title: Rabies

text: Rabies is caused by lyssaviruses, including the rabies virus and Australian bat lyssavirus. It is spread when an infected animal bites or scratches a human or other animals. Saliva from an infected animal can also transmit rabies if the saliva comes into contact with the eyes, mouth, or nose. Globally, dogs are the most common animal involved. In countries where dogs commonly have the disease, more than 99% of rabies cases are the direct result of dog bites. In the Americas, bat bites are the most common source of rabies infections in humans, and less than 5% of cases are from dogs. Rodents are very rarely infected with rabies. The disease can be diagnosed only after the start of symptoms.


title: Rabies

text: Animal control and vaccination programs have decreased the risk of rabies from dogs in a number of regions of the world. Immunizing people before they are exposed is recommended for those at high risk, including those who work with bats or who spend prolonged periods in areas of the world where rabies is common. In people who have been exposed to rabies, the rabies vaccine and sometimes rabies immunoglobulin are effective in preventing the disease if the person receives the treatment before the start of rabies symptoms. Washing bites and scratches for 15 minutes with soap and water, povidone-iodine, or detergent may reduce the number of viral particles and may be somewhat effective at preventing transmission. , only fourteen people were documented to have survived a rabies infection after showing symptoms. However, research conducted in 2010 among a population of people in Perú with a self-reported history of one or more bites from vampire bats (commonly infected with rabies), found that out of 73 individuals reporting previous bat bites, 7 people had rabies virus-neutralizing antibodies (rVNA). Since only one member of this group reported prior vaccination for rabies, the findings of the research suggest previously undocumented cases of infection and viral replication followed by an abortive infection. This could indicate that in rare cases people may have an exposure to the virus without treatment and develop natural antibodies as a result.


title: Rabies

text: Rabies causes about 59,000 deaths worldwide per year, about 40% of which are in children under the age of 15. More than 95% of human deaths from rabies occur in Africa and Asia.


title: Rabies

text: Rabies is present in more than 150 countries and on all continents but Antarctica. More than 3 billion people live in regions of the world where rabies occurs. A number of countries, including Australia and Japan, as well as much of Western Europe, do not have rabies among dogs. Many Pacific islands do not have rabies at all. It is classified as a neglected tropical disease.


title: Rabies

text: The name rabies is derived from the Latin "rabies", "madness". This, in turn, may be related to the Sanskrit "rabhas", "to rage". The Greeks derived the word "lyssa", from "lud" or "violent"; this root is used in the genus name of the rabies virus, "Lyssavirus".


title: Rabies

text: The period between infection and the first symptoms (incubation period) is typically 1–3 months in humans. This period may be as short as four days or longer than six years, depending on the location and severity of the wound and the amount of virus introduced. Initial symptoms of rabies are often nonspecific such as fever and headache. As rabies progresses and causes inflammation of the brain and meninges, symptoms can include slight or partial paralysis, anxiety, insomnia, confusion, agitation, abnormal behavior, paranoia, terror, and hallucinations. The person may also have fear of water.


title: Rabies

text: The symptoms eventually progress to delirium, and coma. Death usually occurs 2 to 10 days after first symptoms. Survival is almost unknown once symptoms have presented, even with intensive care.


title: Rabies

text: Rabies has also occasionally been referred to as hydrophobia ("fear of water") throughout its history. It refers to a set of symptoms in the later stages of an infection in which the person has difficulty swallowing, shows panic when presented with liquids to drink, and cannot quench their thirst. Any mammal infected with the virus may demonstrate hydrophobia. Saliva production is greatly increased, and attempts to drink, or even the intention or suggestion of drinking, may cause excruciatingly painful spasms of the muscles in the throat and larynx. Since the infected individual cannot swallow saliva and water, the virus has a much higher chance of being transmitted, because it multiplies and accumulates in the salivary glands and is transmitted through biting. Hydrophobia is commonly associated with furious rabies, which affects 80% of rabies-infected people. The remaining 20% may experience a paralytic form of rabies that is marked by muscle weakness, loss of sensation, and paralysis; this form of rabies does not usually cause fear of water.


title: Rabies

text: Rabies is caused by a number of lyssaviruses including the rabies virus and Australian bat lyssavirus. Duvenhage lyssavirus may cause a rabies-like infection.


title: Rabies

text: The rabies virus is the type species of the "Lyssavirus" genus, in the family" Rhabdoviridae", order "Mononegavirales". Lyssavirions have helical symmetry, with a length of about 180 nm and a cross-section of about 75 nm. These virions are enveloped and have a single-stranded RNA genome with negative sense. The genetic information is packed as a ribonucleoprotein complex in which RNA is tightly bound by the viral nucleoprotein. The RNA genome of the virus encodes five genes whose order is highly conserved: nucleoprotein (N), phosphoprotein (P), matrix protein (M), glycoprotein (G), and the viral RNA polymerase (L).


title: Rabies

text: To enter cells, trimeric spikes on the exterior of the membrane of the virus interact with a specific cell receptor, the most likely one being the acetylcholine receptor. The cellular membrane pinches in a procession known as pinocytosis and allows entry of the virus into the cell by way of an endosome. The virus then uses the acidic environment, which is necessary, of that endosome and binds to its membrane simultaneously, releasing its five proteins and single-strand RNA into the cytoplasm.


title: Rabies

text: Once within a muscle or nerve cell, the virus undergoes replication. The L protein then transcribes five mRNA strands and a positive strand of RNA all from the original negative strand RNA using free nucleotides in the cytoplasm. These five mRNA strands are then translated into their corresponding proteins (P, L, N, G and M proteins) at free ribosomes in the cytoplasm. Some proteins require post-translative modifications. For example, the G protein travels through the rough endoplasmic reticulum, where it undergoes further folding, and is then transported to the Golgi apparatus, where a sugar group is added to it (glycosylation).


title: Rabies

text: When there are enough viral proteins, the viral polymerase will begin to synthesize new negative strands of RNA from the template of the positive-strand RNA. These negative strands will then form complexes with the N, P, L and M proteins and then travel to the inner membrane of the cell, where a G protein has embedded itself in the membrane. The G protein then coils around the N-P-L-M complex of proteins taking some of the host cell membrane with it, which will form the new outer envelope of the virus particle. The virus then buds from the cell.


title: Rabies

text: From the point of entry, the virus is neurotropic, traveling along the neural pathways into the central nervous system. The virus usually first infects muscle cells close to the site of infection, where they are able to replicate without being 'noticed' by the host's immune system. Once enough virus has been replicated, they begin to bind to acetylcholine receptors at the neuromuscular junction. The virus then travels through the nerve cell axon via retrograde transport, as its P protein interacts with dynein, a protein present in the cytoplasm of nerve cells. Once the virus reaches the cell body it travels rapidly to the central nervous system (CNS), replicating in motor neurons and eventually reaching the brain. After the brain is infected, the virus travels centrifugally to the peripheral and autonomic nervous systems, eventually migrating to the salivary glands, where it is ready to be transmitted to the next host.


