04/01/11

Story by Peggy Graham

'Spamalot'

‘Spamalot’ sold out at JCCC

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. — Lovingly ripped off from the classic film comedy Monty Python and the Holy Grail, the Tony Award-winning Monty Python’s Spamalot brings knights in tights to the local stage in a sold-out performance at 7 p.m. Sunday, May 1, in Yardley Hall of the Carlsen Center, Johnson County Community College. Spamalot concludes a successful 20^th anniversary season for the Performing Arts Series at JCCC.

High resolution photo

High resolution photo

Telling the legendary tale of King Arthur, his knights of the Round Table and their quest for the Holy Grail, Monty Python’s Spamalot features a chorus line of dancing divas and knights, flatulent Frenchmen, killer rabbits and one legless knight.

Spamalot is not exactly like the film. For example, it doesn’t come in a metal canister, but it does feature many of the same characters and the same sense of Python humor. Songs include Find Your Grail, He Is Not Dead Yet, The Song That Goes Like This, Always Look on the Bright Side of Life and You Won’t Succeed on Broadway.

Monty Python's Spamalot was the winner of three 2005 Tony Awards including Best Musical and Best Director, as well as the Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle awards for Best Musical. The original cast recording of Monty Python’s Spamalot won the 2006 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album.

Based on the Tony Award-winning direction of Mike Nichols and the riotous choreography of Casey Nicholaw, Monty Python's Spamalot features a book by Eric Idle, based on the screenplay of Monty Python and the Holy Grail by Monty Python creators Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin, with music and lyrics by the Grammy Award-winning team of Idle and John Du Prez.

The fictitious Monty Python, first created in 1969 for their British comedy television show, Monty Python’s Flying Circus, has grown to have a life of his own becoming the impresario who fronts films like The Holy Grail, The Life of Brian, The Meaning of Life, and And Now for Something Completely Different and books including The Big Red Book and The Papperbok. This is his first Broadway show.

Spamalot’s medieval merry-making is best suited for those over the age of 12.

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