John Cleese: The apology and the fallout

John Cleese begins with an apology. Firmly and sincerely, with the urgency of a man who wants to make amends.“I want to say I’m extremely sorry that I retweeted some things that I didn’t check properly,” he says as he sits down. “I couldn’t believe that some of them had been just completely invented. It was a mistake.”

Some will say the Monty Python and Fawlty Towers star is making excuses. That a man as intelligent and worldly would have the discernment to spot a smear, lie or trope and know not to circulate it.

But the fact that he turned up in person to explain himself speaks to the authenticity of the apology. Offered the same opportunity, Gary Lineker declined, as did others who offended and insulted but chose not to clarify or nuance their comments.

That’s not John. He wants to address all of it and the question that hangs over everything: why he didn’t go to Israel.

His An Evening with John Cleese was scheduled for three nights in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem between 26 November and 1 December. After cancelling last month, a statement from the promoter referenced “security concerns”, then another on socials claimed he was afraid of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement and then came suggestions that John had been warming up excuses for weeks. That was because of a cluster of retweets on his X feed – sarcastic, political or entirely fabricated – that ignited confusion and anger among Israelis and British Jews.

He now understands his mistake.

“I was told for the first time that if you retweet something you’re saying, ‘This is true,’” he explains. “It never occurred to me… When I retweet a post or comment it’s an instant response, not because I can say ‘this is true.’”

He shakes his head. “I’m 86 and don’t understand the internet.
It seems to be almost incomprehensible.” But the false and libellous quote attributed to former ambassador Tzipi Hotovely and another implying that Israel “controls global finance ?

Those posts were removed at his request before we met, but the impact lingered. John insists he hadn’t understood what he was amplifying.
“People create this sh**t. They create whatever they want. I think what I’ve learned in the past two weeks is that there is naked cheating… I always think that you shouldn’t lie if it’s going to be found out, and now… nobody seems to care.”

It’s understandable that a man of his vintage might not realise how easily he could be manipulated online. But why cancel the Israel shows?

“I was beginning to dread it weeks before the posts,” he says. “I thought, ‘Somebody is going to ask me something political at some point and if I don’t say the right thing, it’s going to be very unpleasant for the rest of the tour.’ I had concerns.”

Could anyone argue that an octogenarian with health issues isn’t entitled to be concerned, but I ask him plainly if he really was fearful for his safety? “I think there was always a security element,” he acknowledges. “I’m sorry to say that. I may be exaggerating this… but I didn’t know.”

I explain Israeli security protocols, and he listens. “All right,” he sighs. “I accept what you’re telling me. But I certainly didn’t know that three weeks ago. It wasn’t like that when I was last there.”

That was in 2019, but his relationship with Israel goes back decades. “I first visited a long time ago… probably about 1980,” he says. “I wanted some sun. Thought deserts are hot and went to Eilat. But when I arrived there, it was so cold.”

He remembers fleeing to Jerusalem with his then-girlfriend. “But when I woke up in Jerusalem that morning… snow!” For doubters, meteorological records confirm that two cm of snow fell in Jerusalem on 10 December 1980. “I still can’t believe it,” he chuckles.In 2019, he returned for a run of shows – a sell-out, like those planned for last month.

“The audiences in Israel… they’re very smart and laugh quickly,” he smiles. “I also like the sense of relaxed friendliness everywhere. And the food…”But affection alone doesn’t override the principle that guides his decisions about where he performs.“I’ve always avoided places where there’s no rule of law,” he reveals. I move to point out that Israel, a democracy with an independent judiciary, has that rule, but he’s pushing ahead.

“I’ve never been to China and was only briefly in St Petersburg. I also turned down £200,000 recently to appear in Saudi Arabia. Because I don’t think you’re safe in Saudi. If MBS doesn’t like you, almost anything could happen.”

He’s referring to Mohammed bin Salman, Crown Prince and  Prime Minister of Saudi. Whatever the view of the ruler, John’s own views have clearly been shaped by online headlines and posts. “I don’t do research,” he concedes.

If being adrift in the digital swamp explains his reposts from malicious, antisemitic accounts, and the frame through which he views Benjamin Netanyahu, some won’t buy it. But his unfiltered honesty makes it hard to dismiss.“A lot of people I know and respect, including Jewish friends, think that Netanyahu has extended the conflict in order to avoid what will happen when things settle down.”

