John Marwood Cleese is an English actor, comedian, screenwriter, and producer.
84 Facts About John Cleese
2.
John Cleese co-starred with Kevin Kline, Jamie Lee Curtis, and former Python colleague Michael Palin in A Fish Called Wanda and Fierce Creatures, both of which he wrote.
3.
John Cleese has starred in Time Bandits and Rat Race and has appeared in many other films, including Silverado, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, two James Bond films, two Harry Potter films and the last three Shrek films.
4.
John Cleese has specialised in political and religious satire, black comedy, sketch comedy, and surreal humour.
5.
John Cleese was ranked the second best comedian ever in a 2005 Channel 4 poll of fellow comedians.
6.
In 1976, John Cleese co-founded The Secret Policeman's Ball benefit shows to raise funds for the human rights organization Amnesty International.
7.
John Cleese was born in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, England, the only child of Reginald Francis John Cleese, an insurance salesman, and his wife Muriel Evelyn, the daughter of an auctioneer.
8.
John Cleese was educated at St Peter's Preparatory School, where he received a prize for English and did well at cricket and boxing.
9.
John Cleese was already more than 6 feet tall by then.
10.
John Cleese allegedly defaced the school grounds, as a prank, by painting footprints to suggest that the statue of Field Marshal Earl Haig had got down from his plinth and gone to the toilet.
11.
John Cleese played cricket in the First XI and did well academically, passing eight O-Levels and three A-Levels in mathematics, physics and chemistry.
12.
John Cleese then took up a place he had won at Downing College, Cambridge, to read law.
13.
John Cleese recalled that he went to the Cambridge Guildhall, where each university society had a stall, and went up to the Footlights stall, where he was asked if he could sing or dance.
14.
John Cleese replied "no" as he was not allowed to sing at his school because he was so bad, and if there was anything worse than his singing, it was his dancing.
15.
At the Footlights theatrical club, John Cleese spent a lot of time with Tim Brooke-Taylor and Bill Oddie and met his future writing partner Graham Chapman.
16.
John Cleese wrote extra material for the 1961 Footlights Revue I Thought I Saw It Move, and was registrar for the Footlights Club during 1962.
17.
John Cleese was a scriptwriter, as well as a cast member, for the 1963 Footlights Revue A Clump of Plinths.
18.
However, owing to Chapman's alcoholism, John Cleese found himself bearing an increasing workload in the partnership and was, therefore, unenthusiastic about doing a series with just the two of them.
19.
John Cleese had found working with Palin on The Frost Report an enjoyable experience and invited him to join the series.
20.
Monty Python's Flying Circus ran for four series from October 1969 to December 1974 on BBC Television, though John Cleese quit the show after the third.
21.
John Cleese portrayed the former as a series of announcers, TV show hosts, and government officials.
22.
John Cleese was known for his working class "Sergeant Major" character, who worked as a Police Sergeant, Roman Centurion, etc.
23.
John Cleese appeared during some abrupt scene changes as a radio commentator where, in a rather pompous manner, he would make the formal and determined announcement "And now for something completely different", which later became the title of the first Monty Python film.
24.
John Cleese felt, too, that the show's scripts had declined in quality.
25.
John Cleese received a credit on three episodes of the fourth series which used material from these sessions, though he was officially unconnected with the fourth series.
26.
John Cleese remained friendly with the group, and all six began writing Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
27.
John Cleese returned to the troupe to co-write and co-star in two further Monty Python films, Monty Python's Life of Brian and Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.
28.
Since the last Python film John Cleese has participated in various live performances with the group over the years.
29.
From 1970 to 1973, John Cleese served as rector of the University of St Andrews.
30.
John Cleese's election proved a milestone for the university, revolutionising and modernising the post.
31.
John 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.
32.
John Cleese appeared on a single, "Superspike", with Bill Oddie and a group of UK athletes, billed the "Superspike Squad", to fund the latter's attendance at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal.
33.
John Cleese starred in the low-budget spoof of the Sherlock Holmes detective series The Strange Case of the End of Civilization as We Know It as the grandson of the world's greatest consulting detective.
34.
In December 1977, John Cleese appeared as a guest star on The Muppet Show.
35.
John Cleese achieved greater prominence in the United Kingdom as the neurotic hotel manager Basil Fawlty in Fawlty Towers, which he co-wrote with his wife Connie Booth.
36.
John Cleese based Basil Fawlty on a real person, Donald Sinclair, whom he had encountered in 1970 while the Monty Python team were staying at the Gleneagles Hotel in Torquay while filming inserts for their television series.
37.
John Cleese participated in Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl and starred in The Secret Policeman's Ball for Amnesty International.
38.
In 1985, John Cleese had a small dramatic role as a sheriff in the American Western Silverado, which had an all-star cast that included Kevin Kline, with whom he starred in A Fish Called Wanda three years later.
39.
In 1988, John Cleese wrote and starred in A Fish Called Wanda as the lead, Archie Leach, along with Jamie Lee Curtis, Kevin Kline, and Michael Palin.
40.
Wanda was a commercial and critical success, becoming one of the top ten films of the year at the US box office, and John Cleese was nominated for an Academy Award for his script.
41.
From 1988 to 1992, John Cleese appeared in numerous television commercials for Schweppes Ginger Ale.