title: Rabies

text: All warm-blooded species, including humans, may become infected with the rabies virus and develop symptoms. Birds were first artificially infected with rabies in 1884; however, infected birds are largely, if not wholly, asymptomatic, and recover. Other bird species have been known to develop rabies antibodies, a sign of infection, after feeding on rabies-infected mammals.


title: Rabies

text: The virus has also adapted to grow in cells of cold-blooded vertebrates. Most animals can be infected by the virus and can transmit the disease to humans. Worldwide, about 99% of human rabies cases come from domestic dogs. Other sources of rabies in humans include bats, monkeys, raccoons, foxes, skunks, cattle, wolves, coyotes, cats, and mongooses (normally either the small Asian mongoose or the yellow mongoose).


title: Rabies

text: Rabies may also spread through exposure to infected bears, domestic farm animals, groundhogs, weasels, and other wild carnivorans. However, lagomorphs, such as hares and rabbits, and small rodents, such as chipmunks, gerbils, guinea pigs, hamsters, mice, rats, and squirrels, are almost never found to be infected with rabies and are not known to transmit rabies to humans. Bites from mice, rats, or squirrels rarely require rabies prevention because these rodents are typically killed by any encounter with a larger, rabid animal, and would, therefore, not be carriers. The Virginia opossum (a marsupial, unlike the other mammals named in this paragraph, which are all eutherians/placental), has a lower internal body temperature than the rabies virus prefers and therefore is resistant but not immune to rabies. Marsupials, along with monotremes (platypuses and echidnas), typically have lower body temperatures than similarly sized eutherians.


title: Rabies

text: The virus is usually present in the nerves and saliva of a symptomatic rabid animal. The route of infection is usually, but not always, by a bite. In many cases, the infected animal is exceptionally aggressive, may attack without provocation, and exhibits otherwise uncharacteristic behavior. This is an example of a viral pathogen modifying the behavior of its host to facilitate its transmission to other hosts. After a typical human infection by bite, the virus enters the peripheral nervous system. It then travels retrograde along the efferent nerves toward the central nervous system. During this phase, the virus cannot be easily detected within the host, and vaccination may still confer cell-mediated immunity to prevent symptomatic rabies. When the virus reaches the brain, it rapidly causes encephalitis, the prodromal phase, which is the beginning of the symptoms. Once the patient becomes symptomatic, treatment is almost never effective and mortality is over 99%. Rabies may also inflame the spinal cord, producing transverse myelitis.


title: Rabies

text: Although it is theoretically possible for rabies-infected humans to transmit it to others by biting or otherwise, no such cases have ever been documented, because infected humans are usually hospitalized and necessary precautions taken. Casual contact, such as touching a person with rabies or contact with non-infectious fluid or tissue (urine, blood, feces), does not constitute an exposure and does not require post-exposure prophylaxis. But as the virus is present in sperm and vaginal secretions, it might be possible for rabies to spread through sex. There are only a handful of recorded cases of human-to-human transmission of rabies, and all occurred through organ transplants from infected donors.


title: Rabies

text: Rabies can be difficult to diagnose because, in the early stages, it is easily confused with other diseases or even with a simple aggressive temperament. The reference method for diagnosing rabies is the fluorescent antibody test (FAT), an immunohistochemistry procedure, which is recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO). The FAT relies on the ability of a detector molecule (usually fluorescein isothiocyanate) coupled with a rabies-specific antibody, forming a conjugate, to bind to and allow the visualisation of rabies antigen using fluorescent microscopy techniques. Microscopic analysis of samples is the only direct method that allows for the identification of rabies virus-specific antigen in a short time and at a reduced cost, irrespective of geographical origin and status of the host. It has to be regarded as the first step in diagnostic procedures for all laboratories. Autolysed samples can, however, reduce the sensitivity and specificity of the FAT. The RT PCR assays proved to be a sensitive and specific tool for routine diagnostic purposes, particularly in decomposed samples or archival specimens. The diagnosis can be reliably made from brain samples taken after death. The diagnosis can also be made from saliva, urine, and cerebrospinal fluid samples, but this is not as sensitive or reliable as brain samples. Cerebral inclusion bodies called Negri bodies are 100% diagnostic for rabies infection but are found in only about 80% of cases. If possible, the animal from which the bite was received should also be examined for rabies.


title: Rabies

text: Some light microscopy techniques may also be used to diagnose rabies at a tenth of the cost of traditional fluorescence microscopy techniques, allowing identification of the disease in less-developed countries. A test for rabies, known as LN34, is easier to run on a dead animal's brain and might help determine who does and does not need post-exposure prevention. The test was developed by the CDC in 2018.


title: Rabies

text: The differential diagnosis in a case of suspected human rabies may initially include any cause of encephalitis, in particular infection with viruses such as herpesviruses, enteroviruses, and arboviruses such as West Nile virus. The most important viruses to rule out are herpes simplex virus type one, varicella zoster virus, and (less commonly) enteroviruses, including coxsackieviruses, echoviruses, polioviruses, and human enteroviruses 68 to 71.


title: Rabies

text: New causes of viral encephalitis are also possible, as was evidenced by the 1999 outbreak in Malaysia of 300 cases of encephalitis with a mortality rate of 40% caused by Nipah virus, a newly recognized paramyxovirus. Likewise, well-known viruses may be introduced into new locales, as is illustrated by the outbreak of encephalitis due to West Nile virus in the eastern United States.


title: Rabies

text: Almost all human exposure to rabies was fatal until a vaccine was developed in 1885 by Louis Pasteur and Émile Roux. Their original vaccine was harvested from infected rabbits, from which the virus in the nerve tissue was weakened by allowing it to dry for five to ten days. Similar nerve tissue-derived vaccines are still used in some countries, as they are much cheaper than modern cell culture vaccines.


title: Rabies

text: The human diploid cell rabies vaccine was started in 1967. Less expensive purified chicken embryo cell vaccine and purified vero cell rabies vaccine are now available. A recombinant vaccine called V-RG has been used in Belgium, France, Germany, and the United States to prevent outbreaks of rabies in undomesticated animals. Immunization before exposure has been used in both human and nonhuman populations, where, as in many jurisdictions, domesticated animals are required to be vaccinated. The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services Communicable Disease Surveillance 2007 Annual Report states the following can help reduce the risk of contracting rabies:


title: Rabies

text: 28 September is World Rabies Day, which promotes the information, prevention, and elimination of the disease.


title: Rabies

text: In Asia and in parts of the Americas and Africa, dogs remain the principal host. Mandatory vaccination of animals is less effective in rural areas. Especially in developing countries, pets may not be privately kept and their destruction may be unacceptable. Oral vaccines can be safely distributed in baits, a practice that has successfully reduced rabies in rural areas of Canada, France, and the United States. In Montreal, Quebec, Canada, baits are successfully used on raccoons in the Mount-Royal Park area. Vaccination campaigns may be expensive, but cost-benefit analysis suggests baits may be a cost-effective method of control. In Ontario, a dramatic drop in rabies was recorded when an aerial bait-vaccination campaign was launched.


