The history department’s tradition of playing a history centered comedy during finals week continues tonight. This spring the film of choice is “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” which will show at 7pm Wednesday in Henderson 112.

The tradition started with the realization that the climate of finals week could be lightened with a comedy bringing students together for a laugh.

“We’ve been doing the historical movie side for a while but for whatever reason in May or December, it always seems like a serious, heavy movie seemed inappropriate,” said Tom Prasch, history department chairman, “So the obvious place to go was Monty Python.”

Several years later, the department has developed a rough rotation of historical comedies to choose from including “Blazing Saddles,” “History of the World: Part II,” “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure,” Monty Python’s “Life of Brian” and of course tonight’s “Holy Grail.”

Prasch described that the weight of finals week lightens a little when the department comes together for historical movie night.

“At the same time it is sort of a serious historical work if you really want to take it that direction,” Prasch said. “I mean Monty Python is kind of interested, as a group, deeply in history. They do kind of know the territory… It’s fun territory, but it still has some relevance to history.”