A caster (or castor ) is an undriven wheel that is designed to be attached to the bottom of a larger object (the "vehicle") to enable that object to be moved.
108-474: Mr. Creosote is a fictional character who appears in Monty Python's The Meaning of Life . He is a monstrously obese and vulgar restaurant patron who is served a vast amount of food and alcohol whilst vomiting repeatedly. After being persuaded to eat an after-dinner mint – "It's only wafer-thin" – he graphically explodes. The sequence opens the film's segment titled "Part VI: The Autumn Years". The character
216-464: A liver from a living patient without anaesthetic and the morbidly obese Mr. Creosote exploding over several restaurant patrons after finally giving in to the smooth maître d' telling him to eat a mint – "It's only a wafer-thin mint..."). At the time of its release, the Pythons confessed their aim was to offend "absolutely everyone", adding "It is guaranteed to offend". The Liver Donor scene (in which
324-511: A two-man show for various reasons, including Chapman's supposedly difficult and erratic personality. Cleese had fond memories of working with Palin on How to Irritate People and invited him to join the team. With no studio available at Thames until summer 1970 for the late-night show, Palin agreed to join Cleese and Chapman, and suggested the involvement of his writing partner Jones and colleague Idle—who in turn wanted Gilliam to provide animations for
432-471: A British general of World War II ; requiring a "slippery-sounding" surname, they settled on "Python". On other occasions, Idle has claimed that the name "Monty" was that of a popular and rotund fellow who drank in his local pub; people would often walk in and ask the barman, "Has Monty been in yet?", forcing the name to become stuck in his mind. The name Monty Python was later described by the BBC as being "envisaged by
540-657: A demonstration at the CBC's Montreal studios. The show eventually returned, becoming a fixture on the network during the first half of the 1970s. Sketches from Monty Python's Flying Circus were introduced to American audiences in August 1972 , with the release of the Python film And Now for Something Completely Different , featuring sketches from series 1 and 2 of the television show. This 1972 release met with limited box office success. The ability to show Monty Python's Flying Circus under
648-415: A dozen crates of brown ale (144 bottles)—considerably less than his usual fare. He finishes the feast, and several other courses, vomiting profusely all over himself, his table, and the restaurant's staff throughout his meal, causing other diners to lose their appetite and, in some cases, throw up as well. The audience, however, never sees Creosote eating, with the sole exception of him seemingly chewing on
756-492: A film lampooning the New Testament era in the same way Holy Grail had lampooned Arthurian legend. Despite sharing a distrust of organised religion, they agreed not to mock Jesus or his teachings directly. They also mentioned that they could not think of anything legitimate to make fun of about him. Instead, they decided to write a satire on credulity and hypocrisy among the followers of someone [Brian] who had been mistaken for
864-421: A good concept to apply to the series: allowing sketches to blend into one another. Palin had been equally fascinated by another of Gilliam's efforts, entitled "Christmas Cards", and agreed that it represented "a way of doing things differently". Since Cleese, Chapman, and Idle were less concerned with the overall flow of the programme, Jones, Palin, and Gilliam became largely responsible for the presentation style of
972-401: A great satire on closed minds and people who follow blindly. Then you have them splitting into factions...it is a wonderful satire on the way that Jesus's own teaching has been used to persecute others. They were satirising fundamentalism and persecution of others and at the same time saying the one person who rises above all this was Jesus". Monty Python performed four consecutive dates at
1080-422: A larger wheel surface area. Also, harder wheel materials (e.g., cast iron, high profile polyurethane) are less sensitive to and tend to not track dirt and debris on floors. Common inexpensive casters may include a brake feature, which prevents the wheel from turning. This is commonly achieved using a lever that presses a brake cam against the wheel. However a swivel caster is still able to move around slightly, in
1188-431: A leek tart , frogs' legs amandine and quail's eggs with puréed mushrooms all mixed in a bucket with the quail eggs on top and a double helping of pâté. The appetizers are followed by the main course of jugged hare , with a sauce of truffles, bacon, Grand Marnier, anchovies and cream. For drinks, Mr. Creosote has six bottles of Château Latour 1945, a Methuselah (double Jeroboam, or 6 litres) of champagne, and half
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#17328842414281296-480: A new and exciting direction." —BBC profile for Monty Python's Flying Circus . They enjoyed Cook and Moore's sketch show Not Only... But Also . One problem the Pythons perceived with these programmes was that though the body of the sketch would be strong, the writers would often struggle to then find a punchline funny enough to end on, and this would detract from the overall sketch quality. They decided that they would simply not bother to "cap" their sketches in
1404-425: A paramedic appears at the door of a living man to take his liver) is a satire on bureaucracy, a common Python trope. Besides the opening credits and the fish sequence, Gilliam, by now an established live-action director, no longer wanted to produce any linking cartoons, offering instead to direct one sketch, " The Crimson Permanent Assurance ". Under his helm, though, the segment grew so ambitious and tangential that it
1512-576: A rather pompous manner, make the formal and determined announcement "And now for something completely different.", which later became the title of the first Monty Python film . The Python theme music is the Band of the Grenadier Guards ' rendition of John Philip Sousa 's " The Liberty Bell " which was first published in 1893. Under the Berne Convention 's "country of origin" concept, the composition