title: Rabies

text: The number of recorded human deaths from rabies in the United States has dropped from 100 or more annually in the early 20th century to one or two per year due to widespread vaccination of domestic dogs and cats and the development of human vaccines and immunoglobulin treatments. Most deaths now result from bat bites, which may go unnoticed by the victim and hence untreated.


title: Rabies

text: Treatment after exposure can prevent the disease if given within 10 days. The rabies vaccine is 100% effective if given early, and still has a chance of success if delivery is delayed. Every year, more than 15 million people get vaccinated after potential exposure. While this works well, the cost is significant. In the US it is recommended people receive one dose of human rabies immunoglobulin (HRIG) and four doses of rabies vaccine over a 14-day period. HRIG is expensive and makes up most of the cost of post-exposure treatment, ranging as high as several thousand dollars. In the UK, one dose of HRIG costs the National Health Service £1,000, although this is not flagged as a "high-cost medication". A full course of vaccine costs £120–180. As much as possible of HRIG should be injected around the bites, with the remainder being given by deep intramuscular injection at a site distant from the vaccination site.


title: Rabies

text: People who have previously been vaccinated against rabies do not need to receive the immunoglobulin—only the postexposure vaccinations on days 0 and 3. The side effects of modern cell-based vaccines are similar to the side effects of flu shots. The old nerve-tissue-based vaccination required multiple injections into the abdomen with a large needle but is inexpensive. It is being phased out and replaced by affordable World Health Organization intradermal-vaccination regimens. In children less than a year old, the lateral thigh is recommended. Thoroughly washing the wound as soon as possible with soap and water for approximately five minutes is effective in reducing the number of viral particles. Povidone-iodine or alcohol is then recommended to reduce the virus further.


title: Rabies

text: Awakening to find a bat in the room, or finding a bat in the room of a previously unattended child or mentally disabled or intoxicated person, is an indication for post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP). The recommendation for the precautionary use of PEP in bat encounters where no contact is recognized has been questioned in the medical literature, based on a cost–benefit analysis. However, a 2002 study has supported the protocol of precautionary administration of PEP where a child or mentally compromised individual has been alone with a bat, especially in sleep areas, where a bite or exposure may occur with the victim being unaware.


title: Rabies

text: At least two treatment schemes have been proposed for treating rabies after the onset of symptoms, the Milwaukee Protocol and the Recife Protocol. The Milwaukee Protocol was first used in 2004 on Jeanna Giese, who became the first person known to have survived rabies without preventive treatments before symptom onset. The protocol puts a person into a chemically induced coma and uses antiviral medications to prevent fatal dysautonomia. The overall protocol is complex; the sixth version of the protocol last updated in 2018 consists of 17 pages with 22 steps of treatment, detailed monitoring, and a timeline of expected complications. The Recife Protocol follows the same principle but differs in details like termination of sedation and supplementary medication.


title: Rabies

text: Vaccination after exposure, PEP, is highly successful in preventing rabies. In unvaccinated humans, rabies is virtually always fatal after neurological symptoms have developed.


title: Rabies

text: In 2010, an estimated 26,000 people died from rabies, down from 54,000 in 1990. The majority of the deaths occurred in Asia and Africa. , India, followed by China (approximately 6,000) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (5,600), had the most cases. A 2015 collaboration between the World Health Organization, World Organization of Animal Health (OIE), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nation (FAO), and Global Alliance for Rabies Control has a goal of eliminating deaths from rabies by 2030.


title: Rabies

text: India has the highest rate of human rabies in the world, primarily because of stray dogs, whose number has greatly increased since a 2001 law forbade the killing of dogs. Effective control and treatment of rabies in India is hindered by a form of mass hysteria known as puppy pregnancy syndrome (PPS). Dog bite victims with PPS, male as well as female, become convinced that puppies are growing inside them, and often seek help from faith healers rather than medical services. An estimated 20,000 people die every year from rabies in India, more than a third of the global total.


title: Rabies

text: Australia has an official rabies-free status, although Australian bat lyssavirus (ABLV), discovered in 1996, is a strain of rabies prevalent in Australian native bat populations.


title: Rabies

text: Canine-specific rabies has been eradicated in the United States. But rabies is common among wild animals in the United States, and an average of 100 dogs become infected from other wildlife each year.


title: Rabies

text: Due to high public awareness of the virus, efforts at vaccination of domestic animals and curtailment of feral populations, and availability of postexposure prophylaxis, incidence of rabies in humans is very rare in the United States. From 1960 to 2018, a total of 125 human rabies cases were reported in the United States; 36 (28%) were attributed to dog bites during international travel. Among the 89 infections acquired in the United States, 62 (70%) were attributed to bats. The most recent rabies death in the United States was an Illinois man who refused treatment after waking up in the night with a bat on his neck; the man died a month later. Occurring in 2021, it was the first case of human rabies in the United States in nearly three years.


title: Rabies

text: Either no or very few cases of rabies are reported each year in Europe; cases are contracted both during travel and in Europe.


title: Rabies

text: In Switzerland the disease was virtually eliminated after scientists placed chicken heads laced with live attenuated vaccine in the Swiss Alps. The foxes of Switzerland, proven to be the main source of rabies in the country, ate the chicken heads and immunized themselves.


title: Rabies

text: Italy, after being declared rabies-free from 1997 to 2008, has witnessed a reemergence of the disease in wild animals in the Triveneto regions (Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol, Veneto and Friuli-Venezia Giulia), due to the spreading of an epidemic in the Balkans that also affected Austria. An extensive wild animal vaccination campaign eliminated the virus from Italy again, and it regained the rabies-free country status in 2013, the last reported case of rabies being reported in a red fox in early 2011.


title: Rabies

text: The United Kingdom has been free of rabies since the early 20th century except for a rabies-like virus (EBLV-2) in a few Daubenton's bats. There has been one fatal case of EBLV-2 transmission to a human. There have been four deaths from rabies, transmitted abroad by dog bites, since 2000. The last infection in the UK occurred in 1922, and the last death from indigenous rabies was in 1902.


title: Rabies

text: Sweden and mainland Norway have been free of rabies since 1886. Bat rabies antibodies (but not the virus) have been found in bats. On Svalbard, animals can cross the arctic ice from Greenland or Russia.


title: Rabies

text: Mexico was certified by the World Health Organization as being free of dog-transmitted rabies in 2019 because no case of dog-human transmission had been recorded in two years.


title: Rabies

text: Rabies has been known since around 2000 BC. The first written record of rabies is in the Mesopotamian Codex of Eshnunna (), which dictates that the owner of a dog showing symptoms of rabies should take preventive measures against bites. If another person were bitten by a rabid dog and later died, the owner was heavily fined.


title: Rabies

text: Ineffective folk remedies abounded in the medical literature of the ancient world. The physician Scribonius Largus prescribed a poultice of cloth and hyena skin; Antaeus recommended a preparation made from the skull of a hanged man.


