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John Marwood Cleese (born 27 October 1939) is an Academy Award-nominated and
Emmy Award winning English comedian and actor. He is best known for being one of
the founding members of the renowned comedy group Monty Python, and as the writer
and star of the popular television comedy Fawlty Towers.
He has won BAFTA and Emmy awards, and was an Academy Award nominated screen writer
for his film, A Fish Called Wanda.
 Early life
Cleese was born in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, England to Reginald Francis Cleese
and Muriel (Cross). His family's surname was previously "Cheese", but his father,
an insurance salesman, changed his surname to "Cleese" upon joining the army in
1915. As a boy, Cleese was educated at Clifton College in Bristol, from which he
was expelled for a humorous defacing of school grounds: he used painted footsteps
to suggest that the school's statue of Field Marshal Earl Haig had got down from
his plinth and gone to the toilet
His talent for comedy progressed with his membership of the Cambridge Footlights
Revue while he was studying for a law degree at Downing College at Cambridge
University. Here he met his future writing partner Graham Chapman. Cleese wrote
extra material for the 1961 Footlights Revue I Thought I Saw It Move, and was
Registrar for the Footlights Club during 1962, as well as being one of the cast
members for the 1962 Footlights Revue Double Take!.
Cleese was one of the script writers, as well as being a member of cast for the
1963 Footlights Revue A Clump of Plinths, which was so successful during the
Edinburgh Fringe Festival that its name was changed to Cambridge Circus, was taken
to West End in London, and then on a tour of New Zealand and Broadway, (with the
cast also appearing in some of the revue sketches on The Ed Sullivan Show in
September 1964).
After Cambridge Circus, Cleese decided to stay on in America performing on and
off-Broadway, including in the musical Half a Sixpence, and it was during this time
he met future Python Terry Gilliam and his future wife, American actress Connie
Booth, whom he married on 20 February 1968.
As Cleese's comic reputation grew, he was soon offered a position as a writer with
BBC Radio, where he worked on several programs, most notably as a sketch writer for
The Dick Emery Show. The success of the Footlights Revue led to the recording of a
short series of half-hour radio programmes, called I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again,
which was so popular that the BBC commissioned a regular series with the same
title.
Cleese is also a vegetarian.
Career
After his return to England, Cleese started performing as a cast member of the
highly successful BBC Radio show I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, which ran from
1965 to 1974. Cleese (even though he is credited as "John Cleese") is referred to
at the close of every episode as "John Otto Cleese". His real middle name is
"Marwood", not "Otto". (It appears that John Cleese just liked the name. There were
various characters named "Otto" in episodes of Monty Python's Flying Circus, and
there is also an "Otto", played by Kevin Kline in the film A Fish Called Wanda,
written by Cleese. John Cleese's mother once stated that her son called himself
"Otto", rather than his second name of "Marwood", but she did not know why he
called himself "Otto", or where the name "Otto" came from .)
On his return to London in 1965, Cleese and Chapman began writing on The Frost
Report, an important landmark in satire and British Comedy in the 1960s. The
writing staff chosen for The Frost Report was, in many ways, made up of some of the
finest comedy minds of the 1960s in the United Kingdom. It consisted of a number of
writers and performers who would go on to make names for themselves in comedy. They
included future Goodies Bill Oddie and Tim Brooke-Taylor, and also Frank Muir,
Barry Cryer, Marty Feldman, Ronnie Barker, Ronnie Corbett, Dick Vosburgh and future
Python members Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin. It was while working on
The Frost Report, in fact, that the future Pythons developed the writing styles
that would make their collaboration significant . Cleese and Chapman's sketches
often involved authority figures, some of which were performed by Cleese, while
Terry Jones and Michael Palin were both infatuated with filmed scenes that open
with idyllic countryside panoramas. Eric Idle was one of those charged with writing
David Frost's monologue. It was during this period that Cleese met and befriended
influential British comedian Peter Cook.
