What Does This Button Do?: An Autobiography

by Bruce Dickinson

Back in 1988 the Seventh Son tour was all-conquering, but equally interesting for me was meeting video director, editor and auteur in general Julian Doyle, who was initially called in to direct ‘Can I Play with Madness’. Julian and I went on to direct and storyboard several more ideas and, of course, the Oscar-defying feature film Chemical Wedding, starring Simon Callow as the reincarnated Aleister Crowley. Before Aleister Crowley, though, came Monty Python. Julian was Python’s film guru. He reassembled the film Brazil from the cutting-room floor, having finished large chunks of it himself because Terry Gilliam was ill. As an editor his credits extended to virtually all the Python films, and he taught at film schools and was his own lighting director and cameraman. After directing Donald Sutherland and Kate Bush in ‘Cloudbusting’, Julian was asked to come up with ideas for ‘Can I Play with Madness’. He managed to engage Graham Chapman to perform in the video.