Fawlty Towers Page 5
Basil is by now imitating a gorilla to prove that he is just as capable of having fun as the dreaded Johnson. On hearing Sybil’s addressing the lady as “doctor” he leaps up on the reception counter. Being incapable of understanding that a woman can be academically educated, logic simply deserts him. The veneer of civilisation also begins to wear thin indeed, as he falls prey to his wildest fears. One of these is that some other person might prove able to discern the nature of his psychological dilemma, and, worse, to suggest some kind of treatment for it.
Like most men who have a marked tendency to rationalisation, Basil is utterly unaware of the real force of his instinctual urges. He represses them as best he can, burning so many bridges behind him that the only thing left for him to do is to continue moving forward, head-on towards inevitable catastrophe.
Once Basil has assimilated the fact that the gentleman newly arrived with his doctor-wife is a psychiatrist, he is almost paralysed with fear. Knowing next to nothing about either discipline, he confounds medical psychiatry with Freudian psychoanalysis. The folly of his rapidly mounting paranoia expresses itself in the conviction that a psychiatrist never rests from his perfidious activities, but instinctively looks for new subjects of study — or victims — wherever he can find them. When Sybil sees how truly afraid Basil is of being found out, she almost feels sorry for him. Basil, in his terror, can’t or won’t take this on board. And his worst fears are realised.
In a rare moment of tenderness, Sybil now tries to calm Basil down, realising that he is about to run amok. In her view their shared problem can be defined in simple and straightforward terms, and she wouldn’t mind talking about it. “Now, if I had the money to go to a psychiatrist, he’s just the sort I’d choose. I can’t think of anything nicer than having a good old heart-to-heart. I’m sure they understand women” (pronounced ‘wimin’), the unspoken corollary being that her husband doesn’t, and never will.
The secret agenda underlying Sybil’s display of admiration for Johnson comprises not only the arousal of Basil’s jealousy, but also the arousal of Basil in general, in other words, to make him erotically interested in her again. Sybil does in her way love Basil, and even admires — if only intermittently — his ‘sledge-hammer’ wit. It has taken Basil years to educate her to the point where she is able to display a certain wit of her own. Mrs. Hamilton: “How long how you been married, Mrs. Fawlty?” Sybil: “Since 1485.” (Waldorf Salad.)
Sybil’s razor-sharp remarks (“She can kill a man at ten paces with one blow of her tongue,” Basil tells O'Reilly in The Builders), is actually a defence mechanism she has developed to combat Basil’s biting irony. Sybil used to be less judgemental towards people in general before she met Basil. He forced her into hardness and cynicism. But when Basil now shows signs of real vulnerability, not simply of confusion in general, she is stung by her conscience. All she wanted was to make Basil more aware of her needs as a woman. But alas, her attempt to put everything right between them comes too late: Basil is already on the brink of yet another mental breakdown.
From the moment he thinks he hears the Abbotts asking him how often he and his wife perform the act of love, he gets sex on the brain. When his misgivings about Dr. Abbott have finally been allayed and the misunderstanding resolved, he is free to re-focus all his fear and hatred onto the odious Mr. Johnson — not, however, before greeting at reception a very attractive young Australian, Raylene Miles.
Sybil had her feelings under perfect control while she was flirting with Johnson, but Basil is both delighted and obviously invaded by a sense of shame as he finds his eyes reluctant to stray from Raylene’s attractively filled cleavage. In the preceding kitchen scene, Cleese had developed a finger-and-hand language marvellously appropriate to Basil’s neurosis. The verbal slips between private “parts” and “details” are accompanied by very nervous finger-movements on the part of Basil’s left hand, which he keeps in the depths of his trouser pocket, giving the impression that he is playing with his genitalia down there.
Men often add to the more overt behaviour they adopt before attractive members of the opposite sex a secret sense of shame. This primarily expresses itself in unusual hand and arm movements — who has not in the presence of a sexy woman felt suddenly that he didn’t know what to do with his hands?
