Trump Towers

 

I'm one of those annoying people who takes pride in enjoying entertainment from other shores.  I don't do it just for some sense of cultural superiority - okay, maybe a bit of that - but because I find much of American entertainment to be juvenile. And I don't mean actually juvenile in the way that Michael Bay's endless Transformer flicks are targeted at a young, after-school audience, but in how even serious filmmakers tackle adult topics with a juvenile mentality. Be that as it may, I am always on the lookout for a new experience from beyond America's shores.

Recently, a friend of mine who knows my love of British television (Inside No. 9 is a recent favorite of this Twilight Zone fan!) recommended Fawlty Towers to me. I heard of this classic bit of late 20th-century British television before but had never gotten around to watching it. Seeing how most of the episodes were available on YouTube, I sat down this past weekend to watch it. 

I loved it!

I now understand why this show is often considered Monty Python alumnus John Cleese's magnum ops. It is truly hilarious! Cleese's character, Basil Fawlty, is one of the most memorable I have come across in some time.  

Reminiscent of Bernard Black from Black's Books, another more recent bit of classic British television comedy that I highly recommend, Basil Fawlty is a misanthropic character. However, unlike Bernard Black whose unceasing vitriol is made understandable by the many obnoxious customers who haunt his bookshop, not to mention the chaotic antics of his employee Manny, Basil Fawlty is just an awful human being. He is petty, disagreeable, cruel, and stupid - or is that cruelly stupid? - because he enjoys being petty, disagreeable, cruel, and stupid. No other rationale is offered for the insufferable behavior he displays to his hotel guests, employees, and even his wife.  He is mean just to be mean. 

With such a clownish figure serving as the show's character study, it is no surprise that Fawlty Towers is a hilarious show that is well worth your time. It is an affirmation of Bertrand Russel's observation that the trouble with the world is that the stupid are darn cocksure in their stupidity. 

Of course, this brought me to ruminations about how Basil Fawlty is, in many ways, a more refined version of Donald Trump. Trump is an American Fawlty, a man who relishes indulging in cruelty and obnoxious stupidity. And, as with Fawlty, Trump is surrounded by sycophants who aid and abet his idiotic antics. What results is an unforced comedy of errors where minor problems are escalated into massive scandals because the guy in charge is a conniving incompetent or, as the British put it, "a wanker." In many ways, this White House is an American production of Fawlty Towers. Call it Trump Towers. It is just slightly more absurd than the original show.

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Speaking of Trumpian stupidity, it is something out of a Fawlty Towers episode when one reads the transcript of the recent interview the First Felon did with Meet the Press.  For example, it is hilarious, and completely in character, if you read Trump's answer in the voice of John Cleese's Basil Fawlty:

KRISTEN WELKER:

At the same time, the economy shrank in the first quarter. You’ve been arguing all week that this is President Biden’s economy. Is this now your economy, sir?                               

PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

Well, I think certain aspects of it are. Costs are. I was able to get down the costs. But even that, it takes a while to get them down, but we got them down good. We lost 5 to 6 billion dollars a day with Biden. Five to 6 billion. And I’ve got that down to a great number right now in a very — in a record time. You know, we’re talking about 100 days. But just think of what that is. Five billion dollars a day we’re losing on trade. And we were very tough with China, as you know. We put 145% tariff on. Nobody’s ever heard of such a thing. And we’ve essentially cut off trade relationships by putting that much of a tariff on. And that’s okay. We’ve gone cold turkey. That means that we’re not losing. You know, we lost a trillion dollars to China. A trillion dollars. That means we’re not losing a trillion dollars when we go cold turkey because we’re not doing business with them right now. And they want to make a deal. They want to make a deal very badly. We’ll see how that all turns out, but it’s got to be a fair deal. But think of it. We were losing a trillion dollars. And that was a big part of the 5 million dollars a day.                       

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And this gem:

KRISTEN WELKER:

All right, let’s talk about some of the other actions you’ve taken over the past 100 days. Last month, you directed your attorney general, Pam Bondi, to review two people who you perceive to be your political adversaries. And yet, you told me in December that you would not direct the Justice Department to investigate your political foes. What changed? 