1620-460: A result, a meeting was initiated by Cleese between Chapman, Idle, Jones, Palin, and himself at which it was agreed to pool their writing and performing efforts and jointly seek production sponsorship. According to their official website, the group was born from a Kashmir tandoori restaurant in Hampstead on 11 May 1969, following a taping of Do Not Adjust Your Set which Cleese and Chapman attended. It
1728-409: A rigid ring encircling each swivel caster, slightly above the wheel, that lowers and presses down on the wheel, preventing both wheel and swivel rotation. An alternative method is the central lock caster, which has a rotating cam in the center of each vertical caster shaft, leading down to a braking mechanism in the bottom of each caster. A Kingpinless caster has an inner raceway, an outer raceway which
1836-408: A role in how well the caster performs. Parameters such as tire hardness, tread width and shape, the length of the trailing offset (the 'caster') and wheel diameter all affect the effort required to start the platform moving. Harder wheels will make the caster easier to roll by reducing deformation resistance. A less inflated tire offers more deformation resistance and thus more effort is required to move
1944-518: A separate individual, Brian Cohen, born at the same time, and in a neighbouring stable. When Jesus appears in the film (first, as a baby in the stable, and then later on the Mount , speaking the Beatitudes ), he is played straight (by actor Kenneth Colley ) and portrayed with respect. The comedy begins when members of the crowd mishear his statements of peace, love, and tolerance ("I think he said, 'Blessed are
2052-426: A slow pan across countryside and impressive music was Mike and Terry's, and anything that got utterly involved with words and disappeared up any personal orifice was Eric's". Gilliam's animations ranged from the whimsical to the savage (the cartoon format allowing him to create some astonishingly violent scenes without fear of censorship). Several names for the show were considered before Monty Python's Flying Circus
2160-405: A small circle rotating around offset distance between the vertical shaft and the center of the locked wheel. A more complex type of swivel caster, sometimes called a total lock caster, has an additional rotational lock on the vertical shaft so that neither shaft swiveling nor wheel rotation can occur, thus providing very rigid support. It is possible to use these two locks together or separately. If
2268-536: A straight line path, or mounted on a pivot or pintle such that the wheel will automatically align itself to the direction of travel. A basic, rigid caster consists of a wheel mounted to a stationary fork. The orientation of the fork, which is fixed relative to the vehicle, is determined when the caster is mounted to the vehicle. An example of this is the wheels found at the rear of a shopping cart in North America. Rigid casters tend to restrict vehicle motion so that
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#17328842414282376-411: A swivel caster will tend to automatically align to, and rotate parallel to the direction of travel. This can be seen on a shopping cart when the front casters align parallel to the rear casters when traveling down an aisle. A consequence of this is that the vehicle naturally tends to travel in a straight direction. Precise steering is not required because the casters tend to maintain straight motion. This
2484-509: A swivel or rigid caster design. Industrial casters typically have a flat top plate that has four bolt holes to ensure a sturdy connection between the top plate and the load. They are used in a variety of applications including dolly carts, assembly turntables, heavy duty storage racks, holding bins, tow lines, maintenance equipment, and material handling mechanisms. In early manufacturing, industrial caster bodies were typically fabricated from three separate, stamped metal parts, which were welded to
2592-592: A total of 24 minutes from each, in part to make time for commercials, and in part to avoid upsetting their audience. As the judge observed in Gilliam v. American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. , where Monty Python sued for damages caused by broadcast of the mutilated version, "According to the network, appellants should have anticipated that most of the excised material contained scatological references inappropriate for American television and that these scenes would be replaced with commercials, which presumably are more palatable to
2700-644: A whole pineapple towards the end of the sequence. Finally, after being convinced by the Maître d' to eat a single "wafer-thin mint", his stomach begins to rapidly expand until it explodes: covering the restaurant and diners with viscera and partially digested food—even starting a "vomit-wave" among the other diners, who leave in disgust. Creosote is amazingly still alive when the explosion clears, but his chest cavity and abdomen are now blasted open, revealing his spread ribs and intact, still-beating heart and viscera. As he looks around, seemingly confused by what has just happened,
2808-423: A wide swivel caster in-place, the center part of the wheel-to-ground contact patch rotates slower than the regions further out to the sides. This difference in rotation speed across the base of the wheel contact patch causes wide wheels to resist rotation around the swivel, and this resistance increases as weight loading increases. An alternative way to increase load capacity while limiting swivel-rotation resistance
2916-569: Is also true during vehicle turns. The caster rotates perpendicular to the turning radius and provides a smooth turn. This can be seen on a shopping cart as the front wheels rotate at different velocities, with different turning radius depending on how tight a turn is made. The angle of, and distance between the wheel axles and swivel joint can be adjusted for different types of caster performance. Industrial casters are heavy duty casters that are designed to carry heavy loads, in some cases up to thirty thousand pounds. An Industrial caster may have either
