Python plans new musical

Eric Idle is reviving a musical comedy that’s featured Eddie Izzard and Billy Connolly.

The Monty Python star will stage his show What About Dick? next year – five years after a couple of public run-throughs in Los Angeles.

As well as Izzard and Connolly, those original performances also featured Tim Curry, Emily Mortimer, Tracy Ullman and Frasier star Jane Leeves.

‘We are getting everyone together again and doing it in April for three nights,’ Idle now says.

The original shows were recorded on audio, but Idle admits: ‘I should have filmed it’ – hence the revival.

Described as ‘a lowbrow comedy about highbrow people’, the plot involves eight actors who are gathered together to perform a classic radio drama. The music was written by Idle's Spamalot collaborator John Du Prez,

Idle is returning to the idea after spending three years working a show called Death: The Musical, which failed to get off the ground.

He told the Daily Express: ‘I thought [it] was a really good idea, but it didn’t work.

‘Dick is more fun than death but then almost anything you say with the word “dick” in gets a laugh.’

Published: 16 Dec 2011