Monty Python's Flying Circus/How to Recognise Different Types of Trees from Quite a Long Way Away

How to Recognise Different Types of Trees from Quite a Long Way Away
Season One, Episode Three
Airdate	October 19, 1969
Production Number	53376
Written by	Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin
Directed by	Ian McNaughton
← 1x02 Sex and Violence	1x04 → Owl-Stretching Time
Monty Python's Flying Circus — Season One

How to Recognise Different Types of Trees from Quite a Long Way Away is the third episode of the first season of Monty Python's Flying Circus.

Also Appearing: Ian Davidson (Clerk of the Court)

Guest Stars: Carol Cleveland

Episode Breakdown

• Court Scene with Richelieu: The judge (Jones) passes sentence on Mr. Larch (Idle), who gives a long, impassioned speech about how important freedom is. Of course, it's only a parking offense, so there's no question of him going to prison. The counselor (Cleese) calls Ms. Fiona Lewis (Chapman) to the stand and gives a lengthy, unrelated testimony about the trial at hand. When questioned about the woman's relevance, he then calls the late Arthur Aldridge, who is brought in in a coffin. The man isn't completely dead, but is very ill so he's preemptively been put in a coffin. He knocks once to respond to the lawyer's questions, but quickly dies, leaving him without a second witness. He then calls Cardinal Richelieu (Palin), a character witness for the defense. Richelieu calls Harry a "very wonderful human being" and the defense demands that he be granted clemency. Dim of the Yard (Chapman) appears to question the supposed cardinal, explaining that he could not be the real cardinal, but is actually a professional impersonator. Dim then sings a song about how if he weren't in the CID, he would be a window cleaner. The counselor attempts to join in, but is too late and nobody catches on. A man in a suit of armor clubs him over the head with a chicken.
• Bicycle Repair Man: Mr. F.G. Superman, a man who lives in a version of London where everyone is dressed as Superman appears to be a regular citizen, but is actually Bicycle Repair Man (Palin). In the distance, another Superman (Jones) falls off his bicycle and Bicycle Repair Man goes to work. He fixes the bike with several Batman-esque sound effects while several other Supermen (Cleese, Chapman). The seemingly innocuous story sets the narrator (Cleese) off into a anti-communism rage, but he's quelled by his wife bringing him tea.
• Children's Stories: A storyteller (Idle) attempts to tell several children's stories which all seem to turn into strange, sexual tales.
• Restaurant Sketch: Compère (Palin) introduces a sketch from a beach with several bystanders in the background. A couple (Chapman and Cleveland) are seated at a table in a fancy restaurant and are tended to by a waiter (Jones). When the man requests a clean fork, the waiter fetches the head waiter (Palin), who is disgusted by dirtiness of the fork and becomes intent on firing whoever is responsible, eventually settling on sacking the entire dishwashing staff. They call over the manager (Idle), who breaks down into tears over the fork and blames himself for the minor problems with the restaurant. Mungo, the chef, bursts in and shouts at the couple of "vicious bastards" for grinding down the manager. The manager kills himself with the fork, leaving Mungo screaming for revenge.
• Seduced Milkman: A cartoon about more interesting lives that are available for purchase in the form of pictures of people who are far more interesting than the dull person in question. This leads to a milkman (Palin) who is seduced into entering the house of a scantly clad woman (Cleveland). He's brought up the stairs, led into a room and locked inside with several other milkmen.
• Stolen Newsreader: Michael Queen (Cleese) delivers the 6:00PM news for BBC radio. While he goes on about the mundane happenings of recent, several robbers in striped shirts wearing hosing over their heads burst through the door, shoot at people off screen and steal Queen and his desk. The load him onto a truck, drive him down the road to a dock and push him off into the water. Through this time, he doesn't stop once to question what is happening to him, instead content on the news he's giving.
• The Larch: The lesson on how to recognise particular trees culminates in the narrator (Cleese) asking Eric (Idle), Michael (Palin) and Terry (Jones) about whether or not they could identify a Larch tree from long away. None of them can. Instead, they ask to see Eric's sketch.
• Nudge Nudge: A man sitting at a bar (Jones) is harassed by a man (Idle) who turns everything into vague sexual innuendo which he punctuates with phrases like "nudge nudge" and "say no more." The first man, nearly oblivious to what's going on confronts him about what exactly he's insinuating. After a bit more innuendo, the man asks the other what it's like to sleep with a lady.

Notes

"It's..."

• Michael Palin as the disheveled man, tromping through the forest and tripping briefly before making it to the camera.

Trivia

The Show

• Original Title: This episode was originally meant to be titled "Bunn, Wackett, Buzzard, Stubble and Boot."