42.
John Cleese later played a supporting role in Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein alongside Branagh himself and Robert De Niro.
43.
John Cleese has since often stated that making the second film had been a mistake.
44.
In 1999, John Cleese appeared in the James Bond film The World Is Not Enough as Q's assistant, referred to by Bond as "R".
45.
In 2002, when John Cleese reprised his role in Die Another Day, the character was promoted, making John Cleese the new quartermaster of MI6.
46.
In 2004, John Cleese was featured as Q in the video game James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing, featuring his likeness and voice.
47.
John Cleese makes occasional well-received appearances on the Cornell campus.
48.
In 2001, Cleese was cast in the comedy Rat Race as the eccentric hotel owner Donald P Sinclair, the name of the Torquay hotel owner on whom he had based the character of Basil Fawlty.
49.
In 2002, John Cleese made a cameo appearance in the film The Adventures of Pluto Nash, in which he played "James", a computerised chauffeur of a hover car stolen by the title character.
50.
In 2004, John Cleese was credited as co-writer of a DC Comics graphic novel titled Superman: True Brit.
51.
John 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".
52.
In 2006, John Cleese hosted a television special of football's greatest kicks, goals, saves, bloopers, plays, and penalties, as well as football's influence on culture, featuring interviews with pop culture icons Dave Stewart, Dennis Hopper, and Henry Kissinger, as well as eminent footballers, including Pele, Mia Hamm, and Thierry Henry.
53.
Also in 2006, John Cleese released the song "Don't Mention the World Cup".
54.
John Cleese lent his voice to the BioWare video game Jade Empire.
55.
John Cleese's role was that of an "outlander" named Sir Roderick Ponce von Fontlebottom the Magnificent Bastard, stranded in the Imperial City of the Jade Empire.
56.
John Cleese's character is essentially a British colonialist stereotype who refers to the people of the Jade Empire as "savages in need of enlightenment".
57.
John Cleese's armour has the design of a fork stuck in a piece of cheese.
58.
In 2007, John Cleese appeared in ads for Titleist as a golf course designer named "Ian MacCallister", who represents "Golf Designers Against Distance".
59.
John Cleese collaborated with Los Angeles Guitar Quartet member William Kanengiser in 2008 on the text to the performance piece "The Ingenious Gentleman of La Mancha".
60.
The year 2008 saw reports of John Cleese working on a musical version of A Fish Called Wanda with his daughter Camilla.
61.
John Cleese has hosted comedy galas at the Montreal Just for Laughs comedy festival in 2006, and again in 2009.
62.
In March 2010 it was announced that John Cleese would be playing Jasper in the video game Fable III.
63.
In 2009 and 2010, John Cleese toured Scandinavia and the US with his Alimony Tour Year One and Year Two.
64.
Later in 2011 John Cleese took his Alimony Tour to South Africa.
65.
In October 2010, John Cleese was featured in the launch of an advertising campaign by The Automobile Association for a new home emergency response product.
66.
In 2012, John Cleese was cast in Hunting Elephants, a heist comedy by Israeli filmmaker Reshef Levi.
67.
John Cleese had to quit just prior to filming due to heart trouble and was replaced by Patrick Stewart.
68.
Between September and October 2013, John Cleese embarked on his first-ever cross-Canada comedy tour.
69.
John Cleese returned to the stage in Dubai in November 2013, where he performed to a sold-out theatre.
70.
John Cleese was interviewed and appears as himself in filmmaker Gracie Otto's 2013 documentary film The Last Impresario, about John Cleese's longtime friend and colleague Michael White.
71.
In 2021, John Cleese cancelled an appearance at Cambridge University after learning that art historian Andrew Graham-Dixon had been blacklisted by the student union for impersonating Adolf Hitler.
72.
John Cleese's visit to the university was intended to be part of a documentary on wokeism.
73.
John Cleese said he was "blacklisting myself before someone else does".
74.
The instigation came from John Cleese who wanted to help out.
75.
John Cleese subsequently appeared in broadcasts for the Liberal Democrats in the 1997 general election and narrated a radio election broadcast for the party during the 2001 general election.
76.
In 2008, John Cleese expressed support for Barack Obama and his presidential candidacy, offering his services as a speech writer.
77.
John Cleese was an outspoken critic of Republican Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin, saying that "Michael Palin is no longer the funniest Palin".
78.
John Cleese expressed support for immigration, but concern about the integration of immigrants into British culture.
79.
In 2016, John Cleese publicly supported Brexit in the 2016 referendum on leaving the European Union.
80.
John Cleese had previously described the leadership of the Republican Party as "the most cynical, most disgracefully immoral people I've ever come across in a Western civilisation".
81.
In November 2021, John Cleese protested against perceived cancel culture by blacklisting himself over a Hitler impersonation controversy at the Cambridge Union.
82.
John Cleese met Connie Booth in the US and they married in 1968.
83.
In 1971, Booth gave birth to their only child, Cynthia John Cleese, who went on to appear with her father in his films A Fish Called Wanda and Fierce Creatures.
84.
John Cleese stated that he did not think much of organised religion and said he was not committed to "anything except the vague feeling that there is something more going on than the materialist reductionist people think".