Tesla CEO Elon Musk has stopped meetings to watch clips from the British sketch comedy show "Monty Python's Flying Circus," Wired first reported.
Musk reportedly did this during the second half of 2017, as Tesla struggled to ramp up production of its Model 3 sedan.
"At work, Musk sometimes seemed almost giddy, occasionally interrupting meetings to insist that his colleagues watch clips of Monty Python episodes on his computer, according to several people," Wired reporter Charles Duhigg wrote. "A particular favorite was a skit of aristocrats debating the virtues of words like antelope versus sausage. He would play it more than once, laughing uproariously each time, as his colleagues waited to return to the issues at hand."
Musk said Thursday via Twitter that he showed the sketch mentioned by Wired because he was attempting to explain why he didn't want Tesla vehicles to have a "tinny" sound. The characters in the sketch discuss words that have a "woody" sound versus those that have a "tinny" sound. (A "woody" sound is said to be positive, while a "tinny" sound is said to be negative.)
"This part is true. I was trying to explain that we don’t want our cars to have a 'tinny' sound," Musk said.
Read more: The 36 most wild things said by Elon Musk
According to Wired, Musk's behavior became erratic in the months following the July 2017 launch of the Model 3. Musk would reportedly skip or cancel meetings and seemed irritable to some employees, the publication reported. During this period, he also gave an interview to Rolling Stone in which he was unusually candid about the difficulties of breaking up with his former girlfriend, Amber Heard.
"I will never be happy without having someone. Going to sleep alone kills me," Musk said during the interview.
Tesla employees have in multiple stories about Musk described him as a complicated figure, capable of inspiring and frustrating them. Some Tesla employees told Business Insider in a September report that Musk had empowered them to solve problems and pushed them to exceed their expectations, while others said he can be impulsive and temperamental.
Have a Tesla news tip? Contact this reporter at mmatousek@businessinsider.com.
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