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The Best…Fawlty Towers moments

John Cleese as Basil, Connie Booth as Polly and Andrew Sachs as Manuel in Fawlty Towers
  • Posted at 4:50pm
  • 23 October 2009
  • by PaulJones-RT
  • 3 comments

To celebrate the 30th anniversary of Fawlty Towers, BBC Worldwide is featuring a host of hilarious clips from the show - and making both series available to download from iTunes. Here at RadioTimes.com, we've picked out our four favourite Fawlty Towers moments:

4. "Basil. There's a kipper sticking out of your jumper."
Delivering a guest's breakfast to his room, Basil fails to notice that the man is dead. Things go downhill from there…



3. "Don't mention the war!"
A concussed Basil is just that little bit more offensive than usual when faced with some German guests.



2. "You're a naughty boy, Fawlty! Don't do it again!"
Cheapskate Basil hired the dodgy builders - so whose fault is it that his dining-room door has disappeared?



1. "I'm gonna give you a damn good thrashing!"
Basil teaches his disobedient Mini a lesson. Note the brilliant comic pause as John Cleese disappears off screen to fetch something…



Of course, with such a hoard of comedy gold, it was a tough task whittling it down to just four scenes. So tell us which ones we've missed. Post a comment below and let us know your favourite Fawlty Towers moments.

**

To watch more clips on YouTube, and see interviews with John Cleese, visit the Comedy Greats site.

And to download entire episodes, go to the iTunes store.

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Comments

  • Posted on 30 October 2009
  • at 3:48pm
  • by Linda

"When I pay for a view I expect something more interesting than that."

"That is Torquay Madam."

"Well it's not good enough."

"Well may I ask what you were expecting to see out of a Torquay hotel bedroom window? Sydney Opera House perhaps, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon? Herds of Wildebeest sweeping majestically..."

"Don't be silly."

  • Posted on 30 October 2009
  • at 1:00pm
  • by David

My favourite moment is in "The Kipper and the corpse", where the soon to be departed Mr. Leeman is at the reception desk. Sybil proceeds to ask numerous questions to the thoughful if somewhat bemused Leeman about his breakfast for the morning. Basil, getting increasingly put out by his wife's attention to detail questions Leeman sarcastically....."Rosewood, Mahogany, Teak?" "Excuse me?" "What would you like your breakfast tray made out of?" Priceless genius!!

  • Posted on 27 October 2009
  • at 3:05pm
  • by Dan

I've never understood the love for the "thrashing the car" moment. It just feels plain stupid and unlikely to me. I much prefer the small moment usually overlooked in FT, too -- just the simple reaction of Basil trying to hang a painting for Sybil and being constantly interrupted from doing so by her. It's moments like that you can well imagine happening to yourself. I don't ANYONE has ever whipped their car with a tree branch.

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