, of course, from his Olympian
extravagance. He was the prince of bad taste. He loved
to shock. In fact, Gray, more than anyone I knew, embodied
and symbolised all that was most offensive and juvenile
in Monty Python. And his delight in shocking people
led him on to greater and greater feats. I like to think
of him as the pioneering beacon that beat the path along
which fainter spirits could follow.
Some memories. I remember
writing the undertaker speech with him, and him suggesting
the punch line, 'All right, we'll eat her, but if you
feel bad about it afterwards, we'll dig a grave and
you can throw up into it.' I remember discovering in
1969, when we wrote every day at the flat where Connie
Booth and I lived, that he'd recently discovered the
game of printing four-letter words on neat little squares
of paper, and then  quietly placing them at strategic points around
our flat, forcing Connie and me into frantic last minute
paper chases whenever we were expecting important guests.
I remember him at
BBC parties crawling around on all fours, rubbing himself
affectionately against the legs of gray-suited executives,
and delicately nibbling the more appetizing female calves.
Mrs. Eric Morecambe remembers that too.
 I remember his being invited to speak at the
Oxford union, and entering the chamber dressed as a
carrot---a full length orange tapering costume with
a large, bright green sprig as a hat----and then, when
his turn came to speak, refusing to do so. He just stood
there, literally speechless, for twenty minutes, smiling
beatifically. The only time in world history that a
totally silent man has succeeded in inciting a riot.
I remember Graham
receiving a Sun newspaper TV award from Reggie Maudling.
Who else! And taking the trophy falling to the ground and crawling all the way back
to his table, screaming loudly, as loudly as he could.
And if you remember Gray, that was very loud indeed.
It is magnificent,
isn't it? You see, the thing about shock... is not that
it upsets some people, I think; I think that it gives
others a momentary joy of liberation, as we realised
in that instant that the social rules that constrict
our lives so terribly are not actually very important.
Well, Gray can't do
that for us anymore. He's gone. He is an ex-Chapman.
All we have of him now is our memories. But it will
be some time before they fade." |
