Terry Jones' writing partner of late has been Gavin Scott. Together, they're the chief writers behind the promised new Terry Pratchett TV shows, one of which should be an adaptation of Good Omens, the other of would be something like a crime-of-the-week show set on Discworld - CSI: Ankh Morpork, as it were.

Another of their projects, and one that has been in the works for a rather long time is Anything Else, a sci-fi comedy with a talking dog, some aliens and a once-normal man now with superpowers.

The last we heard, John Oliver, the British one from The Daily Show, was in line for a role, and Jones was thinking of recruiting some of his old Flying Circus chums, but it wasn't clear how many, or quite what they'd have to do.

In today's Variety, there's a story that focuses on the Python involvement. Seems that this might be as full a reunion as is possible:
[Jones] said Gilliam and Python members John Cleese and Michael Palin have agreed to perform and added that producers are attempting to sign Eric Idle.

And in order to clarify, Jones also said:
It's not a Monty Python picture, but it certainly has that sensibility.

The Python-voiced aliens set the plot in motion by giving a human character the power to do... wait for it... absolutely anything. That, I believe, is the role that Oliver was up for before.

Robin Williams is going to provide the voice for Dennis the dog and is also negotiating to play an on-screen role that the film's producer, Mike Medavoy has compared to Peter Sellers' Clouseau:
Terry and Gavin have crafted a classic farce - something I feel I know a little bit about after all the Pink Panther pictures we did with Blake Edwards at United Artists. In fact, the movie even has a pompous Frenchman reminiscent of Inspector Clouseau - but there the similarity ends.

Jones is also said to be cooking up a "heavy metal version of The Nutcracker" with Jim Steinman, the hilarious genius behind the best, most overblown and funniest Meatloaf records, including Bat out of Hell; and a floating musical based on Edward Lear's The Owl and The Pussycat, with The Art of Noise's Anne Dudley.

I'm glad he's keeping busy. Jones has always been my second favourite film director called Terry, even if you're not just counting Pythons.