The Monty Python star and creator of iconic sitcom Fawlty Towers talks cats, comedy and the importance of love
WORDS: ALISON JAMES
● Perfection isn’t funny. If Basil Fawlty was a really nice, kind, efficient human being, then he wouldn’t be the slightest bit funny.
Funniness is about people not being perfect. If you have a character who is kind and generous and doesn’t take himself or herself too seriously, and who generally gets through life without messing anything up, then there is nothing very funny about them.
● Pets are so good for us. They teach us to live in the present.
When you’re playing with a cat or dog, you’re in the present which is where the happiness is. You’re not thinking about the past or the future.
I am definitely a cat person. Dogs are nice but I don’t quite get them.
● In this country the more we love someone, the more we insult them. Whenever I get together with my fellow ex Pythons Michael Palin and Terry Gilliam, for instance, I take the mickey out of Michael for making boring travel documentaries and ask Terry when he’s going to make another expensive flop of a movie!
We’re terribly rude to each other all the time which is very hard for the literal minded to understand.
The legendary sitcom Fawlty Towers has been adapted for stage and is playing at the Apollo Theatre in London. Visit fawltytowerswestend.com for more information and tickets
AQuestion OfEnergy
There are still a lot of things I want to do but your energy drops. You still find energy for the things that you really like but for the ones you don’t, it’s harder to fake it.
All The Fun Of The Farce!
