John Cleese hits back at backlash over slavery joke after ‘microphone taken away’ during SXSW talk
metro.co.ukMonty Python star fronted his titular event, John Cleese in Conversation, at SXSW festival in Austin, Texas, on March 11 – alongside fellow comedians Dulcé Sloan, Jim Gaffigan, and Ricky Velez.According to the Hollywood Reporter Cleese, along with his fellow comics, discussed colonisation in the talk.‘[People] get competitive about this business of being oppressed,’ the Rat Race actor said. ‘You do know the British have been slaves twice, right.’The publication claims that members of the audience were uncomfortable over the comments, reporting that while some were ‘laughing and applauding, some weren’t, and it was hard to know how exactly to take it’.In an attempt to stop the actor from saying more, Sloan reportedly took away Cleese’s microphone, and told the audience: ‘I saved a comic whose career I respect.’Next time the Editor of the Hollywood Reporter sends someone to review a Comedy Festival he would do well to send a reporter with a sense of humourOtherwise it’s like sending someone deaf to review a concertQuite right, Sajid.
But that was the jokeThe ridiculousness of the comparison was the jokeBut if you lack a sense of irony, you might not realisethat.
But that’s not a good reason to deprive peoplewho do understand irony of a good laugh https://t.co/zRXi4hpaHZHowever, Cleese reportedly replied: ‘I want reparations from Italy.‘And then the Normans came over in 1066… they were horrible people from France and they colonised us for 30 years and we need reparations there too, I’m afraid.’Cleese has since tweeted: ‘Next time the Editor of the Hollywood Reporter sends someone to review a Comedy Festival he would do well to send a reporter with a sense of humour.
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