The announcer (John Cleese) appears briefly between some sketches to deliver the line "and now for something completely different", in situations such as being roasted on a spit and lying on top of a desk in a small pink bikini, as well as the Colonel (Graham Chapman) interrupting them and deeming them "too silly".

Each playing various characters: The origin of the phrase is credited to Christopher Trace, founding presenter of the children's television programme Blue Peter, who used it (in all seriousness) as a link between segments.

[5] Many of the early episodes of Monty Python's Flying Circus feature a sensible-looking announcer (played by John Cleese) dressed in a black suit and sitting behind a wooden desk, which in turn is in some ridiculous location such as behind the bars of a zoo cage or in mid-air being held aloft by small attached propellers.

Financed by Playboy′s UK executive Victor Lownes, it was intended to help Monty Python break into the United States.

In particular, he objected so strongly to one character—'Ken Shabby'—that his appearance was removed, although stills from both this and a further cut sketch, "Flying Sheep", were published in Monty Python's Big Red Book.

The film was shot on location in England and inside an abandoned dairy (rather than on a more costly soundstage) beginning on 26 October, ten days after recording was completed on the second series, and ending on 9 December 1970.

[citation needed] When it was released on 22 August 1972, the film had little success at the box office and did not do well until a late 1974 re-release, which was after PBS began showing the original television episodes in the US.

[8] The film originally was on DVD in Region 1 from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment; in 2005, it was repacked in a new collector's pack called And Now For Something Completely Hilarious!