Python musical gives Broadway the full Monty

0 Comments | AFP, March, 2005

NEW YORK (AFP) — "Spamalot," the much-hyped stage adaptation of the movie "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" opened on Broadway to winning reviews and nearly 20 million dollars in advance ticket sales.

Directed by Mike Nichols and written by original Python team member Eric Idle, the musical's opening night drew a star-studded audience that included the likes of Meryl Streep, Steve Martin, Whoopi Goldberg and David Bowie.

At the end of the evening, Idle invited the other surviving Pythons, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Michael Palin and Terry Jones, onto the stage for a curtain call.

A funeral urn was used to represent the sixth member of the legendary comedy troupe, Graham Chapman, who died in 1989.

As the playbill indicated, "Spamalot" is "lovingly...