Python Terry Jones has a rare type of dementia
As he is diagnosed with strain that turns victim mute, fears over how wife and daughter, seven, will cope
MONTY Python star Terry Jones has been diagnosed with a rare type of dementia – raising fears over his wife and young child will cope.
Jones, 74, who has a seven-year-old daughter Siri, suffers primary progressive aphasia, which gradually impairs his ability to communicate.
Sufferers are eventually left mute and unable to understand language.
It means Jones’s second wife Anna Soderstrom, 33, who is from Sweden, will have to care for him.
Fellow Monty Python star Michael Palin said: ‘People need to be very careful not to write him off.
‘What has happened is truly tragic and sad. It’s a form of dementia, it’s progressive and that’s that.
‘His wife and child are doing their very best, it’s difficult. I was with him yesterday evening and I think he knows people.
‘He likes to see old friends and we’ve got to carry on our friendship. It’s not ended, it’s just very sad he’s got this form of dementia. he can’t talk at any great length but he laughs at memories when I bring them up.
‘It’s very limited but that’s the nature of the aphasia he’s got. All the Pythons have known about this for a while and no one knows what to do apart from to be supportive.
‘He’s still a member of the team and as far as we’re concerned a working member of the Python team. I don’t think he’ll be doing any more stage shows but then I don’t think any of us will.
‘One just has to say what a cruel, cruel stroke of fate for someone who was so articulate, and fluent, and funny, and loved words and loved reading and writing. ‘It just seems so dreadfully unfair but there we are, that’s life.’ Actress Carol Cleveland, who appeared in the Monty Python’s Flying Circus series as well as films Life of Brian, The Meaning of Life and Monty Python And The holy Grail, said Jones had shown signs of dementia at the 2014 stage reunion. She said: ‘I know his new lady and his little daughter. It’s going to be dreadful for them. ‘Terry himself indicated he was having memory problems when we were doing the O2 show, but he didn’t mention the word dementia.
‘It had been noticed that he was struggling a bit with his lines, so we were all a bit concerned at the time. I last saw Terry just under a year ago. I could see he was struggling – he wasn’t nearly as coherent as he had been the previous time I’d seen him.’ In 2005 the comedian left first wife Alison Telfer for then-Oxford University student Miss Soderstrom, and married her in 2012.
Last night Miss Telfer, 72, who has two grown-up children with Jones, said: ‘The family are all getting together and looking after him.’
The Welsh star’s diagnosis was revealed after it was announced he was to receive a lifetime achievement award from Bafta Cymru but could no longer give interviews.
he met Palin at Oxford before they rose to fame in Monty Python alongside Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam and eric Idle. While others capitalised on their fame, with Palin presenting BBC travel shows and Cleese starring in Fawlty Towers, Jones had money issues.
In 2014 he took part in the reunion with the other remaining Pythons – Chapman had died in 1989 – for ten shows at London’s O2 Arena, hoping it would help pay off the £700,000 interest- only mortgage on his £2.5million north London home.
But the performances, which made him £800,000, were not as lucrative as the star had hoped.
he had to give half the earnings to Miss Telfer under their divorce terms, leaving him with £200,000 after tax.
‘I could see he was struggling’