The famous English actor-comedian, one of the members of the comedy troupe Monty Python, Graham (Graham) Chapman was born on January 8, 1946 in Leicester in the family of a local police inspector. In 1961 he entered the Medical College at Cambridge University. While studying at Cambridge, Chapman took part in comedy productions of the university theater troupe, in which he met John Cleese, his future colleague and co-writer. After graduating, Chapman worked for a time at St. George's Hospital. Bartholomew,
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The famous English actor-comedian, one of the members of the comedy troupe Monty Python, Graham (Graham) Chapman was born on January 8, 1946 in Leicester in the family of a local police inspector. In 1961 he entered the Medical College at Cambridge University. While studying at Cambridge, Chapman took part in comedy productions of the university theater troupe, in which he met John Cleese, his future colleague and co-writer. After graduating, Chapman worked for a time at St. George's Hospital. Bartholomew, however, soon made the final choice in favor of an artistic career.
For several years, Chapman and Cleese wrote scripts for numerous television and radio shows, and in 1969 they founded the comedy troupe Monty Python, which also included Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Terry Gilliam and Michael Palin. For several years, from 1969 to 1973, their television show Monty Python's Flying Circus was a success on the BBC. Betting on the absurdity and black humor, "Monty Python" often shocked the audience - among other things, political figures of the past and the present, norms of public morality, religion, problems of national and sexual minorities fell under the fire of their ruthless humor. The actor’s personal life was not easy – openly gay, Chapman never made a secret of his homosexuality and did not hide his connection with screenwriter David Sherlock, with whom he lived for 24 years. In the 70s he adopted and began to educate runaway teenager John Tomichek. After the termination of the broadcast of the series "Flying circus", he starred in the feature films Monty Python - "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" (1975, dir. Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones) and "Life of Brian" (1979, dir. Terry Jones). Unfortunately, when in the late 70s the members of the troupe began to gradually go into their own projects, Chapman could not fully realize himself either as an actor or as a screenwriter - the film "Yellow Beard" (1983, dir. Mel Damsky), in which he played the main role, had very negative reviews from film critics. Together with his colleagues, he starred in two more films Monty Python in Hollywood (1982) and The Meaning of Life by Monty Python (1983), but Chapman’s further creative career was prevented by a sharply deteriorating state of health – in the past, an alcoholic with long experience, he often suffered from severe pain and experienced general weakness. In the last years of his life, he practically stopped acting in films, and the roles that happened (mostly in television films) were quite rare. All 1989, Chapman was confined to a wheelchair - long before his death, doctors found him cancer of the larynx and spinal cord. He died in Maidstone on October 4, 1989, a few days after being hospitalized.