Basil’s hands begin to behave in a strange and defensive way when he has to explain to the ravishing Miss Miles where to put her signature. Considering the many ‘involuntary’ caresses he subsequently bestows on her, safety measures were necessary, albeit insufficient. Even if Basil had kept his hand out of the way of doing harm, he would still not have been able to keep his fingers away from the lady. That’s the nature of his problem. Sybil, entering the scene at the moment when Basil has begun to take a putatively numismatic interest in the ‘charm’ dangling athwart her shapely bosom, is now, and as punishment for her earlier transgressions, overcome by genuine jealousy.
This is the crux ot the episode. From this point onward we witness something unique: Basil trying to speak the truth. This is so unusual, so out of character, that Sybil finds it impossible to believe him. Knowing Basil to be a pathological liar who would make up a story even if he didn’t have to, she simply refuses to give him the benefit of whatever doubt there might be. Her unbridled jealousy precipitates him into the abyss.
It must of course be understood that Sybil’s jealousy alone would not be sufficient to give rise to so powerful a cataclysm. Basil is trapped by his utter inability to acknowledge the powerful physical attraction Miss Miles exerts on him. But since he is also unable to admit the existence of a correspondingly strong defence mechanism against arousal — the fear of punishment Sybil inspires in him — he feels compelled to transfer the problem to somebody else. The deus ex machina is Johnson, who happens to arrive at precisely the moment when Basil most desperately needs to shift the burden of his guilt.
The script does not quite convey the real action in this short but crucial scene. Both Basil and Sybil crouch down at this point to look for the order forms, so neither sees Johnson signal that the coast is clear for another pretty girl to pass upstairs unseen. The filmed version, however, clearly shows that Basil actually does see the girl. But it is not until he later hears Johnson utter his by-now infamous phrase, “Pretentious — moi?” that he makes the connection between the two events.
This crucial association in Basil’s mind is preceded by the incredible scene in which, from inside the bathroom, he reaches his hand round for the light switch and makes contact instead with one of Miss Miles’ breasts. At this very moment Sybil enters the room with a bag that Miss Miles has left behind at reception. Basil’s predicament is getting minute-by-minute more and more desperate. Suddenly everything has begun to conspire against him in deadly earnest.
On his way back downstairs, still with the hope of making Sybil believe him, he hears a voice from Johnson’s room, and realises that he has someone in there with him. Aha! The girl he just saw run up the stairs! Basil must seize this opportunity to put everything right again. In reviving his crusade against extra-marital sex, he now has an excellent pretext for not dealing with his own crisis. Winning back Sybil’s confidence, maybe even her affection, will be a piece of cake once she has been made to understand that all he wants is to act in the best interest of Queen, country and English manners.
The moment has come for a favourite stand-by to come into play. This had been introduced in the third episode of the first series, The Wedding Party. (“Not married, is that it? Well, I can’t give you a double room then. The Laws of England. Nothing to do with me.”) In The Psychiatrist we witness a wonderful variation on this theme of bigotry and sexual repression.
To get back into Sybil’s good books, and at the same time to get even with her, Basil needs proof that her favourite, Johnson, has acted immorally. Once this proof is forthcoming Sybil won’t have any hold over him, and they’ll be back to square one. ‘It’s either him or me,’ Basil tells himself. Johnson
has to go down.
Once the premise has been clearly stated the action proceeds with inexorable logic. The viewer is more or less obliged to take this point of departure for granted and to identify with Basil’s rather bizarre attempt to get himself in the clear. In actual fact, his only trump card is that he has an obsolete Victorian ordinance supposedly on his side. Even though Sybil personally couldn’t care less (as proven by her solution of the same problem evoked by Basil in The Wedding Party), she can’t put things straight this time, simply because her jealousy won’t allow her to find out what Basil is really up to.
Basil’s insistence on his inalienable right to solve the problem single-handed makes this a ‘winner-take-all’ game. And he has no idea of how high the stakes will rise once the cards have been dealt.
First, he doesn’t realise how cold blooded his antagonist is. Just like a chess player who believes that he has his opponent helpless, Basil is sure that he’s got his man stone dead.
