John Cleese says "the planet is littered" with his former partners.
The 79-year-old actor has been married four times – to Connie Booth from 1968 to 1978, Barbara Trentham from 1981 to 1990, Alyce Cleese from 1992 to 2008, and to current wife Jennifer Wade, whom he married in 2012 – and has said his three former wives, and the two children he has with them, are a "pain in the a**e".
John – who has 41-year-old daughter Cynthia with first wife Connie, and 34-year-old daughter Camilla with second wife Barbara – said: "Young people have kids and then spend the next 30 years looking after them. For what, I don’t know. It makes you less selfish.
"Basically they are a pain in the a**e as they cost a fortune and you have no control over that, and they are never grateful. But I do have a good one, and the other one is OK. The planet is littered with my ex-wives."
The ‘Monty Python’ star also bemoaned the idea of his comedy pals Eric Idle and Michael Palin being applauded for their lasting marriages – to Tania Kosevich and Helen Gibbins respectively – as he doesn’t see it as a great achievement.
Speaking to the Sunday Mirror newspaper, he said: "Eric Idle has been married 40 years, Michael Palin 50. Everyone claps when you mention this. I say this is just a failure of imagination. I’ve been married 42 years if you add the bits together."
John’s recent rant comes after he revealed last month he’s going deaf, but doesn’t mind because it means he no longer has to listen to things that don’t interest him.
He said: "[I’m going] increasingly deaf. [It’s not a] burden. On the contrary, I find it quite liberating. I smile and nod and point at my ears, and am thus released from the duty of taking notice of all the rubbish directed at me."
John Cleese: The planet is littered with my exes
