Always Look on the Bright Side of Life: A Sortabiography

I have always been a huge fan of Monty Python and Eric Idle and was so looking forward to this “sortabiography.” I think all the Pythons’ were comic geniuses and my friends and family still often bring up certain sketches. We rarely pass up watching Life of Brian when it’s on TV.When I first started reading this, I was really delighted and found myself continually bothering my husband by reading aloud comic passages. I was barely 10 pages in when I realized I had to stop because I was going to drive him nuts and make myself hoarse.I really liked the beginning of the book. I was very interested in reading about Mr. Idle’s (difficult) childhood and schooling and it gave me some real insight into his character. This is why I like to read autobiographies; to gain these kinds of insights and understanding.The book then goes on as Mr. Idle tells us about his own start in comedy and we learn about the origins of Monty Python. Not only do we get a detailed view of his career and accomplishments, we also get transported back in time to the social revolution of the sixties and seventies and how that both affected Eric Idle personally and the comedy scene and culture in general.So why only 3 stars? As funny as this is, and as entertaining as this was at times, I often found myself putting it down and a little reluctant to pick it back up. It’s true that the book is replete with stories where the author is telling us what he is doing and what his experiences were with other celebrities, but at times it felt like too much - as if the name-dropping took focus over the story that was being told. Certainly if I had been so close to all these people - such as George Harrison, Mick Jagger, David Bowie, Robin Williams to the Queen and Prince Charles and on and on I’d be naming names too. But sometimes it just overwhelmed me. This was just an example of a typical passage:In the 1997 James Broooks movie As Good as It Gets, Jack Nicholson sang, ‘Always Look on the Bright Side of Life’ to a dog.“Thanks for ruining our film, Eric,” he said to me.“Thanks for ruining my song, Jack,” I said back.We had met Jack through our friend Angelica Huston and hung out quite a bit with him while Stanley Kubrick was busy driving Shelley Duvall mad filming The Shining in London.”The book is full of passages like this, with constant references to celebrity names to the point where it actually became distracting and dare I say, a little tedious at times.I do want to empathize that there are so many hilariously funny parts as well. Eric Idle is incredibly witty and I found myself laughing a lot while reading this. I also want to add that I was very touched by the last chapters of the book where he talks about loss; I found myself tearing up at such a wonderful and moving end to the book.

To any put-down reviewers of this book, I respond: what did you expect? It certainly is not on a par with Melville’s “Moby Dick” and it never claimed to be. It’s simply a chatty, refreshing exchange of conversation (he in print, I in mental responses) of his reminiscences over the years. No, it isn’t a serious book, i.e., the solution to global warming or how to eliminate robocalls. I knew that going in. I enjoyed the book and took it for what it is ... sitting down with someone and listening as he tells of his “I remember” moments at a time when the world was a slightly different place and we were all a whole lot younger. Thanks, Eric, for letting it all hang out (as we were wont to say in those days). Your reminiscences have joined my copy of Cleese's excellent tome, "So, Anyway..." I have amended my funeral plans to state that "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" MUST be played/sung at my going-away party. I have promised not to haunt the service.

While the book starts ok, the way most do, early life, etc. Once Mr. Idle becomes a celebrity, almost every paragraph is primarily a list of all the famous people he knows wand where they go on vacation. "Keith and Mick flew us down to their giant cabana in Tahiti where Elton John played scrabble with Princess Margaret and Michael Caine and I took turns making fun of the way George Harrison's swimtrunks kept sliding down as he attempted to body surf with the Steve Martin while Robin William's was giving wedgies to Andy Warhol". I've read the biographies of two other Pythons, Cleese and Palin (well I've read all of Michael Palin's diaries, not sure if biography is the right word) and come away at least feeling like I understood something of the person in them, but all I've gotten from this is that he's still very proud of "Always look on the bright side", which is mentioned possibly 500 times, and that he spends a LOT of time traveling all over the world with very famous people who he is deeply close personal friends with. Little is said about the Python TV show other than that he was in it, and not much about any other parts of the Python films etc, other than that he was almost singlehandedly responsible for their success. Surprisingly unfunny as well... Oh well...

I didn’t appreciate the anti-Semitic humor in your book. Using a word like “yidlock” or cracking jokes outside a concentration camp in Germany isn’t funny. I was deeply offended.As for the rest of your book, I had to put it down after yidlock. Your book was a constant naming of celebrities you know and the parties you had gone to. It was nauseating.If your goal was to try to impress upon people that you live on a higher plain than the rest of us, it didn’t work.

Eric Idle doing anything is funny, so it should come as no surprise that his sortabiography is damn funny too. It's also warm, generous, sentimental and extremely inciteful on any number of subjects. His recounting of Leslie Nielsen's elevator antics alone is worth the price of the book. Add in plums about the Pythons, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Steve Martin, Robin Williams and show business in general and you have one fine read. I loved it and I'll bet you will too.

Very disappointed. Not particularly interesting and every page seemed to be filled with the names of the 'important' people he'd met or partied with. I got about half-way through the book couldn't even be bothered to finish it.

A long and wandering story of his boring life. Monty Python was only a small part of the book. Mostly about him having sex with random people

Eric Idle has always been the least favourite of the Monty Python team and this book kind of reinforces my opinion of him. Upon reading it you get the impression of someone who just loves name dropping all the other celebrities he has worked with and whom love the Pythons. He's never happy unless he's swanning around with Hollywood 'A' listers and famous rock stars and you can't help but get the impression that he has absolutely no time for the people that made him rich and famous: i.e. nobodies like us. He even tells about when he goes skulking off to live in California just because one of his films got a panning by the critics in the mid 90s, but what would you expect from someone who wrote The Rutles (which I love, by the way) and yet still won't pay royalties to Neil Innes for writing the songs or even acknowledge that he wrote them at all.

First up from the user name I have chosen (and I have used it for years and years) you will see I am something of a Python fan. So obviously I was going to buy this wonderful tome by his immortal excellence Mr Eric Idle. What a let down. We get to find out his best mate was George from the Beatles. The only time George left him disappointed was when he would not meet David (Bowie) even though he was Eric's new best chum. The name dropping gets boring. In fact other than the brief opening telling of his child hood everything has probably been told in the press in more detail frankly. The one fact that shines through is Eric feels he was never paid enough and will not turn the chance of easy cash if put before him. I feel here he was offered a nice big advance and did the absolute minimum he could get away with to earn it. At the same time as this I purchased Roger Daltrey's book. What a difference, a real deatiled no holds barred tale of the Who. Roger, who I held in high regard, has gone to the top of my list of top chaps.

Having read a few biographies I sorta liked it but would have appreciated more information of Eric's life rather than what he wrote script wise or song wise.

I like Eric Idle but found this book very poor. For a man of his inherent wit, it does not come through when reading the book. Then again, as a money making exercise it probably proved successful.

What an interesting story. Lots of background about the "Pythons", as you'd expect, but also about Eric Idle in particular. It certainly fleshed out his life for me. Highly recommended purchase.