Cleese And Idle Clashed On Urine-drinking Sketch

Idle came up with the skit about a wine expert mistaking chardonnays and champagne for "wee-wee", and Cleese sided with TV bosses, who feared the segment was too off-colour to broadcast.

Cleese says, "I sided with the BBC... I found (it) really rather distasteful."

But Python pal Terry Gilliam insists the sketch wasn't cut from the show because it suggested the expert was drinking urine - but because the TV bosses read a little too much into one part of the skit.

He explains, "Apparently, one of the glasses of wine had a slight rose tint to it, which, to the BBC's mind, this was menstrual urine. Everything they came up with was more and more absurd... They were really twisted."