title: Rabies

text: Rabies appears to have originated in the Old World, the first epizootic in the New World occurring in Boston in 1768.


title: Rabies

text: Rabies was considered a scourge for its prevalence in the 19th century. In France and Belgium, where Saint Hubert was venerated, the "St Hubert's Key" was heated and applied to cauterize the wound. By an application of magical thinking, dogs were branded with the key in hopes of protecting them from rabies.


title: Rabies

text: It was not uncommon for a person bitten by a dog merely suspected of being rabid to commit suicide or to be killed by others.


title: Rabies

text: In ancient times the attachment of the tongue (the lingual frenulum, a mucous membrane) was cut and removed as this was where rabies was thought to originate. This practice ceased with the discovery of the actual cause of rabies. Louis Pasteur's 1885 nerve tissue vaccine was successful, and was progressively improved to reduce often severe side-effects.


title: Rabies

text: In modern times, the fear of rabies has not diminished, and the disease and its symptoms, particularly agitation, have served as an inspiration for several works of zombie or similarly themed fiction, often portraying rabies as having mutated into a stronger virus which fills humans with murderous rage or incurable illness, bringing about a devastating, widespread pandemic.


title: Rabies

text: Rabies is infectious to mammals; three stages of central nervous system infection are recognized. The first stage is a one- to three-day period characterized by behavioral changes and is known as the prodromal stage. The second is the excitative stage, which lasts three to four days. This stage is often known as "furious rabies" for the tendency of the affected animal to be hyper-reactive to external stimuli and bite at anything near. The third is the paralytic stage and is caused by damage to motor neurons. Incoordination is seen, owing to rear limb paralysis, and drooling and difficulty swallowing is caused by paralysis of facial and throat muscles. Death is usually caused by respiratory arrest.


title: Rabies

text: The outer shell of the rabies virus, stripped of its RNA contents and thus unable to cause disease, may be used as a vector for the delivery of unrelated genetic material in a research setting. It has the advantage over other pseudotyping methods for gene delivery in that the cell targeting (tissue tropism) is more specific for the central nervous system, a difficult-to-reach site, obviating the need for invasive delivery methods. It is also capable of infecting neighboring "upstream" cells, moving from one cell to axons of the next at synapses, and is thus used for retrograde tracing in neuronal circuits.


title: Rabies

text: Evidence indicates artificially increasing the permeability of the blood–brain barrier, which normally does not allow most immune cells across, promotes viral clearance.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Simo Häyhä (; 17December 1905 1April 2002), often referred to by his nickname, The White Death (; ), was a Finnish military sniper in World War II during the 1939–1940 Winter War against the Soviet Union. He used a Finnish-produced M/28-30 (a variant of the Mosin–Nagant rifle) and a Suomi KP/-31 submachine gun. He is believed to have killed over 500 men during the Winter War, the highest number of sniper kills in any major war. Because of this he is often considered as the deadliest sniper of all time.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä estimated in his private war memoir that he shot around 500 enemy soldiers. The memoir, titled ("War memoirs"), was written in 1940, a few months after he was wounded, and described his experiences in the Winter War from 30 November 1939 to 13 March 1940. Hidden for decades, the memoir was discovered in 2017.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä was born in the Kiiskinen hamlet of the Rautjärvi municipality in the Viipuri Province of southern Finland near the border with Russia. He was the seventh of eight children in a Lutheran family of farmers; his father, Juho Häyhä, was the owner of the Mattila farm while Simo's mother, Katriina (née Vilkko) was a loving and hard-working farmer's wife. He attended school in the village of Miettilä in Kivennapa parish and cultivated his home farm together with his eldest brother. He was a farmer, hunter, and skier prior to his military service.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä joined the Finnish voluntary militia Civil Guard ("Suojeluskunta") at the age of 17. He was successful in shooting competitions in the Viipuri Province; his home was reportedly full of trophies for marksmanship. He was not keen to hog the spotlight, and accordingly in group photos from his youth he usually stood at the back, until his later successes forced him to take centre stage.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: In 1925, at the age of 19, Häyhä began his 15-month compulsory military service in the Bicycle Battalion 2 in Raivola, Viipuri Province. He attended the Non-Commissioned Officer School and served as a conscript officer in the Bicycle Battalion 1 in Terijoki. However, he did not receive formal sniper training until a year before the war in 1938 at a training centre in Utti.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: According to Major Tapio Saarelainen—who met Häyhä several times and has written five books about him, including his biography—Häyhä was able to estimate distances with an accuracy of 1 metre (3.3 ft) up to 150 metres (500 ft). Saarelainen notes that during his Civil Guard training, Häyhä once hit a target 16 times from 150 metres away in just one minute. "This was an unbelievable accomplishment with a bolt action rifle, considering that each cartridge had to be manually fed with a fixed magazine that held together five cartridges."


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä served as a sniper in the Finnish Army during the 1939–40 Winter War between Finland and the Soviet Union, under Lieutenant Aarne Juutilainen in the 6th Company of Infantry Regiment 34 (, or "JR 34") during the Battle of Kollaa in temperatures between . He was dressed completely in white camouflage; Soviet troops were not issued camouflage uniforms for most of the war, making them easily visible to snipers in winter conditions. Joseph Stalin had purged military experts in the late 1930s as part of the Great Purge, and the Red Army was consequently highly disorganized.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Finnish sources state that Häyhä was nicknamed "The White Death" by the Red Army (, ; ; ). The name "White Death" has been suggested to originate entirely in Finnish propaganda, rather than having been given to Häyhä by the Russians; according to information from prisoners, to the Russians "White Death" referred to a severe frost in the deep forest. Häyhä having the nickname "White Death" first appeared in the Finnish Winter War literature of the late 1980s. During the war, the "White Death" was one of the leading themes of Finnish propaganda. Finnish newspapers frequently featured the invisible Finnish soldier, thus creating a hero of mythical proportions. To add to the myth, he was also nicknamed "The Magic Shooter" among Finns (, in close reference to the Finnish word for "sniper"; ).


