Best known as a member of Monty Python, Michael Palin has been many things — sketchwriter, comedian, actor, and for almost four decades, world traveler. In 1988, he set off with a TV crew to recreate Phileas Fogg’s fictional journey in Jules Verne’s “Around the World in Eighty Days,” and hasn’t slowed down since.
In his latest series, “Michael Palin in the Philippines” – on UK channel 5 – Palin meets the nation’s president, Ferdinand Marcos Jr., visits an overcrowded prison and witnesses firsthand rising tensions in the South China Sea.
In his conversation with Mishal Husain, he speaks about what his travels have taught him, the realities of seeing the world in his 80s and Monty Python’s unlikely diplomatic power.
00:00 Introduction from Mishal Husain
03:30 The impact of “Around the World in 80 Days”
04:10 Michael’s latest trip to the Philippines
05:55 “The journey is becoming increasingly difficult”
06:26 Visiting “countries on the edge”
08:27 The “war on drugs” in the Philippines
11:01 Mishal recalls a news story from her childhood
11:54 When Michael met the president of Philippines
13:56 The president “was interested in how we wrote Monty Python”
14:10 The Fish Slapping dance is Michael’s “calling card”
15:56 A Monty Python reunion?
18:24 The world is becoming harder to document
20:00 Encountering the “hard edge of Chinese power”
22:26 “It’s quite a scary business”
26:16 “I wasn’t very confident in myself to start with”
28:38 Michael’s return to acting
29:26 Writing a diary every day
31:36 “I miss Helen because she was very balanced”
33:11 “I’m at the stage of not knowing whether I’m going to travel again”
38:15 Prison dance routines in the Philippines 40:06 Palin’s travel essentials
Contact The Mishal Husain Show [email protected]
Read Mishal’s notes and reflections on this conversation
https://www.bloomberg.com/mishal
Other episodes of The Mishal Husain Show you might find interesting:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f90wHdX8CwY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRUfIbonrjU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22vlkDSbEzc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6thYjZFvO08
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