The Kipper and the Corpse

A Fawlty Towers guest dies in his sleep and hotelier Basil and his staff try to hide the body until the coroner comes to collect it.

Why they decide to move the corpse, as opposed to leaving it where it is until the authorities arrive, is a mystery to me, but without it there wouldn't be so much frantic farcical chaos. Consequently, the whole episode feels extremely forced, the laughs not flowing as naturally as they should.

Yes, there are plenty of wonderfully barbed quips from Basil, but when the basic plot is so flawed, I simply cannot hold this episode in such high regard as the genuine classics (most of which are from series 1).

Fawlty Towers was notorious for rotten customer service, and this episode is a dissertation on it. It complements "Waldorf Salad" and "Basil the Rat" (the final episode) quite well - this time, dead bodies with a subplot involving ill-prepared kippers (and sausages) are brought into the mix. A group of executives drop off Mr. Leeman at the hotel - he dies during the night, but the hotel staff think it's a result of food poisoning of that morning's breakfast. Painstaking efforts are made by Basil, Manuel, and Polly to hide the body - carting the corpse up and down stairs, eventually depositing it first in one of the closets in a guest room and then in the kitchen. As Andrew Sachs has mentioned, they cast the Leeman character with a small man (Derek Royle) so as to make all the hauling a bit easier. The supporting cast in this one are especially good (Geoffrey Palmer as the snobby sausage-loving Dr. Price, and Mavis Pugh as Mrs. Chase, owner of the sausage-loving shi-tzu dog). Gilly Flower, who plays Ms. Tibbs, got a fairly big part in this episode after many episodes with one and two-liners, and she did it very well.

This is the episode with the well-known 'Basil pokes Manuel in the eye' scene and a bit where Basil walks in on a guest preparing to have his way with an inflatable sex doll. By episode's end, it seems like just about everyone has 'had it' with the lousy hotel - even Manuel belts out a firm, "Meeester Fawlty, I no wan' to work here anymore! I on strike!" But in the end, Basil is the one who gets the respite and once again, leaves Sybil to solve the day's problems. Personally, I think this would've been a good episode to end the series. Although unintentionally, it rounds out the other episodes nicely and pretty much drives home the fact that Fawlty Towers is a hotel that's beyond help.

If I had to pinpoint a piece of comedy television that I would place at the top of the pile, then The Kipper and The Corpse would have to rank at number one. It's the episode I know every word of, but cannot watch it without howling with laughter. Each episode is genius and magical in its own right, but there's something about the way this one plays out that I can't resist. The dialogue is perfection itself, the level of Basil's irritations and frustrations is a delight to watch, the way he sarcastically offers poor Mr Leeman a choice of Breakfast tray is a joy, but the way in which the Doctor is taken to the body in the bed is one of the funniest things I've ever seen.

Zany, madcap, sarcastic, wildly funny, the list of superlatives you could add to this thirty odd minutes of unadulterated joy is endless. It can be difficult to review something you know so well, but the relentless watches have provided me with constant laughs and for that this episode gets a well deserved 10/10

A guest named Mr. Leeman (Derek Royle, 'Brian Rix Presents') has died in his sleep during the night, and Basil, Manuel, *and* Polly are forced to run around like mad fools trying to hide the death from the other guests. Basil is convinced that it came from a result of feeding Leeman spoiled fish, hence the reference to "kipper" in the title.

The slapstick antics with Leemans' body can easily rival anything done with Bernie Lomax a decade later. All in all, this is a VERY funny episode - utterly ridiculous, of course, but that's often the whole point of farce. The breathless performances of Mr. Cleese, Mr. Sachs, and Ms. Booth are great fun, while Ms. Scales as Sybil is virtually the only one keeping a level head. And since part of the point of the series was that the hotel didn't have exemplary customer service, this is a perfect illustration of that point.

Even poor Miss Tibbs (Gilly Flower, a veteran of episodic British television), one of the long-term guests, ends up caught in the mayhem, and it is nice to see Ms. Flower more involved in an episode plotline.

The final punchline is pure silliness, but it's highly appropriate for an episode that leans so hard into absurdity.

Also guest starring Geoffrey Palmer ('As Time Goes By') as a doctor staying at the hotel.

Nine out of 10.

I was 15 years old & in the audience for this recording. Didn't realise at the time I was wltnessing one of the greatest sitcoms of all time. I always remember John Cleese popping his head thru the glass doors at the side of the studio waving to the audience before the recording started& pulling his faces.