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä's war memoir states that they captured a Soviet soldier, blindfolded him, spun him around until he was disoriented, and then took him to a party in the tent of Häyhä's company Lieutenant Aarne "The Terror of Morocco" Juutilainen. The Soviet soldier was overjoyed by the carousing and was disappointed when he was released.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: All of Häyhä's kills were accomplished in less than 100 days, an average of five per day at a time of year with very few daylight hours. His kill count as a sniper was based on his own reporting, with the confirmation of his comrades, and only those who were verified to be dead were counted. No count was taken when several snipers shot at the same target. Men killed with a submachine gun with Häyhä as a group leader were not counted.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä's division commander Antero Svensson credited him with 219 confirmed kills with a rifle and an equal number of kills by submachine gun, when he awarded Häyhä with an honorary rifle on 17 February 1940. On 21 December 1939, Häyhä achieved his highest daily count of 25 kills. In his diary, military chaplain Antti Rantamaa reported 259 confirmed kills made by rifle and an equal number of kills by submachine gun from the beginning of the war until 7 March 1940, one day after Häyhä was severely wounded. Later in his book, Rantamaa credited Häyhä with a total of 542 kills.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Some of Häyhä's figures are from a Finnish Army document, counted from the beginning of the war, 30 November 1939:


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä never discussed it publicly, but his own private memoir, discovered in 2017, states a number. He begins by stating that "this is his sin list", and estimates the total number he shot to be around 500.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Finnish historian Risto Marjomaa questions the large number, as confirmation of casualties was difficult due to the absence of the bodies. In his article, published by the "National Biography of Finland", Marjomaa credited Häyhä with the total number of "more than two hundred" kills. Complicating matters further is the use of Häyhä's achievements as a tool of propaganda: the Finnish press built a hero's myth around Häyhä at the early stage of the war.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä used his issued Civil Guard rifle, an early series SAKO M/28-30, serial number 35281, Civil Guard number S60974. It was a Finnish Civil Guard variant of the Mosin–Nagant rifle known as "Pystykorva" ( due to the front sight's resemblance to the head of a spitz-type dog) chambered in the Finnish-designed Mosin–Nagant cartridge 7.62×53R. When fighting as a group leader with the rest of his unit, he used a Suomi KP/-31 submachine gun.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä preferred iron sights over telescopic sights, as they enable a sniper to present a smaller target for the enemy (a sniper must raise his head a few centimetres higher when using a telescopic sight), and can be relied on even in extreme cold, unlike telescopic sights which tend to cloud up in cold weather. Another disadvantage of telescopic sights is that sunlight may reflect off the lenses and reveal the sniper's position. Häyhä did not have prior training with scoped rifles, and therefore preferred not to switch to the Soviet scoped rifle (M/91-30 PE or PEM).


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä dealt with the intense cold by dressing properly with multiple layers of clothing. He kept sugar and bread in his pockets, consuming them for the calories necessary to keep his body warm. His slight stature of assisted him in disguising his position. Hidden in a snow pit, he could lie still and observe the enemy for long periods of time. It was Häyhä's custom to move, well before daybreak, to the position he had prepared, and stay there until after sunset. He would frequently pack dense mounds of snow in front of his position to conceal himself, provide padding for his rifle, and reduce the characteristic puff of snow stirred up by the muzzle blast. He was known to keep snow in his mouth while sniping to prevent his breath in the cold air from giving away his position.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: On 6 March 1940, Häyhä was severely wounded after an explosive bullet fired by a Red Army soldier hit his lower left jaw. After the battle, as he appeared to be dead, he was placed on a pile of dead bodies. A fellow soldier, under orders from his commanding officer, searched for Häyhä, noticed a leg twitching among the pile and found Häyhä alive, although unconscious. He was evacuated by fellow soldiers who said that "half his face was missing". The bullet had removed his upper jaw, most of his lower jaw, and most of his left cheek.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Rumours of Häyhä's death spread around in Finland and the Soviet Union. He regained consciousness a week later on 13 March, the day that peace was declared. He read about his own death in a newspaper, and sent a letter to the paper to correct the misunderstanding. He spent 14 months recovering from his wounds and endured 26 surgeries.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä wished to serve in the Continuation War (1941–1944). However, he was excused due to the severity of his facial injuries, from which he was still recovering.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä was awarded the First and Second class Medals of Liberty, as well as the Third and Fourth class Crosses of Liberty. The latter two were normally granted to only commissioned officers. As an additional honour, on 17 February 1940, he received a nameplated SAKO M/28-30 “Pystykorva” Honorary Rifle (serial number 100 781), donated by Eugen Johansson, a Swedish businessman and supporter of Finland. According to an unofficial count, he had shot 219 Red Army soldiers at the time. He later donated the rifle to the Karelia Jaeger Battalion's Heritage Room, from where it was transferred to the Finnish Military Museum's collection after the dissolution of the North Karelia Brigade in 2013.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Shortly after the Winter War, on 28 August 1940, Finnish Field Marshal Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim promoted Häyhä straight from alikersantti (the lowest military rank of a non-commissioned officer) to vänrikki (the first military rank of an officer). In 1941, Häyhä was also nominated as a Knight of the Mannerheim Cross, the most distinguished Finnish military honour. However, the nomination remained "under consideration". He also received the Kollaa fighters' medal, the silver version of the Cross of Kollaa Battle, number 4.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: The Kollaa and Simo Häyhä Museum (Kollaa ja Simo Häyhä -museo) is located in the village of Miettilä at Rautjärvi, in a former infirmary. The museum, opened in 1983, covers the Battle of Kollaa, and features a special permanent exhibition dedicated to the life of Simo Häyhä.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: It took several years for Häyhä to recuperate from his wound which required lengthy treatments and several surgeries. Although his face remained disfigured, he otherwise made a full recovery. After World War II, he was given a farm in Valkjärvi ("Whitelake"), Ruokolahti, a small municipality located in southeastern Finland near the Russian border. He became a successful moose hunter and dog breeder. In addition to farming, he enjoyed hunting, and his hunting parties over the years included the President of Finland, Urho Kekkonen.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: However, some people did not approve of his actions during the Winter War; he was met with hate and even death threats. The injuries he sustained in the war left recognizable facial scars, so as a well-known person, he avoided large groups of people. He never married, and lived as a bachelor. He enjoyed working, but he suffered from loneliness and fear; nights were especially difficult for him. However, he had friends and also spent time at his parents' and siblings' homes after the war. Eventually farm work became too difficult, so he put the farm up for rent, and moved to an apartment building in the centre of Ruokolahti.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä was known as a modest man who never boasted of his wartime merits. He rarely spoke of the war and his experiences. When asked in 1998 how he had become such a good sniper, he replied simply: "Practice". In an Independence Day interview with "Helsingin Sanomat" in December 2001, shortly before his 96th birthday, Häyhä opened up about his war experiences. He was asked if he felt remorse for having killed so many people. He replied, "I did what I was told to do, as well as I could. There would be no Finland unless everyone else had done the same."


