Cover -- CONTENTS -- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS -- The Flying Circus and the Wide World of Entertainment -- The Pythons -- The Flying Circus in a Changing British Culture -- The British Broadcasting Corporation -- The Pythons and American Television -- Antecedents and Influences -- Situating Comedy -- Television Time -- Television Forms and Genres -- Animals, Insects, Machines, and Human Bodies -- Cross-Dressing and Gender Bending -- Hyperbole, Excess, and Escalation -- Recycling Literature, Drama, Cinema, and Art -- Language, Words, Sense, and Nonsense -- Common Sense and Audience Response -- The Flying Circus Revisited -- NOTES -- VIDEOGRAPHY AND FILMOGRAPHY -- SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY -- INDEX -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- Y.