3024-481: Is attached to the vehicle, and ball bearings between the raceways. This mechanism has no kingpin , hence the name kingpinless. The absence of a kingpin eliminates most causes of swivel caster failure and reduces or eliminates shimmy after use . They offer capacity and durability comparable to units having sealed precision ball or tapered bearings , and are a practical alternative to traditional swivel casters in high-impact situations . One major disadvantage of casters
3132-442: Is flutter. A common example of caster flutter is on a supermarket shopping cart, when one caster rapidly swings side-to-side. This oscillation, which is also known as shimmy , occurs naturally at certain speeds, and is similar to speed wobble that occurs in other wheeled vehicles. The speed at which caster flutter occurs is based on the weight borne by the caster and the distance between the wheel axle and steering axis. This distance
3240-409: Is known as trailing distance , and increasing this distance can eliminate flutter at moderate speeds. Generally, flutter occurs at high speeds. What makes flutter dangerous is that it can cause a vehicle to suddenly move in an unwanted direction. Flutter occurs when the caster is not in full contact with the ground and therefore its orientation is uncontrollable. As the caster regains full contact with
3348-401: Is played by Terry Jones , who directed the film. According to Jones, John Cleese , who played the Maître d'hôtel, struggled to keep a straight face saying "wafer-thin mint" and also struggled to get out of shot without bursting into laughter. In the sequence, Mr. Creosote dines at a French restaurant. The entrance of this morbidly obese middle-aged man is accompanied by ominous music. One of
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3456-561: The ABC special Best in Film: The Greatest Movies of Our Time . and viewers in a Channel 4 poll placed it sixth. Following the success of Holy Grail , reporters asked for the title of the next Python film, though the team had not even begun to consider a third one. Eventually, Idle flippantly replied "Jesus Christ – Lust for Glory", which became the group's stock answer to such questions. However, they soon began to seriously consider
3564-527: The Charisma Records label, for which the Pythons recorded their comedy albums). The backers of the film wanted to cut the famous Black Knight scene (a Sam Peckinpah send-up in which the Black Knight loses his limbs in a duel), but it was eventually kept in the film. "Tis but a scratch" and "It's just a flesh wound…" are often quoted. Holy Grail was selected as the second-best comedy of all time in
3672-599: The Flying Circus series, in which disparate sketches are linked to give each episode the appearance of a single stream-of-consciousness (often using a Gilliam animation to move from the closing image of one sketch to the opening scene of another). The BBC states, "Gilliam's unique animation style became crucial, segueing seamlessly between any two completely unrelated ideas and making the stream-of-consciousness work." Writing started at 9:00AM and finished at 5:00PM. Typically, Cleese and Chapman worked as one pair isolated from
3780-759: The Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles in September 1980 during preparations for Meaning of Life . The performances were filmed and released in the concert film, Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl (directed by Terry Hughes ), with the Pythons performing sketches from the television series in front of an audience. The released film also incorporated footage from the German television specials (the inclusion of which gives Ian MacNaughton his first on-screen credit for Python since
3888-570: The Spanish Inquisition in a suburban front room), while the Cambridge graduates' sketches tended to be more verbal and more aggressive (for example, Cleese and Chapman's many "confrontation" sketches, where one character intimidates or hurls abuse, or Idle's characters with bizarre verbal quirks, such as "The Man Who Speaks In Anagrams "). Cleese confirmed that "most of the sketches with heavy abuse were Graham's and mine, anything that started with
3996-420: The title sequence and theme music. On several occasions, the cold open lasted until mid-show, after which the regular opening titles ran. Occasionally, the Pythons tricked viewers by rolling the closing credits halfway through the show, usually continuing the joke by fading to the familiar globe logo used for BBC continuity, over which Cleese would parody the clipped tones of a BBC announcer. On one occasion,
4104-422: The "Messiah", but who had no desire to be followed as such. Terry Jones adds it was a satire on those who for the next 2,000 years "couldn't agree on what Jesus was saying about peace and love". "We are three wise men." "Well, what are you doing creeping around a cow shed at two o'clock in the morning? That doesn't sound very wise to me." —Early scene from Life of Brian . The focus therefore shifted to
4212-531: The AFI Star Award by the American Film Institute . Holy Grail and Life of Brian are frequently ranked on lists of the greatest comedy films. A 2005 poll asked more than 300 comedians, comedy writers, producers, and directors to name the greatest comedians of all time, and half of Monty Python's members made the top 50. Jones and Palin met at Oxford University , where they performed together with
4320-587: The American NTSC standard had been made possible by the commercial actions of American television producer Greg Garrison . Garrison produced the NBC series The Dean Martin Comedy World , which ran during the summer of 1974. The concept was to show clips from comedy shows produced in other countries, including tape of the Python sketches "Bicycle Repairman" and "The Dull Life of a Stockbroker". "When [Monty Python] hit
4428-467: The American public." Monty Python won the case. With the popularity of Python throughout the rest of the 1970s and through most of the 1980s, PBS stations looked at other British comedies, leading to UK shows such as Are You Being Served? gaining a US audience, and leading, over time, to many PBS stations having a "British Comedy Night" which airs many popular UK comedies. In 1976, Monty Python became