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä spent his last years in a war veterans' nursing home in Hamina, where he died in 2002 at the age of 96. He was buried in his home town of Ruokolahti. He never married and had no children.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Swedish heavy metal band Sabaton composed the song "White Death" in honor of Häyhä, which was released in 2010 on their album "Coat of Arms". Scottish black/thrash metal band Achren's three-song "The White Death" EP from 2014 is dedicated entirely to Häyhä, right down to the cover art. Japanese metal band Yog = Sothoth has made a song called "Simo Hayha", which appears on the 2015 "To Mega Therion" album.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: In 2011, Philip Kaufman began filming HBO's "Hemingway & Gellhorn" (first airdate 28 May 2012), which features Martha Gellhorn (played by Nicole Kidman) reporting from Finland during the Winter War. In this section, Steven Wiig portrays Häyhä, leading a group of Finnish soldiers to shelter.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: A film about Häyhä called "The White Death" has been planned since 2017. The film is directed by David McElroy and written by James Poirier.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: American author Arna Bontemps Hemenway has written a short story about Häyhä, called "Wolves of Karelia", which was published in the August 2019 issue of "The Atlantic" magazine.


title: Simo Häyhä

text: Häyhä's story has been adapted in two manga, in one called "The White Witch" (, "Shiroi Majo") by Nagakawa Naruki, the main character is named Simo Häyhä, but is female. He also appears in the manga "Record of Ragnarok" (, "Shūmatsu no Warukyūre") by Shinya Umemura and Takumi Fukui, in which he is depicted as a fighter for humanity.


title: Michael Richards

text: Michael Anthony Richards (born July 24, 1949) is an American actor, writer, television producer, and comedian best known for playing Cosmo Kramer on the television sitcom "Seinfeld". He began his career as a stand-up comedian, first entering the national spotlight when he was featured on Billy Crystal's first cable TV special. He went on to become a series regular on ABC's "Fridays". He made numerous guest appearances on a variety of television shows, such as "Cheers". His film credits include "So I Married an Axe Murderer", "Airheads", "Young Doctors in Love", "Problem Child", "Coneheads", "UHF", and "Trial and Error", one of his few starring roles.


title: Michael Richards

text: From 1989 to 1998, he played Cosmo Kramer on "Seinfeld", three times receiving the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series. During the run of "Seinfeld", he made a guest appearance in "Mad About You". After "Seinfeld", he starred in his own sitcom, "The Michael Richards Show", which was cancelled after 2 months.


title: Michael Richards

text: When "Seinfeld" ended in 1998, Richards returned to stand-up comedy. He incited controversy in 2006 after a video was obtained by TMZ of him going on a racist tirade against hecklers while performing at the Laugh Factory. The incident severely damaged his career, and due to significant media coverage of the event, he announced his retirement from stand-up in early 2007. In 2009 he appeared as himself in the seventh season of "Curb Your Enthusiasm", alongside his fellow "Seinfeld" cast members for the first time since that show’s finale, as well as lampooning his incident at the Laugh Factory. In 2013, he portrayed Frank in the sitcom "Kirstie", which was cancelled after one season.


title: Michael Richards

text: Richards was born in Culver City, California, to a Catholic family. He is the son of Phyllis (née Nardozzi), a medical records librarian of Italian descent, and William Richards, an electrical engineer of Scottish and English descent. His father died in a car crash when Michael was two and his mother never remarried.


title: Michael Richards

text: Richards graduated from Thousand Oaks High School. In 1968, he appeared as a contestant on "The Dating Game", although was not chosen for the date. He was drafted into the United States Army in 1970. He trained as a medic and was stationed in West Germany where he was a member of a theatrical group called The Training Road Show. After being honorably discharged, he used the benefits of the G.I. Bill to enroll in the California Institute of the Arts, and received a BA degree in drama from The Evergreen State College in 1975. He also had a short-lived improv act with Ed Begley Jr. During this period, he enrolled at Los Angeles Valley College and continued to appear in student productions.


title: Michael Richards

text: Richards got his big TV break in 1979, appearing in Billy Crystal's first cable TV special. In 1980, he began as one of the cast members on ABC's "Fridays" television show, where Larry David was a fellow cast member and writer. It included a famous instance where Andy Kaufman refused to deliver his scripted lines, leading Richards to bring the cue cards on screen to Kaufman, causing him to throw his drink into Richards's face before a small riot ensued (Richards later claimed he was in on the joke). The film "Man on the Moon" featured a re-enactment of the Andy Kaufman incident where Richards was portrayed by actor Norm Macdonald (although he is never referred to by name, so he could be seen as a composite character taking the place of Richards).


title: Michael Richards

text: In 1986, Richards had a minor role in the cult satirical TV miniseries "Fresno", playing one of a pair of inept criminal henchmen. In 1989, Richards had a supporting role in "Weird Al" Yankovic's comedy film "UHF" as janitor Stanley Spadowski. On television, he appeared in "Miami Vice" as an unscrupulous bookie; in "St. Elsewhere" as a television producer making a documentary about Dr. Mark Craig; in "Cheers" as a character trying to collect on an old bet with Sam Malone; and made several guest appearances with Jay Leno as an accident-prone fitness expert.


title: Michael Richards

text: According to an interview with executive producer David Hoberman, ABC first conceived the series "Monk" as a procedural police comedy with an Inspector Clouseau-like character suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder. Hoberman said ABC wanted Richards to play Adrian Monk, but he turned it down.


title: Michael Richards

text: In 1989, Richards was cast as Cosmo Kramer in the NBC television series "Seinfeld", created by fellow "Fridays" cast member Larry David and comedian Jerry Seinfeld. Although it got off to a slow start, by the mid-1990s it had become one of the most popular sitcoms in television history. It ended its nine-year run in 1998 at No. 1 in the Nielsen ratings. In "Seinfeld", Kramer is the across the hall neighbor of the show's eponymous character, and is usually referred to only by his last name. His first name, Cosmo, was revealed in the sixth-season episode "The Switch".


title: Michael Richards

text: Richards won more Emmys than any other "Seinfeld" cast member, taking home the award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series in 1993, 1994, and 1997.


title: Michael Richards

text: Starting in 2004, he and his fellow "Seinfeld" cast members provided interviews and audio commentaries for the "Seinfeld" DVDs. Richards stepped down from providing audio commentary after Season5, though he continued to provide interviews.


title: Michael Richards

text: In 2000, after the end of "Seinfeld", Richards began work on a new series for NBC, his first major project since "Seinfeld"s finale. "The Michael Richards Show", for which Richards received co-writer and co-executive producer credits, was conceived as a comedy/mystery starring Richards as a bumbling private investigator. When the first pilot failed with test audiences, NBC ordered that the show be retooled into a more conventional, office-based sitcom before its premiere. After a few weeks of poor ratings and negative reviews, it was cancelled.


title: Michael Richards

text: During a performance on November 17, 2006, at the Laugh Factory in Hollywood, California, Richards launched into a racist rant in response to repeated heckling and interruptions from a small group of Black and Hispanic audience members. Richards was recorded shouting "He's a nigger!" several times and making references to lynching and the Jim Crow era. Kyle Doss, a member of the group that Richards addressed, said the group had arrived in the middle of the performance and were "being a little loud". According to Doss:


title: Michael Richards

text: Three days after the incident, Richards made a public apology via satellite on the "Late Show with David Letterman", saying: "For me to be at a comedy club and to flip out and say this crap, I'm deeply, deeply sorry. I'm not a racist, that's what's so insane about this." Many studio audience members laughed as Richards began his unscripted explanation and apology, leading show guest Jerry Seinfeld to reprimand them, saying: "Stop laughing. It's not funny." Richards said he had been trying to defuse the heckling by being even more outrageous, but it had backfired. He later called civil rights leaders Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson to apologize. He also appeared as a guest on Jackson's syndicated radio show. Doss stated that he did not accept Richards's apology, saying: "If he wanted to apologize, he could have contacted ... one of us out of the group. But, he didn't. He apologized on camera just because the tape got out."