Once he’s gained access to Johnson’s room with the bottle of champagne, he doesn’t have the courage to look into the bathroom, though he knows for sure that Johnson’s little friend has to be in there. Instead he irrationally tries to collect evidence, lipstick on a cigarette stub, for instance. This proves a fatal mistake. A golden rule in chess is: “If you can attack, then you must!’’ Add to this the confusion Manuel injects into the situation “I tell her (Mrs. Fawlty) you go to see girl in bedroom. You crazy about this girl, OK? So you go up to look at her, and Mrs. Fawlty, she go crazy”, and we have all the essential ingredients of an emotional Molotov cocktail.
If Basil had had the patience to watch the door until it opened in the morning, he might still have been able to force a draw with his opponent — Johnson would have enjoyed his night of unhallowed bliss, admittedly, but Basil would have made his moral point and cleared himself before Sybil. But, alas, he is all too easily diverted.
The last act adapts masterfully to a different context the classic trick with three cups, under one of which an object is hidden. There are three doors and one Basil, who from his hiding-place in the hall cupboard has to guess when the one, behind which his quarry lurks, will open. In ordinary circumstances this would have required his undivided attention. Here he begins by mistaking the Abbotts and then Miss Miles for his prey.
With fateful precision he places not merely a fingerprint but a entire black handprint on that young lady’s bosom. Realising that Sybil has made the inevitable connection between his black hand and its print on Miss Miles’ chest, his mental faculties suffer a momentary, but total, short circuit. In an act of complete irrationality he leaps to her other breast and covers it with black as well. “Sorry, I got confused.”
Under constant fire from Sybil, and still unable to contain his strong if unacknowledged attraction to Miss Miles, he becomes so confused that he leaves a breach in his plans fatally unguarded. He enters Miss Miles’ room to apologise, thereby allowing Johnson just enough time to open the cage and let out his little friend.
Nonetheless, convinced of the absolute success of his plan, Basil allows himself the luxury of using physical force as well as verbal aggression against his demon-wife (as he sees her) in proving his innocence. The lines he delivers to the dumbfounded Sybil express the tremendous aggression and resentment he feels against his oppressor.
The time has come to settle the score. It is only here and at the end of The Anniversary that we witness Basil using a certain amount of physical force to dominate Sybil. (Even Sybil usually considers herself better off than poor Audrey, subject to George’s violent mood swings.) Nowhere else in the series do we hear him speak his mind with such sincerity and eloquence as in the closing scene of The Psychiatrist. Basil is so convinced of his imminent victory that even his terror of Sybil is momentarily set aside. He feels absolutely fireproof, that he can get away with murder. And what murder! “I’m fed up with you, you rancorous coiffeured old sow. Why don’t you syringe the doughnuts out of your ears and get some sense into that dormant organ you keep hidden in that rat’s maze of yours?”
These are the words of a man sure of his aim and master of his destiny. “Mother Johnson, Mother Johnson,” he carols. “Come out, come out wherever you are.” A nice elderly lady appears smiling on the threshold.5
The defeat is total and irremediable. The fall from the heights of euphoria to utter despair does not stop short even of the womb. In an unsuccessful attempt to disappear, to crawl out of his own skin, he curls up in the classic foetal position. One moment he’s Caesar at The Rubicon, the next a defenceless caterpillar on the floor, the very picture of an acute, pathological mania.
Another episode in which Basil’s sexual phobia plays a major role is The Wedding Party. Flirty French Mrs. Peignoir takes a fancy to Basil, and makes no secret of it. The pivotal point of the drama is the intense embarrassment Basil experiences whenever he has to counter the lady’s veiled, but less-than-totally discreet remarks. Hysteria announces itself in the first scene during the cocktail hour in the lounge. Sybil, giving vent to her characteristic laugh (the sound of a seal barking while being gunned down) is entertaining some rather vulgar male acquaintance at the bar.
Mrs. Peignoir approaches her prey, and Basil is moved to adopt what he imagines to be Gallic politeness. (His enchanté is not at all appropriate, being the response one uses when being formally introduced.)
Basil: (at his very best) Ah, good evening, Mrs. Peignoir.