PRES. DONALD TRUMP:

Well, no. I just look at people — and I’m not directing anybody. They looked at these two people. They might have known it or they might have heard it from two years ago. One person said, “He knew me so well,” he was I think on CNN or MSDNC, but they’re both failing networks, you’re happy to know. Even though one of them I guess is related to you in one form or another, although, they’re trying to cut them loose as fast as possible. But the — it was well-known that this one person, it was almost like he was my brother. I don’t even know who he is. Maybe he was there. Maybe he was in the Oval Office a few times as a surrogate for somebody in some form of government, along with 25 other people that sat in the back of the room or stood in the back of the room. I have no idea who this guy is. And he’s out there and then he did a book called “Anonymous.” Did a book called “Anonymous.” I think that’s really subversion. I think it’s spying, it’s something. It’s something really bad. 

To paraphrase the Trix Rabbit, it is hilariously delicious in its incoherence! 

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I'm just going to put this here:

Seems oddly familiar...

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In other entertainment news, Basil Trump has decided to put tariffs on...movies.  As the New Zork Times reports, 

President Trump’s call to impose steep tariffs on movies “produced in Foreign Lands” came after he met at Mar-a-Lago over the weekend with the actor Jon Voight, whom he named a “special ambassador” to Hollywood this year.

The president’s social media post on Sunday that called for a 100 percent tariff on films produced outside the United States caused confusion in Hollywood, which has lost a great deal of local film and television production to states and nations that offer rich tax credits and cheaper labor. While few in the industry said that they understood Mr. Trump’s proposal, some worried that tariffs could cause more harm than good and called instead for federal help in the form of tax credits.

Honestly, it is not surprising that Trump has taken economic advice from an actor. Everything is a performative act, which is why over half a dozen TV entertainers (not including Trump himself) are serving in official capacities in this administration, whether or not they are qualified for their roles. Trump 2.0 isn't an administration as much as a low-budget sitcom. 

Putting that aside, such a tariff, if possible to implement (how do you tariff digital entertainment?), would be the final nail in the coffin of the American entertainment industry. As I have related elsewhere, Hollywood has taken such a hard dirt nap in recent years that the video games industry often laps it in gross revenue in any given year. To put that another way, in the modern era, more people are financially invested in their favorite video game franchises than they are in Hollywood movie franchises. 

I am old enough to remember when video games would imitate the successes of Hollywood. That is to say that after a particularly successful movie, there would inevitably be a video game copycat, either explicitly, such as Atari's disastrous adaptation of E.T.: The Extraterrestrial (but I confess to liking it as a kid!), or by legally distinct but obviously similar titles, such as Thorn EMI Video's game, Computer War, a title clearly inspired by the success of the movie Wargames. Hollywood called the tune.

Nowadays, however, it is Hollywood that is forced to emulate the world of video games, as seen with Warner Brothers and Legendary Entertainment's adaption of the hit video game, Minecraft. As of late April 2025, it has grossed $873.4 million worldwide, including $398.2 million domestically and $475.2 million internationally. Minecraft is the highest-grossing film of the year and a record for a video game-based flick. The student has become the master, to quote a classic film from the not-so-long-ago glory days of Hollywood. 

Simply, with or without Trump's fantasy of film tariffs, Hollywood is toast. Tariffs will merely expedite that demise.  Morally and intellectually bankrupt, a once globally iconic brand has been augered into the dirt by greed, corruption, and incompetence. Those with ears in the White House should listen...

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Lastly, Donald Falwty has decided that he wants a 91-year-old tourist attraction to become an operational prison.  Putting aside the insane costs that would involve updating a prison nearly a century out of date, I have no doubt that this laughably bad idea was triggered either by another washed-up Hollywood actor who fancies himself an expert on, in this case, the correctional system because he once starred in a movie about it, or by Trump staying up late to watch Escape from Alcatraz on basic cable and, like a child, thought it was really cool and wanted to make it his new toy. I assure you there is no greater impetus behind this fool's errand.  

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Unprovoked trade wars, enemy lists, and a quixotic re-opening of an ancient prison, such are the focus of Trump 2.0's regime. He might have been a sap, but even Basil Fawlty had words of wisdom for this administration: 

Well, let me tell you something! This is exactly how Nazi Germany started! A bunch of idiots sticking their noses in, looking for something to complain about!

I believe making ol' Basil president would probably be an improvement right about now. 

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