title: Michael Richards

text: The incident was parodied on several TV shows, including "Mad TV", "Family Guy", "South Park", "Extras", and "Monday Night Raw". In an episode of "Curb Your Enthusiasm", Richards appeared as himself and poked fun at the incident. In a 2012 episode of Seinfeld's web series "Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee", Richards explained that the outburst still haunted him, and was a major reason for his retirement from stand-up.


title: Michael Richards

text: Comedian Paul Mooney also cited the incident as a key factor leading to his decision to remove the racial slur from his own live performances.


title: Michael Richards

text: Richards played himself in Episode2 of Season1 "The Flirt Episode" (1992) of the HBO series "The Larry Sanders Show". He also had a cameo role in the comedy thriller film "So I Married an Axe Murderer", credited as "insensitive man". He played radio station employee Doug Beech in "Airheads", and co-starred with Jeff Daniels as an actor pretending to be a lawyer in 1997's "Trial and Error". He also made guest appearances on "Miami Vice", "Night Court" and "Cheers". In 2007, he voiced character Bud Ditchwater in the animated film "Bee Movie", which starred and was produced by Jerry Seinfeld. In 2009, Richards and the other main "Seinfeld" cast members appeared in the seventh season of "Curb Your Enthusiasm". In 2012, Richards appeared in comedy web series "Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee", hosted by Jerry Seinfeld. In 2014, he appeared as the president of Crackle in a trailer for Season5. Seinfeld said the trailer's storyline would be expanded on in one of the episodes. In the comedy book SuperMega Saves the Troops written by Matt Watson and Ryan Magee, Michael Richards was a key character as an undercover spy.


title: Michael Richards

text: Richards played Frank in the sitcom "Kirstie", costarring Kirstie Alley and Rhea Perlman. It premiered on TV Land on December 4, 2013 and was canceled after one season.


title: Michael Richards

text: Richards was married to Cathleen Lyons, a family therapist, for 18 years. They have one daughter, Sophia. They separated in 1992 and divorced the following year.


title: Michael Richards

text: In 2010, Richards married his girlfriend Beth Skipp. They have been together since 2002 and have one son.


title: John Cleese

text: John Marwood Cleese ( ; born 27 October 1939) is an English actor, comedian, screenwriter, and producer. Emerging from the Cambridge Footlights in the 1960s, he first achieved success at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and as a scriptwriter and performer on "The Frost Report". In the late 1960s, he co-founded Monty Python, the comedy troupe responsible for the sketch show "Monty Python's Flying Circus." Along with his Python co-stars Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin and Graham Chapman, Cleese starred in Monty Python films, which include "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" (1975), "Life of Brian" (1979) and "The Meaning of Life" (1983).


title: John Cleese

text: In the mid-1970s, Cleese and first wife Connie Booth co-wrote the sitcom "Fawlty Towers", in which he starred as hotel owner Basil Fawlty, for which he won the 1980 British Academy Television Award for Best Entertainment Performance. In 2000 the show topped the British Film Institute's list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes; and in a 2001 Channel 4 poll, Basil was ranked second on its list of the 100 Greatest TV Characters.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese co-starred with Kevin Kline, Jamie Lee Curtis, and former Python colleague Michael Palin in "A Fish Called Wanda" (1988) and "Fierce Creatures" (1997), both of which he also wrote. For "A Fish Called Wanda" he was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. He has also starred in "Time Bandits" (1981) and "Rat Race" (2001) and has appeared in many other films, including "Silverado" (1985), "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein" (1994), two "James Bond" films (as R and Q), two "Harry Potter" films (as Nearly Headless Nick) and the last three "Shrek" films.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese has specialised in political and religious satire, black comedy, sketch comedy, and surreal humour. He was ranked the second best comedian ever in a 2005 Channel 4 poll of fellow comedians. With "Yes Minister" writer Antony Jay, he co-founded Video Arts, a production company making entertaining training films. In 1976, Cleese co-founded "The Secret Policeman's Ball" benefit shows to raise funds for the human rights organization Amnesty International. Formerly a staunch supporter of the Liberal Democrats, in 1999 he turned down an offer from the party to nominate him for a life peerage. In 2022, he joined the revival SDP and spoke at their 2022 party conference.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese was born in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, England, the only child of Reginald Francis Cleese (1893–1972), an insurance salesman, and his wife Muriel Evelyn ("née" Cross, 1899–2000), the daughter of an auctioneer. His family's surname was originally Cheese, but his father had thought it was embarrassing and used the name Cleese when he enlisted in the Army during the First World War; he changed it officially by deed poll in 1923. As a child, Cleese supported Bristol City and Somerset County Cricket Club. Cleese was educated at St Peter's Preparatory School (paid for by money his mother inherited), where he received a prize for English and did well at cricket and boxing. When he was 13, he was awarded an exhibition at Clifton College, an English public school in Bristol. He was already more than 6 feet (1.83 m) tall by then.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese allegedly defaced the school grounds, as a prank, by painting footprints to suggest that the statue of Field Marshal Earl Haig had got down from his plinth and gone to the toilet. Cleese played cricket in the First XI and did well academically, passing eight O-Levels and three A-Levels in mathematics, physics and chemistry. In his autobiography "So, Anyway", he says that discovering, aged 17, he had not been made a house prefect by his housemaster affected his outlook: "It was not fair and therefore it was unworthy of my respect... I believe that this moment changed my perspective on the world."


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese could not go straight to Cambridge, as the ending of National Service meant there were twice the usual number of applicants for places, so he returned to his prep school for two years to teach science, English, geography, history, and Latin (he drew on his Latin teaching experience later for a scene in "Life of Brian", in which he corrects Brian's badly written Latin graffiti). He then took up a place he had won at Downing College, Cambridge, to read law. He also joined the Cambridge Footlights. He recalled that he went to the Cambridge Guildhall, where each university society had a stall, and went up to the Footlights stall, where he was asked if he could sing or dance. He replied "no" as he was not allowed to sing at his school because he was so bad, and if there was anything worse than his singing, it was his dancing. He was then asked "Well, what do you do?" to which he replied, "I make people laugh."


title: John Cleese

text: At the Footlights theatrical club, Cleese spent a lot of time with Tim Brooke-Taylor and Bill Oddie and met his future writing partner Graham Chapman. Cleese wrote extra material for the 1961 Footlights Revue "I Thought I Saw It Move", and was registrar for the Footlights Club during 1962. He was also in the cast of the 1962 Footlights Revue "Double Take!" Cleese graduated from Cambridge in 1963 with an upper second. Despite his successes on "The Frost Report", his father sent him cuttings from "The Daily Telegraph" offering management jobs in places like Marks & Spencer.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese was a scriptwriter, as well as a cast member, for the 1963 Footlights Revue "A Clump of Plinths". The revue was so successful at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe that it was renamed "Cambridge Circus" and taken to the West End in London and then on a tour of New Zealand and Broadway, with the cast also appearing in some of the revue's sketches on "The Ed Sullivan Show" in October 1964.


