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The Spanish Inquisition

Monty Python's Flying Circus1970Season 2Episode 2
Monty Python's Flying Circus
SKETCH-O-VISION
A VERY GOOD USE OF YOUR TIME.

The setup

A mill worker's complaint about being cross-examined summons three cardinals of the Spanish Inquisition, who cannot get through their own dramatic entrance.

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Community rating

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The premise

Here’s the bit.

In a drawing room captioned Jarrow, 1912, a mill worker brings Lady Mountback news of a fault at the mill in dialect so thick she cannot follow it, and when she presses him he protests that he never expected such an interrogation. At that, Cardinal Ximénez bursts in with Cardinals Biggles and Fang, but he keeps miscounting the Inquisition's weapons, has to leave and make his entrance again, and fares no better when he hands the speech to the hapless Biggles. Giving up on the introduction, Ximénez has Fang read out charges of heresy against Lady Mountback, and when she pleads innocent the cardinals tie her to a plastic dish-drying rack that cannot actually be turned, leaving Ximénez to tell Biggles simply to pretend.

The funny people

Meet the cast. 5

Say it with us

Highly quotable.

One of the cross beams has gone out askew on the treadle.

I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition.

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!

Our chief weapon is surprise. Surprise and fear. Fear and surprise.

Behind the scenes

The people who made it.

A little extra

Notes from the archive.

This is the first of several Spanish Inquisition interruptions in series 2, episode 2. The cardinals return later in the episode to torment an old woman with soft cushions and the comfy chair, and finally race to the Old Bailey on a bus against the closing credits.

ScriptEnglish · 48 turns

Automatically generated script; wording may contain errors. Speaker labels are inferred.

  1. 00:19

    Lady Mountback

    Come in.

  2. 00:22

    Reg

    Trouble at the mill?

  3. 00:23

    Lady Mountback

    Oh, no. What sort of trouble?

  4. 00:26

    Reg

    One of the crossbeams has gone out askew on the treadle.

  5. 00:28

    Lady Mountback

    Pardon?

  6. 00:29

    Reg

    One of the crossbeams has gone out askew on the treadle.

  7. 00:31

    Lady Mountback

    I don't understand what you're saying.

  8. 00:33

    Reg

    One of the crossbeams has gone out askew on the treadle.

  9. 00:37

    Lady Mountback

    What on earth does that mean?

  10. 00:39

    Reg

    I don't know. Mr Wentworth just told me to come in here and say that there was trouble at the mill, that's all. I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition.

  11. 00:45

    Who expects

  12. 00:49

    Cardinal Ximénez

    Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition? Our chief weapon is surprise. Surprise and fear. Fear and surprise. Our two weapons are fear and surprise. and ruthless efficiency,

  13. 00:59

    Cardinal Ximénez

    or three weapons, are fear and surprise and ruthless efficiency and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope. Four? No. Amongst our weapons... Amongst our weaponry are such elements as fear... I'll come in again.

  14. 01:18

    Reg

    I I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition.

  15. 01:24

    Cardinal Ximénez

    Nobody Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! Amongst our weaponry are such diverse elements as fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency and almost fanatical devotion to the Pope and nice red uniform. Oh, damn it!

  16. 01:40

    Cardinal Ximénez

    Aye, I can't say it. You'll have to say it.

  17. 01:42

    Cardinal Biggles

    What?

  18. 01:43

    Cardinal Ximénez

    You'll have to say the bit about our chief weapons.

  19. 01:45

    Cardinal Biggles

    Oh, I couldn't do that.

  20. 01:51

    Reg

    I didn't expect a kind of Spanish Inquisition.

  21. 01:59

    Cardinal Biggles

    Uh, nobody, um...

  22. 02:01

    Cardinal Ximénez

    ...expects.

  23. 02:02

    Cardinal Biggles

    ...expects. Nobody expects the, um, Spanish, um...

  24. 02:06

    Cardinal Ximénez

    inquisition

  25. 02:07

    Cardinal Biggles

    I know I know nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition in fact those who do

  26. 02:12

    Cardinal Ximénez

    it's cheap weapons

  27. 02:13

    Cardinal Biggles

    our chief weapons are

  28. 02:14

    Cardinal Ximénez

    surprise

  29. 02:17

    Cardinal Ximénez

    cardinal read the charges

  30. 02:27

    Cardinal Fang

    you are here by charge that you did against the Holy Church

  31. 02:35

    Cardinal Ximénez

    That's enough! How do you plead?

  32. 02:44

    Lady Mountback

    We're innocent.

  33. 02:46

    Cardinal Ximénez

    Ha! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!

  34. 02:48

    Cardinal Ximénez

    We'll soon change your mind about that!

  35. 02:55

    Cardinal Biggles

    Fear, surprise, no more ruthless...

  36. 02:59

    Cardinal Ximénez

    Right. Cardinal, crack!

  37. 03:15

    Cardinal Biggles

    Crack!

  38. 03:18

    Cardinal Ximénez

    Right. Tie her down.

  39. 03:31

    Cardinal Biggles

    Right.

  40. 03:45

    Cardinal Ximénez

    right how do you plead

  41. 03:49

    Lady Mountback

    innocent

  42. 03:50

    Cardinal Ximénez

    right Cardinal give the rack

  43. 03:55

    Cardinal Biggles

    oh dear

  44. 03:55

    Cardinal Ximénez

    give the rack a turn I know I know you can't I didn't want to say anything I just wanted to try and ignore your crash mistake

  45. 04:06

    Cardinal Ximénez

    It makes it all seem so stupid.

  46. 04:08

    Cardinal Biggles

    Shall I, um...

  47. 04:09

    Cardinal Ximénez

    Oh, God, just pretend, for God's sake!

  48. 04:12

    Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Oh.

The rabbit hole continues

One more couldn’t hurt.

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