266 Fawlty Towers

First  watched  : September  1976

Fawlty  Towers  came  to  BBC1  in  September  1976  after  a  successful  run  on  BBC2  the  year  before. It  is  of  course  a  TV  legend , one  of  the  greatest  sitcoms  ever  and  the  most  successful  venture  in  which  any  of  the  ex-Pythons  have  been  involved  and  I  don't  think  I've  anything  new  to  say  about  it.

I  didn't  really  get  into  it  until  the  repeats  in  1980, a  year  after  the  second  series  was  broadcast. My  particular  favourite  is  the  episode  where  they  have  to  get  a  dead  body  out  of  the  hotel  with  Basil  the  rat  a  close  second. Coincidentally  both  feature  Geoffrey  Palmer  as  the  doctor.

The  show  famously  lasted  for  only  12  episodes  and  is  often  quoted  as  the  textbook  example  of  going  out  when  you're  on  top.  It  withstands  repeated  viewing; even  when  you  can  quote  large  parts  of  the  dialogue  there's  still  something  there  that  you  haven't  quite  picked  up  on  before, so  rich  and  condensed  are  the  scripts.