Encounter with Terry Jones
Terry
Jones, former member of Monty Python and writer,
director and star (as Toad himself) of The
Wind in the Willows was in town and JT was lucky enough to have a few
words with him. Here's what Terry had to say about the American
theatrical release of the film, ruthlessly paraphrased, unless quoted.
Apparently Disney had the rights to release the film in theatres, but they
wanted to dump it straight to video. Columbia was looking to release
something they could just quietly plop down on to few theatres, to fulfill
some obligation or other, so they got the rights to do so from Disney.
Though Columbia did almost nothing in the way of advertising, "to their
horror", the film received great reviews in the few cities in which it
could be found. Terry mentioned that perhaps someone out there could start
a web campaign to put the movie into more theatres.
I managed to find someone out there in cyberspace willing to do the work,
but his page never went anywhere. Another site took up the slack, but has
since disappeared. It never really built up any momentum anyway.
Even though I only had a few moments to talk to Terry, he seemed like a
terribly nice guy. (I also got to meet Douglas Adams, who was extremely
cool as well.) Terry seemed reasonably interested in our cause and gave
me his e-mail address so I can contact him. I gave him a copy of the City
Link Magazine with our article that has our
website listed on it.
Since that meeting, I've been in contact with Terry off and on. I sent
him a Save Toad t-shirt, which he was "tickled
green" to receive (and claimed to be wearing as he wrote me). I'll respect
his stature (as an artist) and not tell you what size.
He also told me that he's filled out his SAVE TOAD
postcards as well.
He's one of the good ones.
The latest news is that the video was finally released under the title
Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. There was some concern about it ever being
released, since it was slated to come out some time ago and then
mysteriously disappeared.
But it is out now and available for rental at your local video store,
after getting a fresh round of great reviews from both critics and friends
of this site.
In fact, you can buy it right here
online.
It is a shame the way this film's release was handled, but at least now
you have a chance of seeing it for yourself.
The views and opinions expressed on this page are strictly those of the
author. The contents and links have not been reviewed or approved by the
University of Miami.