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4536-641: The BBC Television Centre. The Pythons had a definite idea about what they wanted to do with the series. They were admirers of the work of Peter Cook , Alan Bennett , Jonathan Miller , and Dudley Moore on Beyond the Fringe —seminal to the British " satire boom "—and had worked on Frost , which was similar in style. "The 1960s satire boom opened up the way for a fresh, inventive generation of young comedy writer-performers to flourish on TV and to take comedy in
4644-614: The Beatles ' influence on music. Their sketch show has been called "an important moment in the evolution of television comedy". Monty Python's Flying Circus was loosely structured as a sketch show, but its innovative stream-of-consciousness approach and Gilliam's animation skills pushed the boundaries of what was acceptable in style and content. A self-contained comedy unit, the Pythons had creative control that allowed them to experiment with form and content, discarding rules of television comedy. They followed their television work by making
4752-439: The Maître d' calmly walks up to him and presents, "monsieur, the cheque". In the documentary The Meaning of Making 'The Meaning of Life (2003), John Cleese said that the sequence, originally written by Jones and Michael Palin , was initially rejected. Cleese said the initial version had suffered from a flawed construction, so he rewrote it with Graham Chapman . At the U.S. Comedy Arts Festival — Tribute to Monty Python it
4860-636: The Oxford Revue . Chapman and Cleese met at Cambridge University . Idle was also at Cambridge, but started a year after Chapman and Cleese. Cleese met Gilliam in New York City while on tour with the Cambridge University Footlights revue Cambridge Circus (originally entitled A Clump of Plinths ). Chapman, Cleese, and Idle were members of the Footlights, which at that time also included
4968-517: The Pythons ) were a British comedy troupe formed in 1969 consisting of Graham Chapman , John Cleese , Terry Gilliam , Eric Idle , Terry Jones , and Michael Palin . The group came to prominence for the sketch comedy series Monty Python's Flying Circus , which aired on the BBC from 1969 to 1974. Their work then developed into a larger collection that included live shows, films, albums, books, and musicals; their influence on comedy has been compared to
5076-416: The Pythons regard as their biggest influence, which also featured Peter Sellers , whom Cleese called "the greatest voice man of all time") recording his groundbreaking BBC series Q... (1969). Not only was Q... more irreverent and anarchic than any previous television comedy , but Milligan also would often "give up" on sketches halfway through and wander off set (often muttering "Did I write this?"). It
5184-402: The Pythons' satirical view of television of the 1970s which condescendingly encouraged more involvement from the "man on the street". The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) added Monty Python's Flying Circus to its national September 1970 fall line-up. They aired the 13 episodes of series 1, which had first run on the BBC the previous autumn ( October 1969 to January 1970 ), as well as
5292-936: The US, whose airing of tracks from the Python LPs had already introduced American audiences to this bizarre brand of comedy. The popularity on PBS resulted in the 1974 re-release of the 1972 ...Completely Different film, with much greater box office success. The success of the show was captured by a March 1975 article headline in The New York Times , "Monty Python's Flying Circus Is Barnstorming Here". Asked what challenges were left, now that they had made TV shows, films, written books, and produced records, Chapman responded, "Well, actually world supremacy would be very nice", before Idle cautioned, "Yes, but that sort of thing has got to be done properly". In 1975 ABC broadcast two 90-minute Monty Python specials, each with three shows, but cut out
5400-569: The World " (a sketch referenced in Google Translate ), and " Four Yorkshiremen sketch " are just a few examples. Most of the show's sketches satirise areas of public life, such as: Dead Parrot (poor customer service), Silly Walks (bureaucratic inefficiency), Spam (ubiquity of Spam post World War II), and Four Yorkshiremen (nostalgic conversations). Featuring regularly in skits, Gumbys (characters of limited intelligence and vocabulary) were part of
5508-479: The ages of man from birth to death. Directed again by Jones solo, The Meaning of Life is embellished with some of the group's most bizarre and disturbing moments, as well as various elaborate musical numbers, which include " Galaxy Song " (performed by Idle) and " Every Sperm Is Sacred " (performed by Palin and Jones). The film is by far their darkest work, containing a great deal of black humour , garnished by some spectacular violence (including an operation to remove
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#17328842414285616-533: The airwaves, it really was quite shocking but it was shocking in a good way. It set you up right and opened up a whole new form of comedy. 'Pythonesque ." — Ron Devillier, PBS programming director. Through the efforts of Python's American manager Nancy Lewis, during the summer of 1974, Ron Devillier, the programming director for nonprofit PBS television station KERA in Dallas , Texas, started airing episodes of Monty Python's Flying Circus . Ratings shot through
5724-500: The attached platform. Turning effort is affected by the amount of caster and by the wheel diameter. Enhancements to traditional caster design include toe guards, track wipers, reinforced legs, steering tubes, swivel locks and brakes, all implemented in an effort to reduce operator injuries in the workplace. The diameter of a caster wheel affects how easily the caster moves over particulate, rough or irregular surfaces. Large diameter caster wheels are able to bridge gaps like that between
5832-408: The caster wheel. When the caster is moved and the wheel is not facing the correct direction, the offset will cause the wheel assembly to rotate around the axis of the vertical shaft to follow behind the direction of movement. If there is no offset, the wheel will not rotate if not facing the correct direction, either preventing motion or dragging across the ground. When in motion along a straight line,
5940-562: The chair more cumbersome. Caster flutter can be controlled by adding dampers or increasing the friction of the swivel joints. This can be accomplished by adding washers to the swivel joint. The friction increases as the weight on the front of the chair increases. Anytime the caster begins to flutter, it slows the chair and shifts weight to the front wheels. There are several online anti-flutter kits for retrofitting wheelchair casters in this manner. Other methods of reducing caster flutter include increasing swivel lead, using heavier grease, reducing
6048-419: The chair must be safe for riders. Increasing trailing distance can increase stability at higher speeds for wheelchair racing, but may create flutter at lower speeds for everyday use. Unfortunately, the more trail the caster has, the more space the caster requires to swivel. Therefore, in order to accommodate this extra swivel space, lengthening of frame or extending the footrests may be required. This tends to make
6156-411: The cheesemakers ' "). Directing duties were handled solely by Jones, having amicably agreed with Gilliam that Jones' approach to film-making was better suited for Python's general performing style. Holy Grail's production had often been stilted by their differences behind the camera. Gilliam again contributed two animated sequences (one being the opening credits) and took charge of set design. The film
6264-541: The credits ran directly after the opening titles. On the subversive nature of the show (and their subsequent films), Cleese states "anti-authoritarianism was deeply ingrained in Python". "Our first rule was: no punchlines. [Some sketches] start brilliant, great acting, really funny sketch, but the punchline is just not as good as the rest of the sketch, so it kills the entire thing. That's why we eliminated them." —Terry Gilliam in 2007. Because of their dislike of finishing with punchlines, they experimented with ending
6372-542: The drama society's theatrical productions, are kept in the archives of the Pembroke Players . The six Python members appeared in or wrote these shows before Flying Circus : The BBC's satirical television show The Frost Report , broadcast from March 1966 to December 1967, is credited as first uniting the British Pythons and providing an environment in which they could develop their particular styles. Following
6480-504: The end of Flying Circus ) and live performances of several songs from the troupe's then-current Monty Python's Contractual Obligation Album . Monty Python's four-night stint as headliners at the Hollywood Bowl set a record for a comedy act at the venue; it has since been equalled by Dave Chappelle in May 2022. The Pythons' final film returned to something structurally closer to the style of Flying Circus . A series of sketches loosely follows
6588-464: The film, but Chapman took the lead as King Arthur. Cleese returned to the group for the film, feeling that they were once again breaking new ground. Holy Grail was filmed on location, in picturesque rural areas of Scotland, with a budget of only £229,000; the money was raised in part with investments from rock groups such as Pink Floyd , Jethro Tull , and Led Zeppelin , as well as UK music industry entrepreneur Tony Stratton Smith (founder and owner of
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#17328842414286696-584: The films Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975), Life of Brian (1979), and The Meaning of Life (1983). Their influence on British comedy has been apparent for years, while it has coloured the work of the early editions of Saturday Night Live through to absurdist trends in television comedy. At the 41st British Academy Film Awards in 1988, Monty Python received the BAFTA Award for Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema . In 1998, they were awarded
6804-533: The first six episodes of series 2 only a few weeks after they first appeared on the BBC ( September to November 1970 ). The CBC dropped the show when it returned to regular programming after the Christmas 1970 break, choosing to not place the remaining seven episodes of series 2 on the January 1971 CBC schedule. Within a week, the CBC received hundreds of calls complaining of the cancellation, and more than 100 people staged
6912-419: The first three seasons contained 13 episodes each, the fourth ended after just six. The name Monty Python's Flying Circus appears in the opening animation for season four, but in the end credits, the show is listed as simply Monty Python . Although Cleese left the show, he was credited as a writer for three of the six episodes, largely concentrated in the "Michael Ellis" episode, which had begun life as one of
7020-433: The fish in the aquarium exclaims, "Oh shit, it's Mr. Creosote!" as he passes, causing all the fish to swim for cover. The scene opens with a short dialogue between Mr. Creosote (who speaks with a coarse Cockney accent) and the maître d'hôtel (who speaks with a fake, exaggerated French accent), played by John Cleese : Creosote is then led to his table and, once seated, starts projectile- vomiting , generally failing to hit
7128-525: The floor and an elevator car. However, the larger the diameter of a caster wheel, the higher the caster support arm must be. Either the base of a low-hanging object must be lifted higher above the wheels, or the casters must hang out to the sides straddling the low-hanging supported object. While rotating around the vertical shaft, swivel caster wheels sweep out a space. Larger wheels require more of this space. Load capacity may be increased by using wider wheels with more ground contact area. However, when rotating
7236-567: The form of Baron Manfred von Richthofen 's Flying Circus of WWI fame, and the new group was forming in a time when the Royal Guardsmen 's 1966 song " Snoopy vs. the Red Baron " had peaked. The term 'flying circus' was also another name for the popular entertainment of the 1920s known as barnstorming , where multiple performers collaborated with their stunts to perform a combined set of acts. Differing, somewhat confusing accounts are given of
