Terry Jones

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Terence Graham Parry Jones, a Welsh writer, comedian, screenwriter, film producer, and historian, born 1 February 1942.

He is a member of the Monty Python comedy troupe. Jones and writing partner Michael Palin (whom he met at Oxford) wrote and performed for many high-profile British comedy shows, including Do Not Adjust Your Set and The Frost Report, before forming Monty Python's Flying Circus with Cambridge graduates Eric Idle, John Cleese, and Graham Chapman, as well as American animator/filmmaker Terry Gilliam.

Jones was largely responsible for the program's unique, surreal layout, in which sketches moved from one to the next without the use of punchlines.

Monty Python and the Holy Grail, the team's first film, was directed by Gilliam, and later Python films Life of Brian and The Meaning of Life were his first directorial appearances. Jones co-created and co-wrote with Palin the anthology book Ripping Yarns.

In addition, he wrote an early draft of Jim Henson's 1986 film Labyrinth, but no part of his work was included in the final cut.

He is a well-respected medieval scholar, has written several books and presented television documentaries about the period, as well as a prolific children's book author. Jones received a Lifetime Achievement award at the BAFTA Cymru Awards for his contribution to television and film in 2016.

Early life

Jones was born on February 1st, 1942, in Colwyn Bay, the son of homemaker Dilys Louisa (Newnes), and Alick George Parry-Jones, a bank clerk, was born. Bodchwil, the family's name, had been identified for the family. He was "born right bang slap in the middle of World War II," when his father served with the Royal Air Force in Scotland as he recalled in The Pythons Autobiography. His father was posted in India as a Flight Lieutenant a week after he was born. (Temporary) Nigel's brother was two years older than him. He reunited with his father when the war came to an end four years ago; at their first meeting at Colwyn Bay train station, he recalled: "I'd only been kissed by a woman's smooth lips up until that point, so his bristly moustache was quite disturbing." The family moved to Claygate, Surrey, England, when Jones was four and a half.

Jones was school captain in Guildford, Surrey, from 1961-61. At St Edmund Hall, Oxford, he read English, but "strayed into history." He became interested in the medieval period by reading Chaucer as part of his English degree. He earned his degree with a 2:1. In the Oxford Revue, he performed comedic relief with future Monty Python castmate Michael Palin. Jones was a year ahead of Palin at Oxford, and it was the first thing that struck him, Palin says. He had no airs and graces. We had a similar idea of what humour could do and where it should go, mainly because we both loved characters; we all agreed that comedy wasn't just jokes."

Personal life

Jones married Alison Telfer in 1970; they had two children together, Sally in 1974 and Bill in 1976. They lived in Camberwell, London, and had an open marriage. Jones left Telfer for Anna Söderström in 2009; she was 41 years old, and the pair had been in a long-term relationship for five years. Söderström and Jones had a daughter in September 2009 and married in 2012. The family lived in Highgate, North London.

Jones wrote a number of articles on political and sociology, most of which appeared in newspapers. The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, The Independent, and The Observer are among those who cited this article. Several of these articles mocked the War on Terror, bemoaning it as "declaring war on an abstract noun" and comparing it to "annihilate mockery."

Jones was one of 200 public figures who signed a letter to The Guardian in August 2014, expressing their displeasure with Scotland's referendum on the subject in September.

Jones was diagnosed with colon cancer and underwent surgery in October 2006. He was cancer-free after undergoing a complete cycle of chemotherapy. "Unfortunately, my illness is not nearly bad enough to sell many newspapers," the prognosis is even more disappointing."

Jones was diagnosed with primary progressive aphasia in 2015, a condition of frontotemporal dementia that compromises the ability to walk and communicate. During Monty Python reunion show Monty Python Live (Mostly) in July 2014, he had first feared about it because of difficulties learning his lines. He became a campaigner for education and fundraising into dementia; and he donated his brain for dementia research. He was no longer able to give interviews by September 2016. He had lost the ability to say more than a few words of agreement by April 2017.

Jones died of dementia complications on January 21, 2020, 11 days before his 78th birthday, at his home in Highgate. He was remembered by his family and close friends at a humanist funeral service.

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Career history

Jones appeared in Twice a Fortnight with Michael Palin, Graeme Garden, Bill Oddie, and Jonathan Lynn, as well as the television show The Complete and Utter History of Britain (1969). Palin, Eric Idle, and David Jason appeared in Do Not Adjust Your Set (1967–69) with Palin, Eric Idle and Jason. He wrote for The Frost Report and several other David Frost programs on British television. Of Jones' appearances as a performer to Monty Python's Flying Circus, his portrayals of middle-aged women (or "ratbag old women" as defined by the BBC, as well as "pepper-pots" or "grannies from hell) are among the most memorable.

