GILLIAMESQUE: A PRE-POSTHUMOUS MEMOIR

Python Terry Jones is a longstanding friend of Bibliophile's. His near neighbour, the illustrator and brilliant animator Terry Gilliam, has the deadpan Minnesota farm boy take on Monty Python's Flying Circus and way beyond. Compared to Max Ernst by our other friend, the late great George Melly, Terry Gilliam writes candidly about his life as a director, screenwriter, animator, actor and member of Monty Python. His films Brazil (1985), The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988), The Fisher King (1991), 12 Monkeys (1995) and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) has ranked him among the top film directors. We can turn with him on the windmills of his mind as we see preparatory sketches for a cinematic adaptation of Don Quixote, end of shoot drawings from his films, the day when his hand was chopped down through the tendons whilst gardening at home, happy memories of Time Bandits and even happier days on filming The Life of Brian on location in Tunisia, within easy reach of Franco Zeffirelli's old sets for Jesus of Nazareth ("of which we made liberal use"). He had been out promoting The Holy Grail in LA with Eric Idle when they first met George Harrison and together they formed Handmade Films. Read about the real Fawlty Towers and Devon's rudest host, his escape-from-success trips camping in Greece and sketches of John Cleese as a vulture, David Frost as an Angel, his relationships with other filmmakers and actors but most of all his visions. Studded with film stills, sketches, colour artworks, nonsense collages, behind-the-scenes Python photos and even his own US Army dog tags, this is an album full of memories, the most visual autobiography you will ever see. 297pp, 8" x 10", colour.