7344-459: The future Goodies ( Tim Brooke-Taylor , Bill Oddie , and Graeme Garden ), and Jonathan Lynn (co-writer of Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister ). During Idle's presidency of the club, feminist writer Germaine Greer and broadcaster Clive James were members. Recordings of Footlights' revues (called "Smokers") at Pembroke College include sketches and performances by Cleese and Idle, which, along with tapes of Idle's performances in some of
7452-414: The greatest comedy films. In 2006, it was ranked first on a Channel 4 list of the 50 Greatest Comedy Films . Empire magazine called it "an unrivalled satire on religion". In 2013, Richard Burridge , a theologian decorated by Pope Francis, called Life of Brian an "extraordinary tribute to the life and work and teaching of Jesus—that they couldn't actually blaspheme or make a joke out of it. They did
7560-477: The ground, it can be in any orientation. This can cause the vehicle to suddenly move in the direction that the caster is pointed. At slower speeds, the caster’s ability to swivel can correct the direction and can continue travel in the desired direction. But at high speeds this can be dangerous as the wheel may not be able to swivel quickly enough and the vehicle may lurch in any direction. Electric and racing wheelchair designers are very concerned with flutter because
7668-454: The images Gilliam used were lifted from famous works of art, and from Victorian illustrations and engravings . The giant foot which crushes the show's title at the end of the opening credits is in fact the foot of Cupid , cut from a reproduction of the Renaissance masterpiece Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time by Bronzino . This foot, and Gilliam's style in general, are visual trademarks of
7776-738: The making of Life of Brian and other later projects by Python members, noted the similarity between the Mr. Creosote episode and the scene in Magical Mystery Tour where John Lennon , dressed as a waiter, serves pasta to Ringo Starr 's fictional Aunt Jessie using a spade to build a giant mound of spaghetti on the table. In his 2015 Movie Guide , Leonard Maltin described Mr. Creosote as having "an unforgettable scene, like it or not". British extreme metal band Anaal Nathrakh reference Mr. Creosote in their song "The Age of Starlight Ends". Monty Python Monty Python (also collectively known as
7884-402: The many drafts of the "Holy Grail" motion picture. When a new direction for "Grail" was decided upon, the subplot of Arthur and his knights wandering around a strange department store in modern times was lifted out and recycled as the aforementioned TV episode. Songwriter Neil Innes contributed to some sketches, including "Appeal on Behalf of Very Rich People". The Pythons' first feature film
7992-509: The mass of the wheel, or increasing friction with the ground by changing materials. Casters are also stopped completely using caster cups. Ergonomic casters are designed with consideration for the operating environment and the task to be performed so that any injurious effects on the operator are minimized. Long-term repetitive actions involving resisting casters can contribute to strain injuries. Improper specifications can also contribute to reduced service life of casters. Many parameters play
8100-483: The origins of the Python name, although the members agree that its only "significance" was that they thought it sounded funny. In the 1998 documentary Live at Aspen during the US Comedy Arts Festival , where the troupe was awarded the AFI Star Award by the American Film Institute , the group implied that "Monty" was selected (Eric Idle's idea) as a gently mocking tribute to Field Marshal Lord Montgomery ,
8208-442: The others, as did Jones and Palin, while Idle wrote alone. After a few days, they would join with Gilliam, critique their scripts, and exchange ideas. Their approach to writing was democratic. If the majority found an idea humorous, it was included in the show. The casting of roles for the sketches was a similarly unselfish process, since each member viewed himself primarily as a "writer", rather than an actor eager for screen time. When
8316-430: The programme. The Pythons used the British tradition of cross-dressing comedy by donning frocks and makeup and playing female roles themselves while speaking in falsetto . Jones specialised in playing the working-class housewife, or "ratbag old women" as termed by the BBC. Palin and Idle generally played the role more posh, with Idle playing more feminine women. Cleese played female roles more sparsely, while Chapman
8424-493: The projected series. Much has been made of the fact that the Monty Python troupe is the result of Cleese's desire to work with Palin and the chance circumstances that brought the other four members into the fold. By contrast, according to John Cleese's autobiography, the origins of Monty Python lay in the admiration that writing partners Cleese and Chapman had for the new type of comedy being done on Do Not Adjust Your Set ; as
8532-416: The provided bucket. The floor quickly becomes covered in vomitus , and so do the cleaning woman and the maître d's trousers. Creosote listens patiently while the restaurant's appetisers are read out to him by the maître d', and after vomiting on the menu held open in front of him, he orders every item on the menu : He is served moules marinières , pâté de foie gras , beluga caviar , Eggs Benedict ,
8640-772: The restaurant wheeling his gut on a caster was omitted from the film. The fake vomitus consisted of large amounts of condensed minestrone soup , which made a considerable mess of the filming location, the Porchester Centre in Bayswater , West London . Film director Quentin Tarantino said that the "Mr. Creosote" scene was the only time he was unable to view a graphic film sequence, recollecting, "If somebody vomits, and I actually smell vomit while I'm watching this, I'm just going to hurl!" George Harrison of The Beatles , who co-founded production company Handmade Films to fund
8748-528: The roof, prompting other PBS affiliates to pick up the show. Devillier states, "We got the Nielsens in and started looking at the Saturday ratings. The first night, it was a 6 rating. We couldn't believe it. We didn't know what a 6 looked like. The next week, it was a 7 and it may have taken a month but it stayed there and we started getting 8s, 9s and 10s." There was also cross-promotion from FM radio stations across