Such was the popularity of the series that, in 1966, John Cleese and Graham Chapman
were invited to work as writers and performers with Tim Brooke-Taylor and Marty
Feldman on At Last the 1948 Show, during which time the Four Yorkshiremen sketch
was written by all four writers/performers (the Four Yorkshiremen sketch is now
better known as a Monty Python sketch). John Cleese and Graham Chapman also wrote
episodes of Doctor in the House. These series were successful and, in 1969, Cleese
and Chapman were offered their very own series. However, due to Chapman's
alcoholism, Cleese found himself bearing an increasing workload in the partnership
and was therefore unenthusiastic about doing a series with just the two of them. He
had found working with Michael Palin on The Frost Report an enjoyable experience,
and invited him to join the series. Palin had previously been working on Do Not
Adjust Your Set, with Eric Idle and Terry Jones, and Terry Gilliam doing
animations. The four of them had, on the back of the success of Do Not Adjust Your
Set, been offered a series for ITV, which they were waiting to begin when Cleese's
offer arrived. Palin agreed to work with Cleese and Chapman in the meantime,
bringing with him Gilliam, Jones and Idle. This union led to the creation of Monty
Python. Many have suggested that this important landmark in comedy was brought
about by Cleese's desire to work with Palin, who Cleese has maintained is his
favourite Python to work with. Monty Python's Flying Circus ran for four series
from October 1969 to December 1974 on BBC. Cleese is particularly remembered for
the "Cheese Shop", "The Ministry of Silly Walks", and "Dead Parrot" sketches.
Though the programme lasted four series, by the start of series 3, Cleese, who was
probably the best known and most experienced member of the group, was growing tired
of coping with Chapman's alcoholism. According to Terry Gilliam, Cleese was the
"most Cambridge" of the Cambridge-educated members of the group (Cleese, Chapman,
and Idle), by which Gilliam meant that Cleese was the tallest and most aggressive
of the whole group. He felt, too, that the show's scripts had declined in quality.
For these reasons, he became restless and decided to move on. Though he stayed for
the third series, he did not appear in the fourth, and received only a minor
writing credit. Cleese returned to the troupe to co-write and co-star in the Monty
Python films Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Monty Python's Life of Brian and
Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.
In 1971, Connie Booth gave birth to Cynthia Cleese, their only child.
From 1970 to 1973 Cleese served as rector of the University of St Andrews. While
his election by the students might have seemed a prank, it proved a milestone for
the University, revolutionising and modernising the post. For instance, the Rector
was traditionally entitled to appoint an "Assessor", in short a deputy to sit in
his place at important meetings in his absence. Cleese changed this into a position
for a student, elected across campus by the student body, resulting in direct
access and representation for the student body for the first time in over 500
years. This was but one of a whole host of improvements that Cleese swept in as a
true wind of change.
Having left Python, Cleese went on to achieve possibly greater success in the
United Kingdom as the neurotic hotel manager Basil Fawlty in Fawlty Towers, which
he co-wrote with Connie Booth. The series won widespread critical acclaim and is
still considered one of the finest examples of British comedy, having won three
BAFTA awards when produced and recently topping the British Film Institute list of
the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes. The series also featured Andrew
Sachs as the much abused Spanish waiter Manuel ("...he's from Barcelona"), Prunella
Scales as Basil's fire-breathing dragon of a wife Sybil, and Booth as waitress
Polly. Cleese based Basil Fawlty on a real person, Donald Sinclair, whom he
encountered in 1971, when he and the rest of the Monty Python team were staying at
the Gleneagles Hotel in Torquay while filming Monty Python's Flying Circus. Cleese
was reportedly inspired by Sinclair's mantra of "I could run this hotel just fine,
if it weren't for the guests." He later described Sinclair as "the most wonderfully
rude man I have ever met", although Mr Sinclair's widow has since said her husband
was totally misrepresented in the comedy.
During the Pythons' stay, Sinclair threw Eric Idle's briefcase out of the hotel "in
case it contained a bomb", complained about Terry Gilliam's "American" table
manners, and threw a bus timetable at another guest after they dared to ask the
time of the next bus to town. The series portrayed stereotypical British attitudes
towards sex, death, complaining, violence towards employees and unhappy marriages,
often simultaneously embodied in Cleese's madcap physical performances.
