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Graham Chapman (January 8, 1941 – October 4,
1989) was a British comedian and
writer. He was one of the six Monty Python members
and lead actor in their two narrative films King
Arthur in Monty Python and the Holy Grail and
Brian in Life of Brian).

Chapman was educated at Melton Mowbray Grammar
School and studied medicine at Emmanuel College,
Cambridge|Emmanuel College at the University of
Cambridge, where he began writing comedy with
fellow University student John Cleese. He
qualified as a medical doctor at the Barts and The
London School of Medicine and Dentistry|Barts
Hospital Medical College, but rarely ever
practiced medicine. 

Whilst at Cambridge, Graham Chapman joined the
famous Footlights. Fellow members were John
Cleese, Tim Brooke-Taylor, Bill Oddie, David
Hatch, Jonathan Lynn, Humphrey Barclay and Jo
Kendall. Their revue A Clump of Plinths was so
successful at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival that
they renamed the revue Cambridge Circus (comedy) |
Cambridge Circus, and took the revue to the West
End Theatre in London, and then took the revue to
New Zealand and Broadway Theatre|Broadway. The
revue appeared in October of 1964 on The Ed
Sullivan Show.

Graham Chapman and John Cleese wrote
professionally for the BBC during the 1960s,
primarily for the ubiquitous David Frost
(broadcaster)|David Frost but also for Marty
Feldman. Chapman also contributed sketches to the
BBC radio series I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again
and television programmes such as The Illustrated
Weekly Hudd (starring Roy Hudd), Cilla Black, This
is Petula Clark and This is Tom Jones. Graham
Chapman, John Cleese and Tim Brooke-Taylor then
joined Marty Feldman in the television comedy
series At Last the 1948 Show. Chapman (and John
Cleese on occassion) also wrote  for the
long-running television comedy series Doctor In
The House (TV series)|Doctor in the House. Chapman
also co-wrote several episodes with Bernard
McKenna and David Sherlock.   

In 1969 Graham Chapman and John Cleese joined
Michael Palin, Terry Jones, Eric Idle and American
artist Terry Gilliam for Monty Python's Flying
Circus. Cleese and Chapman's classic Python
sketches include "The Ministry of Silly Walks" and
"Dead Parrot". One of Chapman's most famous
characters was "The Colonel", a stuffy army
officer who occasionally appeared out of nowhere
to order the end of a sketch for being too silly.
After Cleese left the series in 1973, Chapman
wrote alone, as well as a bit with Neil Innes and
Douglas Adams for the final fourth season. He then
developed a number of television and movie
projects, most notably Out of the Trees (TV), The
Odd Job and Yellowbeard (both films). In
"Yellowbeard" he starred along side Cleese, Peter
Cook, Cheech and Chong and Feldman (who died
during the finals days of production).

In the late 1970s Chapman moved to Los Angeles
where he guested on many US television shows,
including The Hollywood Squares, Still Crazy Like
a Fox and the NBC sketch series The Big Show (TV
show). Upon returning to England he became
involved with the Dangerous Sports Club (an
extreme sportsclub which introduced bungee jumping
to a wide audience), and he began the first of a
lengthy series of US college lecture tours in the
1980s. His memoir,  "A Liar's Autobiography", was
published in 1980 and, unusually for an
autobiography, had five authors: Chapman, his
lover|partner David Sherlock, editor Alex Martin,
David Yallop and Douglas Adams. At the time Adams
became involved 1977 he was a virtually unknown
writer, fresh from Cambridge, whom Chapman took
under his wing. They later had a great falling-out
and did not speak to each other for several years.



Chapman was in many ways the looniest Python
member who basically lived the sort of life that
most people believed a Monty Python lived. His
best friends were fellow loonies Keith Moon of The
Who, singer Harry Nilsson and Beatle Ringo Starr.
Chapman alcoholism|drank alcohol excessively in
the 1970s, and he also kept his homosexuality a
secret, at least from the public, for much of his
adult life although he did coming out|out himself
on a British chat show in the mid-1970s (one of
the first celebrity|celebrities to do so) and was
a vocal spokesman on Gay rights afterwards.
Chapman's homosexuality was kept secret for many
years, even from his friends. He revealed his
homosexuality first to John Cleese (whom Graham
Chapman had known the longest of the Monty Python
group), and then, several days later, he came out
to a group of friends at a party held at his home
in Belsize Park where he officially introduced
them to David Sherlock as his boyfriend.  One of
Michael Palin's favourite stories about Graham
involved Palin's trips to collect him every
morning for Python related business, he would call
up to Chapman's window and be greeted by a
collection of young men before Graham eventually
surfaced pipe in mouth. After Chapman made his
homosexuality public (on a television show hosted
by British jazz musician George Melly) a member of
the public wrote to the Pythons to complain that
she had heard a member of the team was a
homosexual. Eric Idle sent a reply confirming that
the culprit had been found and shot. 

Chapman died on October 4 1989 of throat cancer
which had Metastasis|metastasized to his spine.
His death was one day before the 20th anniversary
of the first broadcast of Flying Circus - in Terry
Jones' words, "the worst case of party-pooping in
all history". John Cleese delivered a eulogy for
Chapman, during which he deliberately used the
word "fuck", and got away with it on the BBC.
Cleese's eulogy was so funny that it was noted
that some people at the funeral "almost died
laughing". Cleese has said that Chapman would have
liked that.

The remaining Python members have acknowledged
that, while brilliant, Chapman was exasperating to
work with, and difficult to know. But none of the
other Pythons could have played King Arthur or
Brian as well as Chapman. After his death,
speculation of a Python revival inevitably faded.
As Idle said, "we would only do a reunion if
Graham came back from the dead. So we're
negotiating with his agent" (subsequent gatherings
of the Pythons have in fact included an urn, said
to contain Chapman's cremation|ashes).

Chapman's life story is currently being developed
into a major motion picture. His estate has
produced several posthumous works by Chapman,
including a new reissue of his novel Yellowbeard
(co-written with David Sherlock) and "Calcium Made
Interesting", a collection of previously unseen
essays, sketches, scripts, letters and other
items.

==Further reading==

*From Fringe to Flying Circus - 'Celebrating a
Unique Generation of Comedy 1960-1980' - Roger
Wilmut, Eyre Methuen Ltd, 1980.
*Footlights! - 'A Hundred Years of Cambridge
Comedy' - Robert Hewison, Methuen London Ltd,
1983.