Busy Idle

Eric Idle turns 70 today.  Of the five British Monty Python members, he was odd man out.  Terry Jones and Michael Palin were one team and John Cleese and Graham Chapman another. Idle generally wrote alone, coming up with his own bits to impress the rest, full of wordplay and oddly insistent characters.

He was also the most musical of the Pythons, writing a bunch of songs.  Not too long ago, in fact, he went on tour performing many of those numbers.  He also (because the others weren't interested) was the one who created Monty Python's Spamalot, the stage musical adaptation of their Holy Grail film that became a huge hit.