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John Cleese almost certainly said that only two series of the popular bed-and-breakfast satire would ever be made, and now a possible U-turn has seemed to be made over four decades, Cleese and his daughter Camilla (a Royal coincidence ahoy) are thinking about penning a 21st century version of the Torquay sitcom. If Open All Hours can "Still" be made for the 2010s then anything could be possible. Only 12 episodes of Fawlty were "ever" made originally and I am certain that Cleese originally wanted it to be like that; in a way that its first showings in 1975 and 1979 were seen as "premieres" rather than subsequent showings as "repeats", and its first repeat was in early 1976. I think that it was also a great way of taking the Michael out of various towns in the British Isles in the same way that Steve Coogan's Alan Partridge has made Norwich infamous for reasons other than the Norwich Union Building Society, Bernard Matthews and Colman's Mustard.
My first (and probably false) memory of seeing an episode was when I was possibly unwell, probably with a Lemsip or warm milk, and I was allowed to stay up to see it, and the parents had decided that I was unwell enough and perhaps too ill to go to school on the following day (a Friday). This was possibly in the late 1980s or very early 1990s on BBC 1 in a Thursday night post-Nine O'clock News slot where Question Time and Crimewatch UK usually hung out, and my memory was that it was the "Farty Towels" episode aka Basil the Rat - the final one originally transmitted, which was repeated, in which a member of my family made some joke on someone in the house who had regular flatulence at the time. The Genome does not give me any clues when researching it - BBC 1 showed it on Tuesday evenings in November 1988 at around the same time that I thought it would be on a Thursday evening. I know that Open All Hours repeats often came up in that slot as well.
I have to say that Cleese is a master of comedy, and I have always assumed that comedy actors such as Leonard Rossiter tried to be a Cleese-alike act with series like Rising Damp and Reggie Perrin but did not cut the mustard. Who could forget "Farty Towels", "Watery Fowls" and "Flowery Twits" [sic - for the benefit of not being censured on here] on the hotel's front entrance sign at the start of the episode, and with no AA sticker on the front window either? It's a pity that we will never know what the late Andrew Sachs would have thought of it - after what he had to put up with in the Ross/Brand controversy a few years ago, it's probably best not to think about it. I am certain that he would be completely in favour of it to be honest.
The Fawlty character has often seen as the standard for bad service in hotels, especially down on the south coast and in the south west. When a member of a group that had booked hotel rooms for a pre-Christmas party had actually complained about her stay in a Cornwall-based hotel and that the manager had charged her £2.00 for a glass of tap water to complement a meal that she had just eaten - she complained about this and the manager wrote back saying "I pay for the water from the South West Water company; I pay for the labour to clean the glasses after use; I pay for the glasses for your use, and you think I should provide this free of charge?" "It's like a letter from Basil Fawlty" the consumer exclaimed when she got her reply and spoken to the media. One could imagine Cleese playing that hotel manager there.
One of the reasons why I use Premier Inns at least once or twice year was mostly to get away from those family bed-and-breakfast stereotypes that the series originally gave illusions to that I used to stay in, and the fact that a lot of the beds slept in makes me want to book a higher place of relaxation - in a nutshell, Fawlty was a bit like a Public Information Film warning viewers to "beware of wayward bed-and-breakfast establishments" that even Judith Chalmers wouldn't have warned viewers about. I do think of Fawlty Towers just as much a satire as a sitcom of the hotel and catering industry in the UK, in the same way that Rising Damp was a satire on private landlords. Where else would a pre-Grange Hill Michael Cronin appear in any one but The Germans episode? (The only 1970s episode not to have the "sign" seen at the start of the episode).
The Fawlty Towers theme tune was also used as an introduction to a BBC Radio schools programme on writing comedy, and I heard it as I was "chilling out" listening to the Night School programmes on BBC Radio 3 circa 1993 where schools programmes were being transmitted on Tuesday to Friday mornings on Radio 3 between 2.00 am and 4.00 am during term time, a precursor to BBC 2's Learning Zone, and transmitted on equipment that was unable to timer record programmes like VCRs could. Ironically enough I often had school in the morning - listening to the programme, it also the first time that I heard the word "parody" being used as its use in writing comedy. A very informative programme, even if I was a bit too old for it like I was for most stuff in Years 10 and 11. I believe that this was when BBC Radio 3 was trying to branch into 24 hour broadcasting for the first time, and this was one way that they would slowly start to do this, although the Night School programmes were not heard on the Scottish transmitters.