The first series began on 19 September 1975, and whilst not an instant hit, soon
gained momentum. However, the second series did not appear until 1979, by which
time Cleese's marriage to Booth had broken down. Despite this the two reprised
their writing and performing roles in the second series. Fawlty Towers consisted of
only twelve episodes. Cleese and Booth both maintain that this was to avoid
compromising the quality of the series.
In 1978, Cleese appeared as guest star on The Muppet Show. Instead of singing
along, he showed up a pretend album, his own new vocal record "John Cleese: A Man
& His Music", and finally strangled Kermit the Frog. Cleese won the TV Times
award for Funniest Man On TV - 1978 / 1979. He was the first person ever to say
'shit' on British Television.
The city of Palmerston North in New Zealand christened a trash heap at the city's
local dump Mt. Cleese in response to Cleese's coments about the city being a
"suicide capital of New Zealand". Palmerston North has a normal suicide rate.
Later
career
During the 1980s and 1990s, Cleese focused on film, though he did work with Peter
Cook in his one-off TV special Peter Cook and Co. in 1980. In the same year a
theatrical piece for TV was released, with Cleese playing Petruchio, in
Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. He also rejoined the Pythons for Monty
Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl (1982), and starred in The Secret Policeman's
Ball for Amnesty International. He married Barbara Trentham on 15 February 1981.
Their daughter Camilla Cleese was born in 1984.
In 1988 he wrote and starred in A Fish Called Wanda, as the lead, Archie Leach,
along with Jamie Lee Curtis, Kevin Kline and fellow Python Michael Palin. Wanda
became the most successful British film ever, and Cleese was nominated for an
Academy Award for his script. Cynthia Cleese starred as Leach's daughter.
However, his marriage was in trouble and in 1990 he and Trentham divorced. On 28
December 1992 he married Alyce Faye Eichelberger, his third blonde American actress
wife.
Cleese's Monty Python writing partner and friend, Graham Chapman, was diagnosed
with throat cancer in 1989, and during his final hours, Cleese, along with Michael
Palin, Peter Cook and David Sherlock, witnessed Chapman's passing. Chapman's death
occurred one day before the 20th anniversary of the first broadcast of Flying
Circus with Jones commenting, “the worst case of party-pooping in all history.”
Cleese gave a stirring eulogy at Graham Chapman's memorial service, in which he
"became the first person ever at a British memorial service to say 'fuck'".
Cleese also produced and acted in a number of successful business training films,
including Meetings, Bloody Meetings and More Bloody Meetings about how to set up
and run successful meetings. These were produced by his company Video Arts.
With Robin Skynner, the Group Analyst (Group Analysis) and family therapist, Cleese
wrote two books on relationships: Families and how to survive them, and Life and
how to survive it. The books are presented as a dialogue between Skynner and
Cleese.
In 1996, Cleese declined the British honour of Commander of the Order of the
British Empire (CBE).
In 1999, Cleese appeared in the James Bond movie, The World Is Not Enough as Q's
assistant, referred to by Bond as R. In 2002, when Cleese reprised his role in Die
Another Day, the character was promoted, making Cleese the new quartermaster (Q) of
MI6. Cleese did not reprise his role in the latest James Bond film, Casino Royale,
where Daniel Craig replaces Pierce Brosnan in the leading role.
He is currently an Andrew D. White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University, his
term having been extended until 2006. Although he makes occasional, well-received
appearances on the Cornell campus, he lives in the town of Montecito, California.
He has also been appointed a Provost's Visiting Professor through 2009.
In a 2005 poll of comedians and comedy insiders The Comedian's Comedian, Cleese's
peers showed their appreciation of his talent when he was voted second only to
Peter Cook. Also in 2005, a long-standing piece of internet humour, "The Revocation
of Independence", was wrongly attributed to Cleese.
