Resurrecting dinosaurs is rarely a good idea in showbusiness but John Cleese appears undaunted as he sets sail on reviving the iconic and very un-pc ‘Fawlty Towers’ comedy series. He is using none of the original cast bar himself since Manuel, Andrew Sachs, has died and Prunella Scales, the long suffering wife, has dementia – and is transplanting it from coastal England to the Caribbean.
Cleese, 27 October 1939 3.15am Weston Super Mare, is a talented man who has had a troubled relationship life. He performed in the Footlights when at Cambridge University, co-founded the surreal Monty Python shows, co-wrote and starred in Fawlty Towers which became a staggering success despite only running for 12 episodes and went on to write and act in movies A Fish Called Wanda, and Fierce Creatures as well as other notable films. He also had a highly publicised divorce from his second American wife, which was so expensive he went on an Alimony Tour to raise money for it. He blamed his mother for his emotional problems.
He has a Scorpio Sun conjunct the North Node opposition an 8th house Saturn square Pluto; with his Saturn conjunct an Aries Moon, also in his 8th. It is a bleak chart where emotional relationships are concerned with lurking self-doubts, a fear of intimacy and a defensive need to over-control. He also has a volatile Venus and Mercury in Scorpio opposition Uranus in his 9th square Mars in Aquarius – overly blunt, irascible, stubborn, quite a bulldozer. Plus a confident Jupiter in Aries in his 7th trine Pluto; and an inspired Neptune trine Uranus. A complicated and difficult man.
He’s not in an easy patch with tr Uranus rattling up his Mars and Venus, Uranus T square now and through this year which will lead to outbursts and irritability. Plus a real drag from not only tr Pluto square his 8th house Saturn all this year; but also his Solar Arc Pluto opposition his Saturn and his Solar Arc Sun in square to his Saturn. He will have tr Pluto sextile his Jupiter for mild uplift.
His strongest harmonic is his 13th – sometimes described as breakthrough-genius. It was also comedian Peter Sellers’ most notable.
It’s ironic really that he made his name as a comic by sending up fossilized aspects of British society with sketches like the Ministry of Silly Walks in full civil servant regalia of the period and then the dinosaurs running British seaside hotels back in the ‘60s with the character of Basil Fawlty (the humour was cringeworthy even the first time around), and now he seems to have become one himself tilting at PC windmills. He seems to forget that he was the straightman, without the talents of the formidable cast he had around him I think a relaunch is likely to be mostly embarrassing. If it’s money he needs he could consider selling something from his collection of Rolls Royces.:)
This was a shocker, wasn’t it. And not a hair out of place. Totally unemotional and sincere about jumping ship. What is going on? That is Scotland and New Zealand in a couple of weeks…The heat is on and they’re flying out the kitchen.