John Cleese Popular Books
John Cleese Biography & Facts
John Marwood Cleese ( KLEEZ; born 27 October 1939) is an English actor, comedian, screenwriter, producer, and presenter. Emerging from the Cambridge Footlights in the 1960s, he first achieved success at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and as a scriptwriter and performer on The Frost Report. In the late 1960s, he cofounded Monty Python, the comedy troupe responsible for the sketch show Monty Python's Flying Circus. Along with his Python costars Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin, and Graham Chapman, Cleese starred in Monty Python films, which include Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975), Life of Brian (1979), and The Meaning of Life (1983). In the mid-1970s, Cleese and first wife Connie Booth cowrote the sitcom Fawlty Towers, in which he starred as hotel owner Basil Fawlty, for which he won the 1980 British Academy Television Award for Best Entertainment Performance. In 2000, the show topped the British Film Institute's list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes, and in a 2001 Channel 4 poll, Basil was ranked second on its list of the 100 Greatest TV Characters. Cleese costarred with Kevin Kline, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Michael Palin in A Fish Called Wanda (1988) and Fierce Creatures (1997), both of which he also wrote. For A Fish Called Wanda, he received Academy Award, BAFTA Award, and Golden Globe Award nominations. He has also starred in Time Bandits (1981), Clockwise (1986), and Rat Race (2001) and acted in Silverado (1985), Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1994), two James Bond films (as R and Q), two Harry Potter films (as Nearly Headless Nick), and the last three Shrek films. He received a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series for Cheers (1987) and was nominated for 3rd Rock from the Sun (1998) and Will & Grace (2004). Cleese has specialised in political and religious satire, black comedy, sketch comedy, and surreal humour. He was ranked the second best comedian ever in a 2005 Channel 4 poll of fellow comedians. He cofounded Video Arts, a production company making entertaining training films as well as The Secret Policeman's Ball benefit shows to raise funds for the human rights organisation Amnesty International. Formerly a staunch supporter of the Liberal Democrats, in 1999, he turned down an offer from the party to nominate him for a life peerage. In 2023, he began presenting a talk show on GB News. Early life and education Cleese was born in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, England, the only child of Reginald Francis Cleese (1893–1972), an insurance salesman, and his wife Muriel Evelyn (née Cross, 1899–2000), the daughter of an auctioneer. His family's surname was originally Cheese, but his father had thought it was embarrassing and used the name Cleese when he enlisted in the Army during the First World War; he changed it officially by deed poll in 1923. As a child, Cleese supported Bristol City and Somerset County Cricket Club. Cleese was educated at St Peter's Preparatory School, paid for by money his mother had inherited, where he received a prize for English and did well at cricket and boxing. When he was 13, he was awarded an exhibition at Clifton College, an English public school in Bristol. By that age, he was more than 6 feet (1.83 m) tall. Cleese allegedly defaced the school grounds, as a prank, by painting footprints to suggest that the statue of Field Marshal Earl Haig had left its plinth and gone to the toilet. Cleese played cricket in the First XI and did well academically, passing eight O-Levels and three A-Levels in mathematics, physics and chemistry. In his autobiography So, Anyway, he says that discovering, aged 17, he had not been made a house prefect by his housemaster affected his outlook: "It was not fair and therefore it was unworthy of my respect... I believe that this moment changed my perspective on the world." Cleese could not go straight to the University of Cambridge, as the ending of National Service meant there were twice the usual number of applicants for places, so he returned to his prep school for two years to teach science, English, geography, history, and Latin (he drew on his Latin teaching experience later for a scene in Life of Brian, in which he corrects Brian's badly written Latin graffiti). He then took up a place he had won at Downing College, Cambridge, to read law. He also joined the Cambridge Footlights. He 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. He 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. He was then asked "Well, what do you do?" to which he replied, "I make people laugh." At the Footlights theatrical club, Cleese spent a lot of time with Tim Brooke-Taylor and Bill Oddie and met his future writing partner Graham Chapman. Cleese wrote extra material for the 1961 Footlights Revue I Thought I Saw It Move, and was registrar for the Footlights Club during 1962. He was also in the cast of the 1962 Footlights Revue Double Take! Cleese graduated from Cambridge in 1963 with an upper second. Despite his successes on The Frost Report, his father sent him cuttings from The Daily Telegraph offering management jobs in places such as Marks & Spencer. Career 1963–1968: Pre-Python Cleese was a scriptwriter, as well as a cast member, for the 1963 Footlights Revue A Clump of Plinths. The revue was so successful at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe that it was renamed Cambridge Circus and taken to the West End in London and then on a tour of New Zealand and Broadway, with the cast also appearing in some of the revue's sketches on The Ed Sullivan Show in October 1964. After Cambridge Circus, Cleese briefly stayed in America, performing on and off-Broadway. While performing in the musical Half a Sixpence, Cleese met future Python Terry Gilliam as well as American actress Connie Booth, whom he married on 20 February 1968. At their wedding at a Unitarian church in Manhattan, the couple attempted to ensure an absence of any theistic language. "The only moment of disappointment", Cleese recalled, "came at the very end of the service when I discovered that I'd failed to excise one particular mention of the word 'God'." Later, Booth became a writing partner. Cleese was soon offered work as a writer with BBC Radio, where he worked on several programmes, most notably as a sketch writer for The Dick Emery Show. The success of the Footlights Revue led to the recording of a short series of half-hour radio programmes, called I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, which were so popular that the BBC commissioned a regular series with the same title that ran from 1965 to 1974. Cleese returned to Britain and joined the cast. In many episodes, he is credited as "John Otto Cleese" (according to Jem Roberts, this may have been due to the embarrassment .... Discover the John Cleese popular books. Find the top 100 most popular John Cleese books.
