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Fawlty Towers moving from UK to Caribbean

John Cleese won't allow sequel to screen on BBC due to fears of editorial interference.

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The new Fawlty Towers sequel will be located in a “bijou hotel in the Caribbean” John Cleese has confirmed.

But he won’t be letting the BBC screen the series.

“No. Because you wouldn’t get the freedom,” he told GB News host Dan Wooton.

“I was terribly lucky, Dan. I was working in the ’60s, ’70s, beginning of the ’80s. That was the best time because the BBC was run by people with real personality, who loved the medium and were operating out of confidence.”

But Cleese, 83, who is also joining the conservative UK news channel, has been critical of comedy being cancelled and warnings attached to his former episodes.

“Some of it triggers from a very good idea which is to be kind to people, but I believe it’s become far too dominated by people who are frightened of offending people,” he said.

On the question of whether characters should be shouting racial epithets he said, “No, but I don’t think prison is a correct sanction.

“There’s lots of good angles to ‘woke’ but then it goes to the crazy extremes.”

Cleese also attributed some of his success to no editorial interference from BBC’s Head of Light Entertainment, Michael Mills.

“Go away and make 13 programmes,” he recalled hearing. “No one in the history of television has trusted a group like that.

“But of course a lot of people at the BBC hated (Monty Python). I mean the guy in charge of the department… absolutely hated it. He bumped into the Director in the elevator and he said ‘What is this awful show? Is it supposed to be funny? I can’t stand it.’ This is the guy in charge of the department,” Cleese said.

“But if you actually let people create and have new ideas instead of sort of … what do they call them? That kind of parenting… what is it? Hover craft painting? No. Helicopter parenting! That’s what you get in Television because nobody trusts anyone. They’ve got to be in charge and in control. And that’s exactly what’s wrong with most Television.”

8 Responses

  2. Now that’s a reassuring sign if there ever was one.

    I would love to see Connie Booth return, as unlikely as it would be.

    It would also be great to see the other surviving Pythons make guest appearances for (possibly) one last hurrah seeing as virtually no-one else from the original Fawlty Towers will be appearing.

    1. Speaking of, I would welcome a third (and final) Mr. Bean film. I’ve always been disappointed with how abruptly his relationship with Irma ended (though it lived on in the animated series, to which I am indifferent). I would love to see a happy ending for the two (and all of the hijinx in between) as they rekindle their *erm* “romance” after three decades apart, and unlike the first film, would invite ample opportunity for the two leads to flex their silent humour muscle once more.

  4. I used to like Monty Python’s Flying Circus but was never one of those people who could remember a classic Python comedy sketch word for word with the funny voices. Python’s origins began in both Oxford and Cambridge University where Goodies Tim Brooke-Taylor, Bill Oddie also performed in the Footlights revue using sketch comedy. You could say that this era was the heyday of British comedy development, a time when all sides of politics and social classes could be featured and poked fun at without much emphasis on political correctness, that is really what creating comedy is all about; laughing at oneself, your culture and your lifestyle. This is why I’m not sure about the motivation for a ‘new’ Fawlty Towers product, but John Cleese is no fool so he must have thought it through, but if he is about making a socio-political challenge for TV broadcasters it probably wont work.

  5. Cleese wouldn’t be Cleese without objecting to something, he’s mastered the art. His offensive comedy The Alimony Tour he clearly started you have to push the limits to provoke, he terms it as black humour I’m sure is the reason he likes to push the boat because of the anxiety it causes most people.

  6. I think John Cleese is reasonable in his claims about the BBC. He is now a centrist and lives in a community in Saint Kitts and Nevis that is about 90% majority ethnic African heritage. I doubt that BBC would show some of their previous comedies again because of their position nowadays.

    I’m aware that Dan Wooton is associated with ITV and the other moderate or centrist UK networks could pick it up.

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