Why John Cleese And Eric Idle Get "Weird Confidence" Together

During his time at Cambridge University in the early '60s, John Cleese came across many similarly talented people in the field of comedy. There was his soon to be main writing partner Graham Chapman, as well as future Goodies Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie. Cleese also recalls in his autobiography So, Anyway… about first meeting another person at the Pembroke College Smokers — shows that were a mix of stand up comedy and sketches. "I was also introduced to Eric Idle, who proved to be extremely funny and who treated me with remarkable respect. Well, I was four years older…"

"They don't want a beautiful performance presented to them in a glass case anymore, they want some kind of authenticity."

And so began a relationship that has lasted 53 years, with a new show Cleese and Idle are performing called Together At Last… For The Very First Time. The show, which they first did together in America at the end of last year, mixes scripted material and improvisation with storytelling, musical numbers, footage and an audience Q&A. And all this will make each show completely different, meaning the audience is seeing it for the very first… oh, you guessed?

Cleese describes this stage show he's doing with Idle as "the most enjoyable stage thing I've done". "Because he and I get on very well together and it's very loose and I don't have the usual feelings I've got to turn in a perfect performance, which can put pressure on you. I accept there's going to be a few things happening, some things will go wrong in this kind of show — and that's what the audience seems to want. They don't want a beautiful performance presented to them in a glass case anymore, they want some kind of authenticity. And if you break up or forget the words or something, they seem to like it even better than if you get it right."

Such a statement echoes an incident that occurred to Cleese during Monty Python's reunion shows in 2014. Annoyed that he'd stuffed up a line in a sketch, he confided this to Eddie Izzard, whom he bumped into backstage. "John, they've seen you do these sketches right many times. It's more special for them when you get them wrong," Cleese recalled of the incident in his book.

"He was quite right," Cleese states now. "It's all very different from what I was aiming at in the late '60s. Very different. And it's more enjoyable. And Eric and I say we wouldn't want to play two-and-a-half thousand on our own. The two of us together, we get some weird confidence and we just go out. There are moments on stage where we don't know what's going to happen next, which is kind of fun, because we've been there now. We don't tighten up.

"You get a moment now and you're not sure what's happening next and instead of panicking, it's like, 'Well, something will crop up in a moment.' So that's fun, I like doing that."