By Isaac Hamlet
King Arthur, a noble king of legend known for his purity and losing Guinevere to the knight Lancelot, has been the subject of centuries of epic tales, poems, and film.
But this week, it’s just as likely to hear he and his Knights of the Round Table mentioned for other things: an inability to count to 3, pretending to ride a horse to the sound of coconuts, or a fondness for the battle cry “Run Away.”
On Friday evening, director, writer, and cofounder of Monty Python Terry Gilliam will visit Iowa City. His visit starts at 5 p.m. at hotelVetro, 201 S. Linn St, after which he will travel to the IMU Main Ballroom for a lecture. This is part of a tour to promote his new book, Gilliamesque: A Pre-posthumous Memoir.
“I jumped at the opportunity [to have Gilliam] right away,” said Oliver Hidalgo-Wohllebe, the event’s coordinator on the University of Iowa Lecture Committee. “I was a big fan of ‘Monty Python’s Flying Circus,’ as well as his later films, so I wanted to be involved in any way possible. We’re very fortunate here at the university to have a community that supports these projects and wants to collaborate as much as possible.”
The event began to take shape last fall. A group of arts programmers began brainstorming possible events relating to the Obermann Center’s Don Quixote Symposium this month, celebrating the Don Quixote’s 400th anniversary.
“What we didn’t know at the time, or for another couple of weeks, was that Amazon had agreed to finally fund Gilliam’s Quixote adaptation,” said Joe Tiefenthaler, FilmScene’s executive director. “The timing — with his book’s publication, the film, the symposium, and a number of on- and off-campus groups working together — was everything.”
For nearly two decades, Gilliam — a fan of the book — struggled to produce a film based on Don Quixote titled The Man Who Killed Don Quixote.
Attempt after attempt proved unfruitful, with 17 years cluttered by cast changes and rewrites. Only now does it seem the film has found the funding to finally see the light of day.
“Terry Gilliam offers insight into the life and work of a world-class film director and as someone who has taken on large institutions and won,” said Carter Bell, the head of the UI Lecture Committee. “His lecture will be a unique format. He’ll actually be interviewed by [Iowa Public Radio’s] Charity Nebbe. I suspect it will be about his life, his films, and his new book.”
In preparation for Gilliam’s arrival, FilmScene has presented a sample of his multicolored filmography.
“So many of his individual films are beloved, and that’s before you dig into ‘Monty Python,’ ” Tiefenthaler said. “So we went with a range from his career and covered what we could.”
The series kicked off with cult-classic Monty Python and the Holy Grail and will conclude with Time Bandits on Oct. 29, the first film in what Gilliam considers his “Trilogy of Imagination.”
“Because of [FilmScene’s] many wonderful partnerships we’re able to bring visionary filmmakers and legendary figures in cinema to the community,” Tiefenthaler said. “I think it’s important to connect our community with such storytellers, who shift how we see and empathize with the world.”
Event: Terry Gilliam Lecture
When: 7:30 p.m. Friday
Where: IMU Main Ballroom
Admission: Free