John Cleese recently lent his voice to the BioWare video game Jade Empire. His role
was that of an "outlander" named Sir Roderick Ponce von Fontlebottom the
Magnificent Bastard, stranded in the Imperial City of the Jade Empire. His
character is essentially a British colonialist stereotype who refers to the people
of the Jade Empire (effectively like the ancient Chinese) as a lot of savages in
need of enlightenment. While perhaps a small role in John Cleese's respect, such
lines as "half of you can't even grow a decent moustache" and "your idea of honour
is outdated, too. (shoots player). PERCIVAL! My towel" were a welcome touch of
humour.
He also had a cameo appearance in the computer game Starship Titanic as "The Bomb"
(credited as "Kim Bread"), designed by Douglas Adams. When the bomb is activated it
tells you that "The ship is now armed and preparing to explode. This will be a
fairly large explosion, so you'd best keep back about 22 miles", and, in attempting
to disarm it, "Well, you can try that, but it won't work because nobody likes a
smartarse!"
In 2003, John also appeared as Lyle Finster in long-running US sitcom Will &
Grace. His character eventually ended up having a short-lived marriage to Karen
(Megan Mullally) and was Lorraine's (Karen's arch-nemesis, following her affair
with Karen's then husband) father.
In 2004, Cleese was credited as co-writer of a DC Comics graphic novel entitled
Superman: True Brit. Part of DC's "Elseworlds" line of imaginary stories, True
Brit, mostly written by Kim Howard Johnson, suggests what might have happened had
Superman's rocket ship landed in Britain, not America.
From 10 November to 9 December 2005, Cleese toured New Zealand with his stage show
'John Cleese — His Life, Times and Current Medical Problems'. Cleese described it
as "a one man show with several people in it, which pushes the envelope of
acceptable behaviour in new and disgusting ways." The show was developed in New
York with William Goldman and includes Cleese's daughter Camilla Cleese as a writer
and actor (the shows were directed by Australian Bille Brown.) John's assistant of
many years, Garry Scott-Irvine, also appeared, and was listed as a co-producer. It
then played in universities in California and Arizona from 10 January to 25 March
2006 under the title "Seven Ways to Skin an Ocelot" . His voice can be downloaded
for directional guidance purposes as a downloadable option on some personal
GPS-navigation device models by company TomTom.
In June 2006, whilst promoting a football (soccer) song in which he was featured,
entitled Don't Mention the World Cup, Cleese appears to have claimed that he
decided to retire from performing in sitcoms, instead opting to writing a book on
the history of comedy and tutoring young comedians. This was an erroneous story,
the result of an interview with The Times of London (the piece was not fact checked
before printing).
In 2007, Cleese is appearing in ads for Titleist as a fictional (and miffed) golf
course designer named "Ian MacCallister", who represents the equally fictional
organization, "Golf Designers Against Distance".
Just For Laughs
2006
John Cleese's most recent live comedic performance was at the
2006 Just For Laughs festival in Montreal, Canada. John Cleese was host for
one of the galas and performed sketches very reminiscent to his Monty Python
days. His first sketch was him performing his own eulogy as he promised to
kill himself as the grand finale, remarking "Top that Jason Alexander...you
bastard." The second sketch was him as the judge of 'Cleese Idol', where
contestants from Montreal would be performing his skits, so he could find his
successor. He shot the last contestant as well as the special guest host, Ben
Mulroney (the host of Canadian Idol). The gala ended with his 'execution',
where he asked people to choose the method of execution by text messaging a
number (which was fake). The choices were stoning, electric chair, firing
squad, hanging and guillotine. The guillotine won, and John Cleese was
beheaded just as he was about to say something to the crowd.
Honours and
tributes
A species of lemur, Avahi cleesei, has been named in his honour. John Cleese
mentioned this in television interviews. Also there is mention of this honour in
"The New Scientist" — and John Cleese's response to the honour.
An asteroid, 9618 Johncleese, is named in his honour.
In the BBC documentary series, "The Human Face", it is claimed that Cleese is a
Professor-At-Large at Cornell University, and that he is a best-selling author on
psychology.
Source : Some of the information on this page came
from a Wikipedia article and is licensed under the GNU Documentation
License. ©2008 www.geneticmatrix.com.
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John
Cleese- Generator - Biography
