Sometime in the 1980s, I discovered Fawlty Towers. A family member had taped all of the shows from the BBC on the VCR, and I watched them for the first time. I thought I was going to die laughing.
Basil Fawlty (John Cleese) has to be one of the most imaginative characters ever created. He is a complete loon. And his wife Sybil (Prunella Scales) is a hilarious counterpart. (In one classic moment, John Cleese refers to his wife as “my little nest of vipers.”) The interaction with the Spanish waiter, Manuel, who doesn’t speak English, and Basil Fawlty is incomparable.
So, expecting to share with my wife this amusing show, which she had never seen, I ordered the complete 12-volume set on DVD and sat down to watch with her. And something funny happened. Not funny as in laughing, but funny as in strange. It wasn’t amusing anymore.
I still got a few chuckles, but I didn’t roll over laughing as I had when I was younger. In fact, I couldn’t even get through all 12 episodes. What happened? Was it me or was it the show?
I have a theory which is a cause for some optimism about society. A lot of the humor in Fawlty Towers involves physical humor — people hitting people and people threatening to hit people. And a lot of the humor involves a dysfunctional family life with a husband and wife who genuinely seem to despise each other. Given all of society’s ills — and the changing standards of what is acceptable behavior — I just didn’t find it funny, whereas 20 years ago it was.
Think about it. Until recently, threatening to hit somebody — or actually hitting them — made up a lot of the comedy action. Think of the “Honeymooners” or “I Love Lucy” or “The Three Stooges.” I was watching “Gone With the Wind” the other day and Rhett threatens to whip Scarlett when he is mad at her, and I thought, “yeah, that’s what a man would have done to a woman in those days,” but these days threatening to whip your wife can land you in jail. Think about “The Philadelphia Story” with its signature scene of Cary Grant pushing Katherine Hepburn violently through the door as he leaves. These days, Cary Grant would be a wife-beater thrown the slammer. In those days, his act was hilarious and celebrated.
All in all, this is a very good thing. Family violence is no longer funny or the source of our humor. It’s a serious thing. It means the Satanic work of creating contention is taking over a home. Modern-day prophets have long preached against violence at home. And finally it’s starting to take root — family violence is simply unacceptable and definitely not politically correct.
So if it means that Fawlty Towers is less funny, that’s OK. It may mean that more husbands and wives find ways to restrain themselves and control their meanest impulses. And that’s another reason for optimism.