Best Seller John Cleese Books of 2024
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Sicker in the Head
Judd ApatowNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER An allnew collection of honest, hilarious, and enlightening conversations with some of the most exciting names in comedyfrom lifelong comedy nerd Ju...
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Pratt Of The Argus
David NobbsHenry Pratt, back home from National Service, is a man at last. As eager to prove it as he is to please, he is in at the deep end in his chosen profession cub reporter on the Thur...
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Only Fools and Stories
David JasonThe Hilarious Number One Sunday Times Bestseller! The followup autobiography to one of Britain’s best loved actors and national treasuresAs seen in David and Jay’s Touring Toolshe...
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Road to Rouen
Ben HatchBen Hatch is on the road again. Commissioned to write a guidebook about France (despite not speaking any French) he sets off with visions of relaxing chateaux and refined dining. T...
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How to Enjoy Poetry
Frank Skinner'Someone recently said to me, in reference to my poetry podcast, that you'd think poetry would be more popular than ever, in the twentyfirst century, because people don't have a lo...
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The funny side of the United Kingdom
Theo TebbeIf people who are living outside the United Kingdom are asked to characterise British humour, many of them will probably mention the jokes of one of the Monty Python series or mayb...
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Pratt a Manger
David NobbsWhen pretty young TV researcher Nicky Proctor visits Cafe Henry in London's Soho, Henry Pratt's life changes forever. He becomes an instant star of the TV food quiz, A Question of ...
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Behind the Lens
David SuchetDaily Mail Showbiz Memoir of the Year'A beautiful book' Chris Evans'Terrifically entertaining' Mail on Sunday'An arresting photographic voyage through the life and loves of this en...
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The Tap-Dancing Knife Thrower
Paul HoganThe icon and legend at last tells his story his way without the boring bitsPaul Hogan first appeared on Australia's screens in 1971 as a 'tapdancing knife thrower' on TV talent sh...
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Creativity
John CleeseThe legendary comedian, actor, and writer of Monty Python, Fawlty Towers, and A Fish Called Wanda fame shares his key ideas about creativity: that it’s a learnable, ...
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Criatividade
John Cleese«Existe o mito de que a criatividade é algo que nasce connosco. Não é verdade. Todos podemos ser criativos.»Quem melhor do que John Cleese para nos ensinar a sermos mais criativos?...
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Always Look on the Bright Side of Life
Eric IdleNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the ingenious comic performer, founding member of Monty Python, and creator of Spamalot comes an absurdly funny memoir of unparalleled wit and ...
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The Complete Pratt
David NobbsTHE COMPLETE PRATT compiles the first three volumes of the misadventures of Henry Pratt, beginning with a brilliantly funny evocation of a Yorkshire boyhood in SECOND FROM LAST IN ...
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So, Anyway...
John CleeseNEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER “John Cleese’s memoir is just about everything one would expect of its authorsmart, thoughtful, provocative and above all funny. . . . A pictur...
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The funny side of the United Kingdom
Theo TebbeIf people who are living outside the United Kingdom are asked to characterise British humour, many of them will probably mention the jokes of one of the Monty Python series or mayb...
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The Fall And Rise Of Reginald Perrin
David NobbsAS READ ON RADIO 4'Manages to find joy in the trivial and creates farce out of monotony . . . To say that a book has 'changed your life' has become so commonplace that it has becom...
