Cleese Shows His True Brit in ‘Fawlty Towers’ Episode

Forgive Basil Fawlty (John Cleese) if he’s a little cranky. The world seems to be conspiring against the contemptuous hotelier and his peace of mind. He could be annoyed by his lazy wife or the bumbling waiter or a guest--just for being a guest.

This time Basil is put upon while preparing for a visit from “The Germans” (Sunday at 9 a.m. on Comedy Central). It’s perhaps the funniest installment of the 12-episode British series “Fawlty Towers,” which Cleese created in the ‘70s after his “Monty Python’s Flying Circus” days.

There’s a lot of damage for Basil to do and undo before the German tourists arrive. He insults guests, bungles a fire drill, insults more guests and accidentally traps the waiter in the kitchen--where there’s a real fire. A knock on the head leaves him woozy when it’s time to take care of those pesky Germans.

“Don’t mention the war,” he warns the staff, then in an outrageous sequence makes a score of references to it. (An order of a prawn cocktail, pickled herring and four cold meat salads becomes “a prawn Goebbels, Hermann Goering and four Colditz salads.”)

“Will you stop talking about the war?” asks one German when another has begun to sob.

“Me? You started it,” Basil says.

“We did not start it.”

“Yes you did, you invaded Poland. . . .” and goose-steps into the lobby.

Basil is one of those wonderfully petty, stubborn characters like George Jefferson or Ralph Kramden, except that you wouldn’t want him as a pal in real life. TV-watching distance is about as close as you want to get, or you could wind up with a smack upside the head or a poke in the eye.

Cleese wrote “Fawlty Towers” with then-wife Connie Booth, who plays Polly, the competent chambermaid who nevertheless is a target for Basil’s sarcasm. They did six of the episodes in 1975 and the rest in 1979. “The Germans” was the last of the ’75 batch. Comedy Central will air “Communication Problems,” the first of the ’79 group, after “The Germans.”

In a 1995 newspaper interview, Cleese trashed his own ‘70s work, saying he didn’t know what people were laughing at. “It was all embarrassingly awful,” he said. Sounds a little like Basil, doesn’t he?

Set Your VCR

Sharon Tate plays a secretary on “The Beverly Hillbillies” (Friday at 3:30 a.m. on KTTV Channel 11). She appeared occasionally as Janet Trego from 1963 to ’65.

The three female “Convicts-at-Large” who hold Barney and Floyd at a cabin are sort of like the Fun Girls with tattoos, on “The Andy Griffith Show” (today at 10 a.m. on KTTV Channel 11).

Actor-director Peter Horton appears on a “Dallas” episode (today at 8 a.m., 4 p.m. and 8 p.m. on TNN) from 19 years ago.

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Flashbacks tell how Ben met his second wife, Hoss’ mother, on “Bonanza” (Tuesday at 2 p.m. on KDOC Channel 56). In “Inger, My Love,” the on-again, off-again widower falls in love with a woman (Inga Swenson, later of “Soap” and “Benson”) who has a fiance and a bullying brother.

DETAILS, DETAILS: Who played Little Joe’s mother in flashbacks on “Bonanza”?

The answer to last week’s quiz (Which actress went by the name Cherie Moore when she provided the voice for one of the singers in “Josie and the Pussycats”?): Cheryl Ladd.