Spreading the word
MICHAEL PALIN on The Missionary — his first solo film as writer — as it turns 37 years old
JUST LIKE DENNIS, the mud-gatherer played so memorably by one Michael Palin in Monty Python And The Holy Grail, The Missionary is now 37. Often overlooked in Palin’s CV, The Missionary is a charming character comedy about an English missionary, the Reverend Charles Fortescue (Palin), who becomes involved with Maggie Smith’s adventurous Lady Ames, and establishes a mission to try to save a group of prostitutes. Now getting a welcome re-release, Empire spoke with Palin about the film that saw him write for the first time without his long-time writing partner, Terry Jones.
Not wishing to age you, but The Missionary is now 37 years old.
Almost everything ages me now, really. I don’t feel any older mentally. Probably I feel less old, so I always tend to be slightly taken aback by the fact that it was 40 or 50 years ago that we did this, that and the other. Surely it can’t be!
Does it come up often for you?
It was very significant for me because it was the first time I’d written a script of my own. I felt quite excited by the prospect, and also exposed by the prospect, of having to produce something you initiated, and therefore it had to be just right. But I learned a lot.
You had worked with Terry Jones for so many years. What made you write this without him?
Well, Terry and I were going in slightly different directions anyway. I felt, because we’d worked together for so long, that a chance for us to realise what we individually wanted to do was a good thing. We still wrote together for The Meaning Of Life, but I also worked with Terry Gilliam on Time Bandits. The old Python writing boundaries had already been broken, if you like. But I was always very aware of Terry, and of his opinion. I sent him the script, he was very, very useful over certain things in the writing and the plotting of it, and very supportive when the film was complete. We remained, and remain still, very good friends.
Where did the idea come from?
I do remember having the idea whilst I was running on Hampstead Heath. Where it was going to go from then was more difficult. I had the idea of a missionary coming back from Africa. There seemed to be comic potential in how such a character might fit into Edwardian England. Also, it was a chance to explore Englishness, but of a different period. I wasn’t sure exactly how the missionary should be played, what were his motivations and the motivations of the other people in the film. I never really sorted those things out. I think it made sense, the story, but it’s occasionally a bit rickety.
The movies you wrote — this and American Friends — are both quite gentle character pieces. Were you keen to move away from that idea of ‘Pythonesque’.
I think the idea of moving away from Python is something that prompted Ripping Yarns several years before, for both Terry and myself. We both felt very strongly that the work we did after Python, especially if it was comedy, had to look different and have a different shape. I see The Missionary very much in the same genre as a Ripping Yarn. American Friends perhaps less so, because that had a particular genesis in my great grandfather’s diary.
Did it ever cross your mind to direct?
It crossed my mind slightly. People do round up my career sometimes. I hear them say, “We’re very lucky to have with us Michael Palin, actor, director, writer.” I’ve never directed anything. Well,
I have. At university. I was much more keen on the writing. There are things I didn’t have to worry about but Richard [Loncraine] probably did. If I had to make all of those decisions and write and act, it would be overwhelming.
Your diaries would perhaps be a lot shorter, due to exhaustion.
Well, I’d have written about exhaustion. An exhausting read, written by an exhausted writer.
Your career went in an unexpected direction with the travel documentaries after A Fish Called Wanda. It seems that movies have never really been a major pursuit for you.
There was that period from Life Of Brian to A Fish Called Wanda where movies were the main thing in my life. I was always writing and acting in other people’s movies. It was exciting. After that I didn’t know where to go with movies. I was beginning to think about writing American Friends, but I was quite exhausted with film. So when the BBC said, “We’d like you to do Around The World In 80 Days,” I thought, “This will be a nice break [before] the movies I’m obviously going to make in future.” It turned out, of course, that it created a genre that was very successful. It’s funny how the travel programmes superseded the acting and writing.
The Missionary took you to Kenya. For the first time?
Yeah. That was a little victory over the producers, who thought it would be far too expensive. But we wanted that authentic feel. The camera broke almost immediately, and Neville Thompson, the wonderful producer, flew back, got another camera, and flew back. It was impressive. I’m glad we did it.