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Goodbye Soldier
Spike MilliganSpike Milligan's legendary war memoirs are a hilarious and subversive firsthand account of the Second World War, as well as a fascinating portrait of the formative years of this to...
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Stark
Ben EltonStark is a secret consortium with more money than God, and the social conscience of a dog on a croquet lawn. What's more, it knows the Earth is dying.Deep in Western Australia wher...
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Small Man in a Book
Rob BrydonRob Brydon tells story of his slow ascent to fame and fortune in Small Man in a Book.A multiawardwinning actor, writer, comedian and presenter known for his warmth, humour and insp...
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Second From Last In The Sack Race
David NobbsBorn into poverty, saddled with a born loser and parrotstrangler for a dad, short sighted and ungainly, young Henry Pratt doesn't exactly have a head start in life.But in David Nob...
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Gang War
Graham Johnson'If those pricks want a war, lad, we'll show what some proper soljas can do.'Dylan, Nogger and their crew 'tax' rival drug dealers using a redhot steam iron and celebrate by making...
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Dear Fatty
Dawn FrenchA SUNDAY TIMES NUMBER ONE BESTSELLERThe hilarious and heartwarming memoir from one of Britain's bestloved comedians and Women's Prize longlisted author, Dawn French.Dawn French is ...
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Semi-Detached
Griff Rhys JonesSemidetached Griff relives freezing bus journeys to school and the impulsive stealing of that halfacrown from Charlie Hume’s money box; sitting outside Butlins at Clacton (longing ...
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Camp David
David WalliamsBritain's Got Talent is BACK . . . so it's time to get serious with Britain's favourite funny man.Famous comedian and actor, funniest judge on Britain's Got Talent, highachieving s...
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Nothing Significant To Report
Dario NustriniLaughoutloud yarns from a soldier in the New Zealand ArmyWhen new recruit Dario Nustrini's head was freshly shaved in preparation for the army, he knew nothing about what training ...
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All Puns Blazing
Geoff RoweI don't like to brag but I can control a kayak brilliantly. Canoe?'Pardon' is the only French word that I know. I can only apologise.From Geoff Rowe and the Leicester Comedy Festiv...
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Puckoon
Spike MilliganDISCOVER PUCKOON, SPIKE MILLIGAN'S CLASSIC SLAPSTICK NOVEL 'Pops with the erratic brilliance of a careless match in a box of fireworks' Daily MailIn 1924 the Boundary Commission is...
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Monty Python
Richard ToppingHave you ever wanted to be a lumberjack? Had trouble with a dead parrot? Or gone for a silly walk?Combining outrageous humour, unbridled creativity and surreal animation, John Clee...
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Monty Python Speaks
David MorganWith a Foreword by John Oliver, host of Last Week TonightIn celebration of the 50th anniversary of its BBC debut, a revised and updated edition of the complete oral history of Mont...
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Changeling
Mike OldfieldBorn without social instincts many people take for granted, brought up in a troubled environment and possessed with an extraordinary musical talent, Mike Oldfield was thrust into t...
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John Cleese
Patrick BunkerJohn CleeseThe Inspirational Life Story of John Cleese; Comedian, Public Speaker, and The Movie Star Who Helped Introduce Monty Python to the WorldBy Patrick BunkerJohn Cleese was ...
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Me Moir - Volume One
Vic ReevesVic Reeves' vivid, enchanting, and utterly hilarious childhood memoir is a comic masterpiece.Before there was Vic Reeves, there was a boy called James Moir who was much the same as...
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Peace Work
Spike MilliganSpike Milligan's legendary war memoirs are a hilarious and subversive firsthand account of the Second World War, as well as a fascinating portrait of the formative years of this to...
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And To My Nephew Albert I Leave The Island What I Won Off Fatty Hagan In A Poker Game
David ForrestFoul Rock is a tiny speck only seventy meters wide and one hundred and forty meters long, just off the coast of England. When he first sets foot on his inheritance, Albert quickly ...
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Monty
Spike MilliganVOLUME THREE OF SPIKE MILLIGAN'S LEGENDARY MEMOIRS IS A HILARIOUS, SUBVERSIVE FIRSTHAND ACCOUNT OF WW2'The most irreverent, hilarious book about the war that I have ever read' Sund...
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The Bible According to Spike Milligan
Spike MilliganSpike Milligan's legendary war memoirs are a hilarious and subversive firsthand account of the Second World War, as well as a fascinating portrait of the formative years of this to...