As an eight-year-old,I lovedFawlty Towers so dearly it became a sort of Bible. I adored its protagonist,the self-defeating hotelier Basil Fawlty. In fact,I idolised him. Too young to realise Basil was a sneering,pompous,bigoted monster,and certainly not someone you’re supposed to like or admire,I strove to emulate him in every aspect of my life.
No wonder I didn’t have many friends.
A reboot? Que?BBC
I loveFawlty Towersto this day,despite repeated cancellings of both and the character of Manuel. Speaking of cancellings,that’s suddenlynot the case for Mr Cleese’s famously short-running hitFawlty Towers.About 193 years since its last episode,the,or a “reboot” as these things are poetically called.
This is huge news forFawlty Towersfans. Huge and divisive news. Some fans are gloating like Basil when he thinks he’s won money on a horse race. Others have taken it like a moose’s head just fell on them. (What do you callFawlty Towersfans,anyway? Towerites? Fawltians?) Today,I’ve already spoken to five Fawltians firmly opposed to the series returning. After all,its original length of a mere 12 episodes is often held up as one of its greatest virtues. Mr Cleese himself said so in interviews over the years.
How might Basil Fawlty react to news the hotel that inspired the iconic English comedyFawlty Towers is to be torn down?
Fawlty Towers left on a high,many Fawltians say. It’s classy because it wasn’t flogged to death like,well,every other popular show ever made. To make more would be tragic,a mistake,a sellout,they say. On Twitter,I can scarcely find a positive comment:either aboutFawlty Towersor any other topic.
Now,anyone who’s written TV must cop this kind of suspicion whenever a new season is announced. It happened to the little homegrown shows I made with my comedy group. The minute a second season ofThe Chaser’s War On Everything was announced,it was pooh-poohed widely by the very people who’d adored the first. They proceeded to adore “Season 2” regardless but complained again when hearing dire news of a third.
So imagine how much greater the New Season Suspicion Syndrome must be for a worldwide hit likeFawlty Towersthat’s been AWOL for decades. Insurmountable!
My question is always:How can we know what it’ll be like if we haven’t actually seen it yet? Some reply,“I just know”. And fair enough,maybe sometimes you just know. Like we knewPolice Academy 7wouldn’t be much chop.
If we’re going off track records though,surely we have reason to be hopeful about this one.Fawlty Towersnails all the elements of narrative comedy like nobody’s business. The story structures are as dazzling as DNA,the threads coalescing at the end of each episode in a thrilling comic catastrophe. The dialogue is blistering. Every character is a joy to watch,the situations bonkers enough to be hilarious but not so divorced from reality as to be unrelatable. The direction is top-notch,the acting exquisite,the editing paced like sublime music. And it’s all wonderfully free from sentiment and life lessons.
So,why this conviction that a new season is doomed to failure?
Well,reports say Mr Cleese might have a different co-writer this time in daughter Camilla Cleese,and certainly different production personnel. But those factors aren’t the ones troubling the nay-saying Fawltians. Their objection is the return itself. They’d rather it not be made at all than risk being disappointed by it.
Why? I suspect the answer largely lies in the changing way we respond to pop culture as we age. Most of us fall in love with our favourite music,movies and shows during our childhoods and teen years,when everything strikes us as new and astounding and important.
As we battle our weary way through adult life,we notice patterns repeating. Our patience grows thin as we realise we might well drop dead in a month or two,and we become harder to impress.
So as musicians age,audiences are less moved by their new output. Radio stations won’t program it. People at concerts moan,“I like your old stuff better” and chide the musician for having the temerity to keep being creative. But in reality,the musician hasn’t changed.We’ve changed.
TV reboots suffer the same fate.Sex and the City,Gilmore Girls,Borgen – reboots never rise to the stratospheric,nostalgia-fuelled expectations of fans whose lives have profoundly moved on. I wonder why! (Okay,theSex and the City reboot is simply terrible. But my point stands in most other cases.)
I admit to a personal stake in asking Fawltians to keep open minds. As a comedian in imminent danger of ageing myself,I hope to write comedy into my 80s,just like John Cleese. And besides,comics need the money. Why else would I agree to write this opinion column,for God’s sake?
So,like another great John – Lennon – my plea is this:Give Cleese a chance.
Andrew Hansen is a comedian,musician and author. His new live show,Andrew Hansen is Cheap,is touring nationally.