8856-411: The show, and claimed that only two Cleese- and Chapman-penned sketches in the third series ("Dennis Moore" and the "Cheese Shop") were truly original, and that the others were bits and pieces from previous work cobbled together in slightly different contexts. He was also finding Chapman, who was at that point in the full throes of alcoholism, difficult to work with. According to an interview with Idle, "It
8964-499: The sketches by cutting abruptly to another scene or animation, walking offstage, addressing the camera (breaking the fourth wall ), or introducing a totally unrelated event or character. A classic example of this approach was the use of Chapman's "anti-silliness" character of " the Colonel ", who walked into several sketches and ordered them to be stopped because things were becoming "far too silly". Another favourite way of ending sketches
9072-566: The stoning scene in Monty Python's Life of Brian , they took the idea one step further by playing women who impersonated men. Many sketches are well-known and widely quoted. " Dead Parrot sketch ", " The Lumberjack Song ", " Spam " (which led to the coining of the term email spam ), " Nudge Nudge ", " The Spanish Inquisition ", " Upper Class Twit of the Year ", " Cheese Shop ", " The Ministry of Silly Walks ", " Argument Clinic ", " The Funniest Joke in
9180-399: The success of Do Not Adjust Your Set (which broadcast on ITV from December 1967 to May 1969), Thames Television offered Gilliam, Idle, Jones, and Palin their own late-night adult comedy series together. At the same time, Chapman and Cleese were offered a show by the BBC , which had been impressed by their work on The Frost Report and At Last the 1948 Show . Cleese was reluctant to do
9288-514: The team as the perfect name for a sleazy entertainment agent". Flying Circus popularised innovative formal techniques, such as the cold open , in which an episode began without the traditional opening titles or announcements. An example of this is the "It's" man: Palin, outfitted in Robinson Crusoe garb, making a tortuous journey across various terrains, before finally approaching the camera to state, "It's ...", to be then interrupted by
9396-464: The themes for sketches were chosen, Gilliam had a free hand in bridging them with animations, using a camera, scissors, and airbrush. While the show was a collaborative process, different factions within Python were responsible for elements of the team's humour. In general, the work of the Oxford-educated members (Jones and Palin) was more visual, and more fanciful conceptually (e.g., the arrival of
9504-410: The third and fourth series, the group decided to embark on their first "proper" feature film, containing entirely new material. Monty Python and the Holy Grail was based on Arthurian legend and was directed by Jones and Gilliam. Again, the latter also contributed linking animations (and put together the opening credits). Along with the rest of the Pythons, Jones and Gilliam performed several roles in
9612-418: The top plate. Today, many industrial caster bodies are made by laser cutting the body from a single metal blank and then using a press brake to shape the legs to the required ninety degree angle, thus producing a mechanically stronger device. Various factors affect industrial caster performance. For example, larger wheel diameters and widths provide higher weight capacity by distributing the load's weight across
9720-569: The top rated show in Japan. The popularity of the show in the Netherlands saw the town of Spijkenisse near Rotterdam open a 'silly walks' road crossing in 2018. Believed to be a world first, the official sign asks pedestrians to cross the road in a comical manner. Having considered the possibility at the end of the second series, Cleese left the Flying Circus at the end of the third. He later explained that he felt he no longer had anything fresh to offer
9828-502: The traditional manner, and early episodes of the Flying Circus series make great play of this abandonment of the punchline (one scene has Cleese turn to Idle, as the sketch descends into chaos, and remark that "This is the silliest sketch I've ever been in"—they all resolve not to carry on and simply walk off the set). However, as they began assembling material for the show, the Pythons watched one of their collective heroes, Spike Milligan , whom they had admired on The Goon Show (a show
9936-509: The vehicle travels along a straight line. Like the simpler rigid caster, a swivel caster incorporates a wheel mounted to a fork, but an additional swivel joint above the fork allows the fork to freely rotate about 360°, thus enabling the wheel to roll in any direction. This makes it possible to easily move the vehicle in any direction without changing its orientation. Swivel casters are sometimes attached to handles so that an operator can manually set their orientation. The improved swivel caster
10044-411: The vertical shaft is locked but the wheel can still turn, the caster becomes a directional caster, but one which may be locked to roll in one direction along any horizontal axis. In some cases it is useful to be able to brake or lock all casters at the same time, without having to walk around to individually engage a mechanism on each one. This may be accomplished using a central lock mechanism engaged by
10152-444: Was claimed Cleese was taken with the unflappable maître d' character. Jones thought Creosote should be played by fellow Python Terry Gilliam , before Gilliam persuaded Jones to play the role instead. Jones was transformed into Mr. Creosote by British prosthetic make-up artist Christopher Tucker , who also created the prosthetic effects for the American film drama The Elephant Man (1980). An outdoor shot in which Creosote approaches
10260-550: Was clear that their new series would now seem less original, and Jones in particular became determined the Pythons should innovate. Michael Palin recalls "Terry Jones and I adored the Q... shows...[Milligan] was the first writer to play with the conventions of television." After much debate, Jones remembered an animation Gilliam had created for Do Not Adjust Your Set called "Beware of the Elephants", which had intrigued him with its stream-of-consciousness style. Jones felt it would be