Considering comedy series like On the Buses and Are You Being Served, I am surprised that Fawlty Towers never had a feature film spin-off of the series just like a lot of 1970s British sitcoms. One assumes that Cleese wanted the project to be contained within its original foundational 12 episodes and so therefore didn't want to extend the series onto a feature film which in many ways was a pity. If a new series was made, viewers would still say that both 1970s series would be better. It is nice that as Cleese is progressing in years and is a lot older than when the original series was made, he is thinking of giving it another go before it is too late.
Perhaps Basil might want to run a Premier Inn or even an Ibis these days? - a great learning curve...
My first (and probably false) memory of seeing an episode was when I was possibly unwell, probably with a Lemsip or warm milk, and I was allowed to stay up to see it, and the parents had decided that I was unwell enough and perhaps too ill to go to school on the following day (a Friday). This was possibly in the late 1980s or very early 1990s on BBC 1 in a Thursday night post-Nine O'clock News slot where Question Time and Crimewatch UK usually hung out, and my memory was that it was the "Farty Towels" episode aka Basil the Rat - the final one originally transmitted, which was repeated, in which a member of my family made some joke on someone in the house who had regular flatulence at the time. The Genome does not give me any clues when researching it - BBC 1 showed it on Tuesday evenings in November 1988 at around the same time that I thought it would be on a Thursday evening. I know that Open All Hours repeats often came up in that slot as well.
I have to say that Cleese is a master of comedy, and I have always assumed that comedy actors such as Leonard Rossiter tried to be a Cleese-alike act with series like Rising Damp and Reggie Perrin but did not cut the mustard. Who could forget "Farty Towels", "Watery Fowls" and "Flowery Twits" [sic - for the benefit of not being censured on here] on the hotel's front entrance sign at the start of the episode, and with no AA sticker on the front window either? It's a pity that we will never know what the late Andrew Sachs would have thought of it - after what he had to put up with in the Ross/Brand controversy a few years ago, it's probably best not to think about it. I am certain that he would be completely in favour of it to be honest.
The Fawlty character has often seen as the standard for bad service in hotels, especially down on the south coast and in the south west. When a member of a group that had booked hotel rooms for a pre-Christmas party had actually complained about her stay in a Cornwall-based hotel and that the manager had charged her £2.00 for a glass of tap water to complement a meal that she had just eaten - she complained about this and the manager wrote back saying "I pay for the water from the South West Water company; I pay for the labour to clean the glasses after use; I pay for the glasses for your use, and you think I should provide this free of charge?" "It's like a letter from Basil Fawlty" the consumer exclaimed when she got her reply and spoken to the media. One could imagine Cleese playing that hotel manager there.
One of the reasons why I use Premier Inns at least once or twice year was mostly to get away from those family bed-and-breakfast stereotypes that the series originally gave illusions to that I used to stay in, and the fact that a lot of the beds slept in makes me want to book a higher place of relaxation - in a nutshell, Fawlty was a bit like a Public Information Film warning viewers to "beware of wayward bed-and-breakfast establishments" that even Judith Chalmers wouldn't have warned viewers about. I do think of Fawlty Towers just as much a satire as a sitcom of the hotel and catering industry in the UK, in the same way that Rising Damp was a satire on private landlords. Where else would a pre-Grange Hill Michael Cronin appear in any one but The Germans episode? (The only 1970s episode not to have the "sign" seen at the start of the episode).
The Fawlty Towers theme tune was also used as an introduction to a BBC Radio schools programme on writing comedy, and I heard it as I was "chilling out" listening to the Night School programmes on BBC Radio 3 circa 1993 where schools programmes were being transmitted on Tuesday to Friday mornings on Radio 3 between 2.00 am and 4.00 am during term time, a precursor to BBC 2's Learning Zone, and transmitted on equipment that was unable to timer record programmes like VCRs could. Ironically enough I often had school in the morning - listening to the programme, it also the first time that I heard the word "parody" being used as its use in writing comedy. A very informative programme, even if I was a bit too old for it like I was for most stuff in Years 10 and 11. I believe that this was when BBC Radio 3 was trying to branch into 24 hour broadcasting for the first time, and this was one way that they would slowly start to do this, although the Night School programmes were not heard on the Scottish transmitters.
Considering comedy series like On the Buses and Are You Being Served, I am surprised that Fawlty Towers never had a feature film spin-off of the series just like a lot of 1970s British sitcoms. One assumes that Cleese wanted the project to be contained within its original foundational 12 episodes and so therefore didn't want to extend the series onto a feature film which in many ways was a pity. If a new series was made, viewers would still say that both 1970s series would be better. It is nice that as Cleese is progressing in years and is a lot older than when the original series was made, he is thinking of giving it another go before it is too late.
Perhaps Basil might want to run a Premier Inn or even an Ibis these days? - a great learning curve...
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