John Cleese has criticised Netflix after he claimed they never returned his calls after he pitched them an idea for a "special".
The 79-year-old star took to Twitter to reveal that he previously visited the television streaming giant to pitch them an idea for a comedy special, however, Netflix never "returned" his "phone calls or emails".
He tweeted: "In December I visited Netflix to pitch the idea of a ‘Special’. They must have hated the idea because they never got back to me, or returned any of my agent’s phone calls or emails!"
He then sarcastically added: "Recently someone showed me one of the ‘Specials’ they did commission. It was very original… (sic)"
The ‘Monty Python’ star pitched his idea to Netflix in December 2018, and went on to criticise them for commissioning a different stand-up special with an unnamed female comedian who made a series of gratuitous jokes about her vagina.
He added in other tweets: "A hugely likeable and jolly young woman did a highly original routine based on the fact that she was so ‘fat’ that she couldn’t find her own ‘pussy’. My only disappointment was that when I approached Netflix in December I had not known the sort of material they were looking for (sic)"
Cleese – who will head back out on the road on his ‘Last Time To See Me Before I Die’ international tour in May – explained that it wasn’t just Netflix who refused one of his ideas, as British broadcaster ITV also "turned down" his pitch for not being "tonally right".
He continued: "Another idea was turned down by UK ITV as it wasn’t ‘tonally right’. Why didn’t they just say it was too intelligent… (sic)"
However, Cleese still has hope for his current ideas as many of his biggest ever comedy successes were originally "turned down" or "shunned", including classic ‘Monty Python’ Christianity satire ‘Life of Brian’, acclaimed sitcom ‘Fawlty Towers’ and comedy movie ‘A Fish Called Wanda’.
He tweeted: "Still, I take heart from the fact that every UK and US studio passed on ‘Life of Brian’, 10 out of 11 Hollywood studios turned down ‘Fish Called Wanda’, and the man who commissioned ‘Fawlty Towers’ told me, after the first episode, that I had to ‘get it out of the hotel more’ (sic)"
Among the stand-up comedians that Netflix has chosen to commission specials for include Amy Schumer, Ray Romano, Russell Brand and Jimmy Carr.
John Cleese claims Netflix snubbed his show pitch