10368-736: Was cut from the movie and used as a supporting feature in its own right. (Television screenings also use it as a prologue.) This was the last project on which all six Pythons collaborated, except for the 1989 compilation Parrot Sketch Not Included , where they are all seen sitting in a closet for four seconds. This was the last time Chapman appeared on screen with the Pythons. Caster Casters are used in numerous applications, including shopping carts , office chairs , toy wagons , hospital beds, and material handling equipment. High capacity, heavy duty casters are used in many industrial applications, such as platform trucks, carts, assemblies, and tow lines in plants. Casters may be fixed to roll along
10476-489: Was directed by Ian MacNaughton , reprising his role from the television series. It consisted of sketches from the first two seasons of the Flying Circus , reshot on a low budget (and often slightly edited) for cinema release. Material selected for the film includes: "Dead Parrot", "The Lumberjack Song", "Upper Class Twit of the Year", "Hell's Grannies", "Self-Defence Class", " How Not to Be Seen ", and "Nudge Nudge". Financed by Playboy ' s UK executive Victor Lownes , it
10584-471: Was frequently paired with Jones as a ratbag woman or with Idle portraying middle-class women commenting upon TV. Generally speaking, female roles were played by women only when the scene specifically required that the character be sexually attractive (although sometimes they used Idle for this). The troupe later turned to Carol Cleveland —often described as the unofficial seventh member—who co-starred in numerous episodes after 1970. In some episodes, and later in
10692-458: Was good at it, when he did it he was professional, but he'd rather not have done it. The others all loved it, but he got more and more pissed off about having to come out and do filming, and the one that really swung it, in my view, was when we had to do the day on the Newhaven lifeboat." The rest of the group carried on for one more "half" season before calling a halt to the programme in 1974. While
10800-480: Was intended as a way of breaking Monty Python into America, and although it was ultimately unsuccessful in this, the film did good business in the UK, and later in the US on the " Midnight movie " circuit after their breakthrough television and film success, this being in the era before home video would make the original material much more accessible. The group did not consider the film a success. In 1974, between production on
10908-469: Was invented in 1920 by Seibert Chesnutt, US Patent 1341630, which was easily manufactured by stamping, and incorporated ball bearings for longer life. Basic swivel casters were in evidence in Charles Darwin's famous "office chair" as early as the 1840s. Additionally, a swivel caster typically must include a small amount of offset distance between the center axis of the vertical shaft and the center axis of
11016-443: Was not prepared to amend it. Gwen Dibley's Flying Circus was named after a woman Palin had read about in the newspaper, thinking it would be amusing if she were to discover she had her own TV show. Baron Von Took's Flying Circus was considered as an affectionate tribute to Barry Took, the man who had brought them together. Arthur Megapode's Flying Circus was suggested, then discarded. The name Baron Von Took's Flying Circus had
11124-431: Was on an Air Canada flight on the way to Toronto , when John (Cleese) turned to all of us and said 'I want out.' Why? I don't know. He gets bored more easily than the rest of us. He's a difficult man, not easy to be friendly with. He's so funny because he never wanted to be liked. That gives him a certain fascinating, arrogant freedom." In 2012, Jones spoke on Cleese's work in the third series and subsequent departure, "He
11232-446: Was settled upon. Some were Owl Stretching Time , The Toad Elevating Moment , A Horse, a Spoon and a Basin , Vaseline Review , and Bun, Wackett, Buzzard, Stubble and Boot . Reportedly, these names were considered for the show because the group members found it funny that the show name would have nothing to do with the actual content of the series. Flying Circus stuck when the BBC explained it had printed that name in its schedules and
11340-461: Was shot on location in Tunisia , the finances being provided this time by The Beatles ' George Harrison , who together with Denis O'Brien formed the production company Hand-Made Films for the movie. Harrison had a cameo role as the "owner of the Mount". Despite its subject matter attracting controversy, particularly upon its initial release, it has (together with its predecessor) been ranked among
11448-408: Was subject to United States copyright law which states that any work first published prior to 1924 was in the public domain , owing to copyright expiration. This enabled Gilliam to co-opt the march for the series without having to make any royalty payments . The use of Gilliam's surreal , collage stop motion animations was another innovative intertextual element of the Python style. Many of
11556-471: Was the first time all six got together, reportedly going back to Cleese's apartment on nearby Basil Street afterwards to continue discussions. According to show director Ian MacNaughton , the first discussion over the idea for the show, Monty Python's Flying Circus , was a result of BBC's comedy advisor, Barry Took , bringing the Pythons along with John Howard Davies (director of the first four episodes) and MacNaughton together into one conference room at
11664-418: Was to drop a cartoonish "16-ton weight" prop on one of the characters when the sketch seemed to be losing momentum, or a knight in full armour (played by Terry Gilliam) would wander on-set and hit characters over the head with a rubber chicken, before cutting to the next scene. Yet another way of changing scenes was when John Cleese, usually outfitted in a dinner suit, would come in as a radio commentator and, in
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