Fawlty Towers reboot: ‘John Cleese comedy classic revival is a terrible idea and looks more like an act of revenge’

In the 43 years since the series ended, Cleese, who co-wrote the 12 volumes of Fawlty’s Tower with then-wife Connie Booth (although they divorced before the second series), has said he would never revive it. Doing so would only tarnish the original, which has been named the best British sitcom ever. Radio Times poll four years ago.

In 2009, during a cast reunion to promote two 30th anniversary documentaries on digital channel Gold, Cleese told Guard: “We both feel like we did our best. We just knew that if we did more, it wouldn’t be as good.”

But now he has changed his mind. He turned his head completely. Suddenly, give Fawlty’s Tower Returning to comedian daughter Camilla Cleese as co-star and co-writer was a great idea.

Even Rob Reiner, who gave audiences his own pair of comedy classics in This is Tap spine And When did Harry meet Sally, think it’s a great idea. Reiner who is developing a new one Fawlty’s Tower with his team at Castle Rock Entertainment, said this week: “John Cleese is a comedy legend. Just the idea of ​​working with him makes me laugh.”

Let’s hope for his sake he’s still smiling when the whole world gets to see the finished series. Let’s hope for us that we are too. Somehow, I don’t think we will, because revival Fawlty’s Tower Really not a great idea. It’s a terrible idea, for a number of reasons.

The film is not only about Cleese but also about the rest of the cast: Andrew Sachs as the Spaniard Manuel, Connie Booth as the receptionist Polly and especially Prunella Scales as Sybil, the wife. by Basil.

Fawlty’s Tower returning without any of them is unthinkable, but it is Fawlty’s Tower return to them.

Booth gave up acting in the 1990s and became a psychotherapist; Now she is retired. Sadly, Scales has Alzheimer’s disease and is no longer able to work.

Above all, the age factor cannot be avoided. Cleese was 36 years old when Fawlty’s Tower start and 40 when it ends. He’s 83 years old now, more than a decade older than Ballard Berkeley when he played the sly Major Gowen.

Basil is a physically demanding role that involves frantic running and some pretty big mistakes. With the best will in the world, a man in his 80s simply cannot do the same things he can do at half that age.

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So what does that leave us with? Fawlty Tower 2.0 obviously there will be Basil and his daughter (where on earth did she certain word spring Basil always seems to have sex-fear?) runs a boutique hotel.

It will, according to the publicity, “explore how Cleese’s superior, cynical and hateful Basil Fawlty navigates the modern world”.

Honestly, this doesn’t sound like the Basil Fawlty we’ve known and the John Cleese we’ve come to know all too well. John Cleese, who has complained for years about how horrible all modern comedies are, how the cancellation culture is stifling creativity, how the BBC has frozen him (although he did appear in the scary BBC sitcom Keeping Sunset a few years ago) and refused to repeat Monty Python’s Flying Circus because it’s afraid to upset the viewer.

A quick look on the internet will tell him why the BBC isn’t showing Python another is owned by Netflix exclusively.

This is also John Cleese, who last year signed up to present a program on GB News, in the clear belief that it was a free speech channel, not a megaphone for right-wingers.

Basically, Cleese seems to have turned into a real-life Basil, eliminating xenophobia and reviving Fawlty Tháp Tower looks more like an act of revenge than anything else.

I can’t see this ending well. I can see it ending quickly, though. At a stroke, revived Frasier doesn’t sound like the worst idea anyone in television has ever had.