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English actor, comedian, writer and film producer John Cleese says he is considering legal action over what he calls a ‘rip-off’ of one of his best-loved television shows, Fawlty Towers, which has been staged several times in Bahrain.
The star took to Twitter to complain about an Australian theatre company’s show titled Faulty Towers Dining Experience.
Cleese co-founded Monty Python, the comedy troupe responsible for the sketch show Monty Python’s Flying Circus and four Monty Python films. Later, he co-starred in A Fish Called Wanda and Fierce Creatures, both of which he also wrote.
He also starred in Clockwise, and has appeared in many other movies, including two James Bond films as Q, two Harry Potter films and the last three Shrek films.
In the mid-1970s, Cleese and his first wife, Connie Booth, co-wrote and starred in the British sitcom featuring Basil Fawlty, an outrageous English hotel manager, who was tortured by ‘that annoying section of the general public who insisted on staying’. Fawlty was constantly berated by his wife and his efforts were continually hampered by their Spanish waiter, Manuel.
Cleese wrote on social media: “I’ve just found out from an Aussie journalist the astonishing financial success of the ‘Faulty Towers Rip-Off Dining Experience’ – had no idea.”
In response to one comment describing the news as ‘XXXXXXX shocking’, he said: “That’s the phrasing I’m hoping to use in court.”
He wrote to fellow actor David Baddiel: “Seems they thought that by not asking, and by changing the ‘w’ to a ‘u’, they’d be in the clear! Hilarious.”
“I’ve never minded student and amateur groups using FT material, but when I find professionals making a small fortune out of it, that’s not OK,” he added.
“I never heard anything was wrong with the show. After all, they start with a lot of advantages: the basic concept ... 40 years of unpaid publicity, the characters’ personalities, the characters’ names, the characters’ dress, the characters’ dialogue ... 12 funny episodes to which they make reference, plus all the catch-phrases, without the need to pay Connie Booth and me a single cent.
“I’m always learning. I had never realised that ‘tribute’ is a synonym for ‘rip-off’.”
But Faulty Towers Dining Experience makers Imagination Workshop told the BBC it had made ‘nothing like’ the £1 million-a-year that was reported by newspapers in Australia.
“We are not an unauthorised rip-off show – anyone who knows the law in this area will understand that we do not require authorisation to use the concept of Fawlty Towers,” they claimed.
Only 12 episodes were ever made of the classic sitcom, which was broadcast between 1975 and 1979, but it remains one of the best-loved BBC comedies.
The Faulty Towers Dining Experience played to sell out audiences at the InterContinental Regency Bahrain hotel in 2012.
A review in GulfWeekly read: “The marvellous thing about this show is that the actors not only look the part, but played them with conviction and swagger that Cleese himself would no doubt be proud of. From Manuel’s ineptitude, to Sybil’s bemoaning, right down to Basil’s impotent rage, all the boxes were ticked for an evening of authentic British humour, served up by Australians and brought to Bahrain by Punchline Media.”
On reflection, Cleese’s suggested reaction was well off the mark.
