MICHAEL
PALLIN |
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British
actor/satirist Michael Palin first demonstrated his writing and performing
skills at Oxford University's Experimental Theatre Club. Almost immediately
upon graduation, Palin was snatched up by the BBC, which made excellent
use of his scathing wit and thespic versatility in such series as Twice
a Fortnight and The Complete and Utter History of Britain. A relative
latecomer to the fabled Monty Python troupe, Palin made up for lost time,
writing and performing in the group's long-running TV series and in such
big-screen projects as Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) and Life
of Brian (1978); he also wrote much of the musical score for Monty Python's
the Meaning of Life (1983). To date, Palin |
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and Cleese have been the two ex-Pythonites most active as solo performers. Palin was hilarious as the green-as-grass Reverend Charles Fort, ministering to "fallen women" ("Women who've tripped?") in The Missionary (1982) and as stuttering doofus Ken in A Fish Called Wanda (1988), winning a British Film Association award for the latter performance. Palin remained active in television into the 1990s with cheeky projects like Ripping Yarns (1976), Do Not Adjust Your Set (1977-79) and Palin's Column (1994). An inveterate globetrotter, Michael Palin channelled his wanderlust into his tongue-in-cheek TV miniseries Around the World in 80 Days (1989) and Pole to Pole (1991). |