Mrs. Peignoir: Good evening. Thank you for your map, it was so useful. I had no idea how charming Torquay is. (Sybil watches her for a moment, with a distinct lack of enthusiasm.)
Basil: Enchante. May I ask — did you find anything of interest?
Mrs. Peignoir: Mmm. A few pieces I liked very much, and one, oh! (with flashing eyes) I had to have it!
In thus showing her passion, strong appetite and determination to acquire a coveted object, she instils in Basil a sense of foreboding, a feeling that he may well be next in line in her list of things desired. At once he’s overcome by shame — and fear of Sybil’s only too easily aroused jealousy.
In psychological terms the situation is very similar to the aforementioned scene in The Psychiatrist. To free himself from a sense of guilt (for the sin of adultery, even if only imagined) he’s compelled to seek out some irreproachable moral cause in order to keep his conscience clear in relation to Sybil. (It is instructive to note that Sybil herself never feels guilt about her little flirtations — for some reason women have much less sense of responsibility or shame in matters of this kind than men.)
As in The Psychiatrist, the moral cause required by Basil offers itself. The first to suffer its consequences are Alan and Jean, the young couple arriving on the eve of the wedding party. Finding that they aren’t married, Basil of course refuses to give them a room with a double bed. It takes Sybil to sort things out and do the natural thing.
Any male and married person not suffering from excessive sexual repression would by this point have cleared his conscience in relation to his partner. But Basil hasn’t even started yet. The intensification of his erotic fantasies, his emotional disorder and his general propensity for messing things up range from his inferring from Alan’s question if the chemist’s was still open that he needs to buy condoms and batteries for his girlfriend’s vibrator, to the unforgettable, “I’m so sorry. I made a mistake.”
Still, even after he has seen the light and somehow disentangled himself from the web of his delusions, he’s unable to shake off the uneasy feeling Mrs. Peignoir inspires in him — especially during that warm night when Sybil has left the hotel to tend the ever-ailing Audrey. Here Mrs. Peignoir uses the stuck bedroom window as a convenient pretext to inform Basil that, “I shall sleep an naturel tonight — only it’s not so much fun on your own.”
Convinced that it must be Mrs. Peignoir who is knocking at his bedroom door (“I won’t try and sit on you again!”) in the middle of the night, he invents a scenario in which his wife is suppos
ed to have come back — she is in the bathroom, perilously close to overhearing their daring conversation.
Basil: Look, you’ll meet somebody else sooner or later.
Sybil: Let me in!
Basil: Shut up, will you, you silly great tart. Go away! My wife will hear us!
Sybil: This is your wife!
(Suddenly he realises the situation. He has exactly three seconds to come up with an explanation. He opens the door and faces Sybil.)
Basil: Oh, what a terrible dream!
Luckily for him Sybil’s mind is elsewhere. The supposed burglar is Manuel waking up from his alcohol-induced coma in the laundry basket.
In Waldorf Salad we see yet another instance in which Basil’s sexual neuroses gain the upper hand. One might imagine that it would make no difference to him whether Terry’s negotiated extra money was to be spent on karate classes or on entertaining a blonde Finnish girl. But to Basil this makes all the difference in the world. The very thought that Terry managed to wring some extra money out of him, money destined to he spent on pleasures of a carnal nature, is not to be borne. He would be guilty of an abominable crime of omission if he allowed Terry to get away with this.
Although it would be more plausible for a hotel owner simply to use a moral argument in salving his conscience while at the same time making an extra buck, Basil’s indignation is real. In other words, his aim is not primarily to make money, but morally to punish Terry for envisaging pleasures that are forbidden fruit, and, to Basil, anathema.
Mr. Hamilton, being an American and not accustomed to Basil’s peculiarly English vision, later takes it for granted that Basil dismissed Terry so that he could keep the money for himself. He would have been astonished to learn that Basil’s behaviour was in fact dictated by a very real moral indignation, and not by greed pure and simple. In this respect Basil was absolutely right when later informing Mr. Hamilton that “there are things far more important to us British than money” — namely, to suppress everything having to do with you know what ...