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Louis XIV also known as The Golden Age of Ballooning 2: The Montgolfier Brothers in Love (Not with each other, obviously) is a sketch that appears in The Golden Age of Ballooning the fortieth episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus.

Synopsis[]

The announcer (Graham Chapman) describes the features of next week's episode of The Golden Age of Ballooning, including the work of Girlsher and Coxwell who ascended to a height of 7 miles in a balloon without washing, and advertising a Golden Age of Ballooning book the BBC made, as well as more merchandise. Episode 2 of The Golden Age of Ballooning plays.

Back in 1783, Joseph Montgolfier (Terry Jones) draws balloons while Antoinette, his wife (Carol Cleveland), complains about his obsession of balloons as she is suspended in an experimental hot air balloon invention. Then Jacques (Eric Idle) walks in and reminds Joseph about their special guest coming over tonight, Louis XIV (Michael Palin), who is funding their experiment. Joseph thought he was dead, but if he's visiting tonight, supposedly not.

Later that evening O'Toole (Chapman) introduces Louis XIV from France. Louis XIV and his dukes walk in seedily. Jacques greets him and asks O'Toole to get a claret for the king, but O'Toole says Mr Bartlett is still waiting to see him. It becomes increasingly obvious Louis XIV is not French, from the thick Scottish accent and his confusion of what Paris is. O'Toole cannot find the claret even after very detailed directions from Jacques.

Louis then says that Jacques and his dukes are very busy men and must look at Jacques's balloon blueprints, and that he'd like to bring them to his Royal Archives of France. As Louis tries to steal the blueprints, Joseph enters from the middle of his wash and orders them to stop. He tells Jacques that "Louis XIV" is not Louis XIV, as he really died in 1717 and that it is currently 1783. "Louis" then lies and says he's Louis XV, who died in 1774, and then Louis XVI. Louis explains when you're the king of France, you have better things to do than remember your number, then breaks Joseph's nose, running away with the blueprints.

A camera crew enters and sets up a projection of a video of Louis XIV and his dukes being chased by Joseph, Jacques and O'Toole.

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