Jones co-directed Monty Python and the Holy Grail with Terry Gilliam, and was sole director on two other Monty Python films, Life of Brian and Monty Python's The Meaning of Life. Jones, a film producer, took full responsibility of the projects and created a distinct, signature style that relied on physical comedy and surreal touches to complement the jokes. To bring out the deadpan humour, he would often abandon punchlines and create fragmented, non-sequitur story arcs. Erik the Viking (1989) and The Wind in the Willows (1996) were two of his later films. Jones wrote the libretto for and directed the opera Evil Machines in 2008. In 2011, he was hired to direct and write the libretto for another opera, titled The Doctor's Tale.

In Ireland, three of Jones' films, The Meaning of Life, Monty Python's Life of Brian, and Personal Services, were all banned.

Jones produced Definitely Anything, a comedy about a disillusioned schoolteacher who is given the opportunity to do what he wants by a group of aliens watching from space. Simon Pegg, Kate Beckinsale, Robin Williams, and the voices of Monty Python's five remaining members are included in the film. It was shot in London during a six-week shoot.

Jones produced Jeepers Creepers, a West End play about comedian Marty Feldman's life. It would be Jones' last directorial work before his death.

Jones wrote several books and screenplays, including comic books and more formal studies on medieval history.

Jones, a promoter of real ale, was also interested in real ale and helped found Penrhos Brewery, a microbrewery at Penrhos Court in Penrhos, Herefordshire, which operated until 1983.

With Palin, Jones co-wrote Ripping Yarns. They also wrote Underwood's Finest Hour, about an obstetrician distracted during a child born during a pregnancy by the radio broadcast of a Test match, which took place at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith in 1981. Jones wrote several children's books, including Fantastic Stories, The Beast in a Thousand Teeth, and a collection of comic verse titled The Curse of the Vampire's Socks.

Jones was the co-creator (with Gavin Scott) of the animated television series Blazing Dragons (1996-1998), which parodied the Arthurian myths and Middle Ages periods. The series's protagonists are anthropomorphic dragons befuddled by evil humans, atypical story line.

Jones wrote the screenplay for Labyrinth (1986), but his story went through several rewrites and several other writers before being shot; consequently, a large portion of the finished film was not written by Jones.

He also co-wrote Who Murdered Chaucer?

Popular historical interpretations of history were debating Jones' television show. For example, Terry Jones' Medieval Lives (2004), for which he received an Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for Nonfiction Programming), he argues that the Middle Ages were a more advanced period than was widely believed, and that Terry Jones' Barbarians (2006) puts the cultural achievements of people conquered by the Roman Empire in a more positive light than Roman historians usually do, attribution to propaganda in 410 AD.

Jones wrote several columns for The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, and The Observer all condemned the Iraq War. Many of these essays were included in Terry Jones' War on Terror, a paperback collection.

The Adam Street Club in London announced his book Evil Machines in November 2011. It was the first book to be published by a crowdfunding website devoted solely to books. When they first introduced their publishing model, Jones gave Unbound a great deal of assistance. Jones released The Tyrant and the Squire in February 2018, as well as Unbound.

Jones was a member of the Poetry Society, and his poems have appeared in Poetry Review.

Jones appeared on the Carnival Band's 2007 album Ringing the Changes.

The Teatro Só Luiz, a Portuguese theatre, premiered Evil Machines, a musical performance based on Jones' book, in Lisbon, Portugal, in January 2008. Original music by Portuguese composer Luis Tinoco was provided. After a long run of Contos Fantásticos, a short play based on Jones' Fantastic Stories with music by Tinoco, Jones was welcomed by the Teatro Só Luiz to write and direct the performance.

Jones revealed in January 2012 that he was working with songwriter/producer Jim Steinman on a heavy metal version of The Nutcracker.

Jones seldom appeared in other positions outside of his own programs, aside from a cameo in Terry Gilliam's Jabberwocky and a minor role as a booze-suffion in the BBC sitcom The Young Ones. However, he provided narration for The Legend of Dick and Dom, a CBBC fantasy series set in the Middle Ages, from 2009 to 2011. He appears in two French films by Albert Dupontel: Le Créateur (1999) and Enfermés dehors (2006).

Jones appeared on BBC Wales' Coming Home about his Welsh family history in 2009. Jones reunited with the other four living Pythons in July 2014 at the O2 Arena in London. This was Jones' last appearance with the company before he was diagnosed with aphasia.

When Jones was given a Lifetime Achievement Award for his contributions to television and film in October 2016, he received a standing ovation at the BAFTA Cymru Awards.

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Award and recognition

• Terry Jones was nominated for Grammy Awards three times for Best Comedy Recording: