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Welsh town ends ban on controversial Monty Python film, Life of Brian
Two Monty Python stars will attend the first ever screening of their controversial Life of Brian film in a Welsh town which banned it 30 years ago. According to WalesOnline, Michael Palin and Terry Jones will travel to Aberystwyth, west Wales, later this month for the town’s first ever screening of the movie, reports Dan Wooding, founder of ASSIST Ministries.
“Their host will be town mayor Sue Jones-Davies who played Brian’s girlfriend in the once controversial film three decades ago,” said the story. “Thirty years on and the tiny Aberystwyth Arts Centre venue where the film will be screened is a sell-out at £25 a ticket.”
The WalesOnline story stated that Mrs. Jones-Davies vowed to fight for the film to be shown after learning it had been banned and subsequently never screened in the town.
Opponents of the comedy, which was a world-wide box-office success, claimed it made fun of Jesus.
The Python team were accused of blasphemy because the film tells the story of a Jewish man who is mistaken for the messiah and crucified.
Mrs. Jones-Davies, now mayor of Aberystwyth, played Brian’s girlfriend Judith Iscariot in the 1979 film. She is responsible for the one-off charity screening of the film which will take place on March 28.
“It was actually a journalist who pointed out to me that the film had never been shown in Aberystwyth because of the ban,” said Mrs Jones-Davies today. “We decided that we might as well go on with it and see if we could arrange a screening in Aberystwyth.”
The story went on to say that local government reorganization meant the former ban had been swept away in the 1990s with the formation of new unitary councils.
As a result Mrs. Jones-Davies called up Terry Jones and invited him to the screening.
“He said, ?I think I’ll ask Michael (Palin) to come’ which is lovely because it makes it all more special,” she said. “I’m pretty sure the event is already a sell-out. Aberystwyth Arts Centre is a beautiful venue and there are only 120 places.
“It will be a great evening and it is about time the film was shown anyway.”
She said cash raised from the screening would go to the British Heart Foundation.
Terry Jones had also chosen to donate cash from the screening to Truthout, a website for ethical news, she said.
Note from Dan Wooding. Many years ago I attended an event in London with the Monty Python team and during several interviews I did with them, they told me that they had made a film that “sends up Jesus.” My newspaper, the Sunday People, promptly ran the story and the original backer, who was Jewish, pulled his financial support from the movie. Funding for the film was eventually provided by George Harrison, who was a long-time Python fan and had also got to know Eric Idle a few years previously. Desperate to see the finished product, Harrison and business manager Denis O'Brien set up Handmade Films, with Harrison providing the £2 million funding necessary to get Brian made.
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