Then John asks: “I’ve been trying to figure out how popular Netanyahu is in Israel. If you had to say the percentage of division, is it 50/50?”

I tell him about the protests before October 7, the deep divisions inside Israel, and how the massacre has forged a different, grief-driven
divide. “I never thought of that,” he says. “It helps to know.”

When the conversation turns to October 7,  there is no ambiguity.“Hamas… the nastiest of all terrorist organisations,” he says. “Completely contemptible.”I ask whether Israel has the right to defend itself. He answers – yes – immediately.

John also makes no secret of being troubled by Palestinian suffering – olive farms taken, fundamentalist settlers – but, for him, the new horror is what Hamas has done to its own people. “What happened after the ceasefire?” he tuts. “Hamas shot a lot of Arabs.”

John has opinions but not the hard certainties that online activists insist are ‘the truth’ and he won’t be posting about Israel going forward. “I’m so distressed about the state of the world at the moment,” he says. “Sometimes I start thinking the world might have been happier if we hadn’t had computers.”

He also wants his criticism of Israel’s leadership to be seen as separate from his liking of the country and its people – a distinction he knows many Israelis and British Jews also make. Bob Vylan is on his radar and ‘Death to the IDF’ chants, but he says: “I didn’t have all the facts.” When I tell him the BBC aired it and antisemitic incidents spiked, he shakes his head.

“I thought the trouble at the BBC in recent years was that it has become much too influenced by government. But the middle of the BBC is very, very woke, so you’ve got two contemporary biases.”

On antisemitism itself, John is openly bewildered. He recalls a line from the film Ship of Fools (1965), where a character says Jews and cyclists are being rounded up, and another asks: “Why the cyclists?” “Why the Jews?” comes the reply.

“It’s always stuck in my mind,” he continues. “Because I don’t understand antisemitism. I can understand being anti-Netanyahu, but I don’t see the point of antisemitism. It’s like – why?”

He tells me that, as a pupil at Clifton College in Bristol, 1952, he had friends in Polack’s, the Jewish house. “Mike Filer, my friend in the cricket team, was from Polack’s – he’s now mayor of Portsmouth I believe.”

Is my question about Jewish comedians too obvious?  “You mean all the great ones I grew up with… like the Marx Brothers – wonderful – Danny Kaye, Jack Benny, George Burns?” He has others, but wants to mention Peter Sellers as they worked together on the film, The Magic Christian in 1969.

He suggests a self-penned piece about them all to be delivered in a month’s time, then scatters names of Jewish colleagues and friends, raising film producer Steve Abbott and wife Nicola, who had opposing views on John going to Israel. His former accountant confided recently, that, for the first time, he felt physically afraid as a Jew. John was upset. “It seems to me… I don’t know people who are antisemitic,” he says. “When you discover they’re there – what? What’s it all about?”

His direct experience of Judaism in the family came when daughter Cynthia – his child with Fawlty Towers’ Polly, played by Connie Booth — married Jewish screenwriter-producer Ed Solomon.

“She was going to convert, but it was too much for her,” says John. Cynthia is now divorced, but the connection remains important.

“My grandchildren are half-Jewish. People say it has to come through the mother, and I say: ‘No, that’s a Jewish rule. If my daughter married an Italian, the children are half-Italian.’”

The week we meet, John should be celebrating. He is promoting his new book Fawlty Towers: Fawlts and All and documentary John Cleese Packs It In. At his publisher Hachette, 1,200 copies of the book are stacked in front of him for signing.

His new documentary – spanning five countries, 16 cities, 23 shows – will screen in more than 350 UK cinemas. But what mattered to him was what Jewish people now think of him – that’s why he agreed to the interview.

And will he go back to Israel? “Yes,” he says. “When I really feel it’s safe. And I will perform for free.” As our conversation ends, John circles back to where he started. “I realise I’ve been very naïve. I don’t understand how people make things up and don’t care that it can be disproved. They will think I’m trying to eke my way out of this. I’m not.”

John didn’t ask to see the questions before we met, nor request that his apology lead the story. He just wants us to know he is sorry. Who knows, he may start a trend.