The Beatles’ cultural impact extends beyond music into film, TV, fashion, literature, and even comedy. And if you ask Eric Idle, member of the influential British comedy troupe Monty Python, the band’s sharp wit was crucial to ushering in the Beatlemania craze in America. He even argues that The Beatles (John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr) were equally funny to his own crew.
“When The Beatles first arrived in America, what made everybody love them is they were funny,” he said on the Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend podcast. “There was this guy called Ringo with a big nose, a funny name, the funny haircuts. Everybody knew Ringo first. That’s the first name they knew. But it was their humor at the airport conference that broke them in America—I’m convinced of it. In a way, they were just as funny as we were.
“They were all Liverpool comedians really, but they went the wrong way,” he added, playfully. “They went on the dark side.”
Idle is referring to The Beatles’ now-iconic press conference on Feb. 7, 1964, held at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City. It remains a pivotal moment in the group’s history, happening two days before their seismic first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, which was viewed by 73 million people and fully kickstarted the “British Invasion.” If you look back at the footage from their media appearance, it’s hard to argue with Idle’s logic. The band threw out sarcastic punchlines and goofy slapstick with ease, countering the stuffiness of the reporters and showcasing a natural comedic balance.
When asked, “What about the reports that you guys are nothing but a bunch of British Elvis [Presleys]?”, Starr immediately adopted the singer’s trademark snarl and hip swivel, firing back, “It’s not true! It’s not true!” As his bandmates batted away questions about whether they plan to get haircuts, Harrison deadpanned, “I had one yesterday.” Asked why their music is so exciting to young people, Lennon chimed in with one of his signature acerbic quips: “If we knew, we’d form another group and be managers.”
As Idle shared with O’Brien, The Beatles’ arrival marked a turning point in his own life. “At the Edinburgh [Fringe] Festival [in 1963], it was the first time [everybody was] playing all their records. ‘What’s this about? What’s this about?’” he said. “Then they came through Cambridge the year after, and everybody changed. The whole world changed. We used to wear little old tweed jackets with leather pads; suddenly we were wearing Beatle jackets and saying, ‘Who’s your favorite Beatle?’ They did literally change the world after that Edinburgh festival.”
Idle formed Monty Python with Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin in 1969—shortly before The Beatles publicly announced their breakup. The timing was fitting, as, according to Gilliam in the 2006 book Here Comes the Sun, Harrison felt a distinct connection between the two acts. “He was a huge Python fan,” Gilliam said of the guitarist. “We started the year the Beatles quit. He was absolutely convinced whatever that spirit was that animated the Beatles just drifted across to Python.”
Harrison was indeed a devoted fan—he wound up being an executive producer on the 1979 Python film, The Life of Brian, after their previous backing fell through. But he was also a friend. “I met Eric Idle in 1975, at the California premiere of the Holy Grail film,” he told Rolling Stone. “And although that was the first time I’d ever met him, I felt like I’d known them all for years, because I’d watched all the programs and had had them on videotape. So it only took [10] minutes before we were the best of friends. I think after The Beatles, Monty Python was my favorite thing. It bridged the years when there was nothing really doing, and they were the only ones who could see that everything was a big joke.”
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