"I don't want to talk about it": John Cleese shuts down Waleed Aly
John Cleese has butted heads with Waleed Aly in an awkward interview on The Project, with the Monty Python star refusing to answer a question and mocking Waleed's name.
The 83-year-old comedic legend appeared on the show to promote his new Australian tour, An Evening with the Late John Cleese, when Waleed asked him what had brought him Down Under for the show.
Cleese simply quipped, "Money."
The interview turned sour when Waleed began to ask Cleese about his iconic 1970s sitcom Fawlty Towers, before he was shut down.
.@JohnCleese is 83 years old, but he doesn't fear death; in fact, he says he's already dead. pic.twitter.com/2uHTp1w1oX
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“We can’t let you go without talking about Fawlty Towers – at least I can’t, because I think it’s one of the greatest shows …” Aly began, before Cleese interjected.
“I don’t want to talk about Fawlty Towers,” he said.
“Yeah but, you know what – it’s not all about you, is it? I mean, I can ask you about Fawlty Towers?” Aly asked.
“You can talk about Fawlty Towers,” Cleese told him, before turning his back and facing away from his hosts to take a sip of water, which earned him a round of applause from the panel.
After making his point, Cleese turned back to the hosts, and asked: “What kind of a name is Waleed, anyway? Is it an anagram?”
“No. It’s just Arabic. I take it your Arabic’s not great?” Waleed replied.
“No. I tried to learn it once. There’s about four h’s and two k’s or something.”
“Do you know what John is in Arabic? Yahya. I bet you can’t say that either,” said Aly.
Cleese remarked that it was a “more interesting” topic to discuss than Fawlty Towers, but Aly persisted, asking whether he could see the show’s imprint in any recent comedy series.
Despite his reluctance to talk about the show, Cleese conceded that it was, in fact, “a very interesting question.”
As the interview wrapped, Cleese joked that as his original family surname is actually Cheese, he could be known as “Yahya Cheese.”
Image credits: The Project