title: John Cleese

text: After "Cambridge Circus", Cleese briefly stayed in America, performing on and off-Broadway. While performing in the musical "Half a Sixpence", Cleese met future Python Terry Gilliam as well as American actress Connie Booth, whom he married on 20 February 1968. At their wedding at a Unitarian Church in Manhattan, the couple attempted to ensure an absence of any theistic language. "The only moment of disappointment," Cleese recalled, "came at the very end of the service when I discovered that I'd failed to excise one particular mention of the word 'God.'" Later, Booth became a writing partner.


title: John Cleese

text: He was soon offered work as a writer with BBC Radio, where he worked on several programmes, most notably as a sketch writer for "The Dick Emery Show". The success of the Footlights Revue led to the recording of a short series of half-hour radio programmes, called "I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again", which were so popular that the BBC commissioned a regular series with the same title that ran from 1965 to 1974. Cleese returned to Britain and joined the cast. In many episodes, he is credited as "John Otto Cleese" (according to Jem Roberts, this may have been due to the embarrassment of his actual middle name Marwood).


title: John Cleese

text: Also in 1965, Cleese and Chapman began writing on "The Frost Report". The writing staff chosen for "The Frost Report" consisted of a number of writers and performers who went on to make names for themselves in comedy. They included co-performers from "I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again" and future Goodies Bill Oddie and Tim Brooke-Taylor, and also Frank Muir, Barry Cryer, Marty Feldman, Ronnie Barker, Ronnie Corbett, Dick Vosburgh and future Python members Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin. While working on "The Frost Report", the future Pythons developed the writing styles that would make their collaboration significant. Cleese's and Chapman's sketches often involved authority figures, some of whom were performed by Cleese, while Jones and Palin were both infatuated with filmed scenes that opened with idyllic countryside panoramas. Idle was one of those charged with writing David Frost's monologue. During this period Cleese met and befriended influential British comedian Peter Cook, eventually collaborating with Cook on several projects and forming a close friendship that lasted until Cook's death in 1995.


title: John Cleese

text: It was as a performer on "The Frost Report" that Cleese achieved his breakthrough on British television as a comedy actor, appearing as the tall, "upper class" patrician figure in the classic "Class" sketch (screened on 7 April 1966), contrasting comically in a line-up with the shorter, "middle class" Ronnie Barker and the even shorter, "working class" Ronnie Corbett. The British Film Institute commented, "Its twinning of height and social position, combined with a minimal script, created a classic TV moment." This series was so popular that in 1966 Cleese and Chapman were invited to work as writers and performers with Brooke-Taylor and Feldman on "At Last the 1948 Show", during which time the "Four Yorkshiremen sketch" was written by all four writers/performers (the Four Yorkshiremen sketch is now better known as a Monty Python sketch).


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese and Chapman also wrote episodes for the first series of "Doctor in the House" (and later Cleese wrote six episodes of "Doctor at Large" on his own in 1971). These series were successful, and in 1969 Cleese and Chapman were offered their very own series. However, owing to Chapman's alcoholism, Cleese found himself bearing an increasing workload in the partnership and was, therefore, unenthusiastic about doing a series with just the two of them. He had found working with Palin on "The Frost Report" an enjoyable experience and invited him to join the series. Palin had previously been working on "Do Not Adjust Your Set" with Idle and Jones, with Terry Gilliam creating the animations. The four of them had, on the back of the success of "Do Not Adjust Your Set", been offered a series for Thames Television, which they were waiting to begin when Cleese's offer arrived. Palin agreed to work with Cleese and Chapman in the meantime, bringing with him Gilliam, Jones, and Idle.


title: John Cleese

text: "Monty Python's Flying Circus" ran for four series from October 1969 to December 1974 on BBC Television, though Cleese quit the show after the third. Cleese's two primary characterisations were as a sophisticate and a loony. He portrayed the former as a series of announcers, TV show hosts, and government officials (for example, "The Ministry of Silly Walks"). The latter is perhaps best represented in the "Cheese Shop" and by Cleese's Mr Praline character, the man with a dead Norwegian Blue parrot and a menagerie of other animals all named "Eric". He was also known for his working class "Sergeant Major" character, who worked as a Police Sergeant, Roman Centurion, etc. Cleese also appeared during some abrupt scene changes as a radio commentator (usually outfitted in a dinner suit) where, in a rather pompous manner, he would make the formal and determined announcement "And now for something completely different", which later became the title of the first Monty Python film.


title: John Cleese

text: Along with Gilliam's animations, Cleese's work with Graham Chapman provided Python with its darkest and angriest moments, and many of his characters display the seething suppressed rage that later characterised his portrayal of Basil Fawlty.


title: John Cleese

text: Unlike Palin and Jones, Cleese and Chapman wrote together in the same room; Cleese claims that their writing partnership involved him doing most of the work, while Chapman sat back, not speaking for long periods before suddenly coming out with an idea that often elevated the sketch to a new level. A classic example of this is the "Dead Parrot sketch", envisaged by Cleese as a satire on poor customer service, which was originally to have involved a broken toaster and later a broken car (this version was actually performed and broadcast on the pre-Python special "How to Irritate People"). It was Chapman's suggestion to change the faulty item into a dead parrot, and he also suggested that the parrot be specifically a "Norwegian Blue", giving the sketch a surreal air which made it far more memorable.


title: John Cleese

text: Their humour often involved ordinary people in ordinary situations behaving absurdly for no obvious reason. Like Chapman, Cleese's poker face, clipped middle class accent, and intimidating height allowed him to appear convincingly as a variety of authority figures, such as policemen, detectives, Nazi officers or government officials, which he then proceeded to undermine. In the "Ministry of Silly Walks" sketch (written by Palin and Jones), for example, Cleese exploits his stature as the crane-legged civil servant performing a grotesquely elaborate walk to his office. On the Silly Walks sketch, Ben Beaumont-Thomas in "The Guardian" writes, "Cleese is utterly deadpan as he takes the stereotypical bowler-hatted political drone and ruthlessly skewers him. All the self-importance, bureaucratic inefficiency and laughable circuitousness of Whitehall is summed up in one balletic extension of his slender leg."


title: John Cleese

text: Chapman and Cleese also specialised in sketches wherein two characters conducted highly articulate arguments over completely arbitrary subjects, such as in the "cheese shop", the "dead parrot" sketch and "Argument Clinic", where Cleese plays a stone-faced bureaucrat employed to sit behind a desk and engage people in pointless, trivial bickering. All of these roles were opposite Palin (who Cleese often claims is his favourite Python to work with)—the comic contrast between the towering Cleese's crazed aggression and the shorter Palin's shuffling inoffensiveness is a common feature in the series. Occasionally, the typical Cleese–Palin dynamic is reversed, as in "Fish Licence", wherein Palin plays the bureaucrat with whom Cleese is trying to work.


title: John Cleese

text: Though "Flying Circus" lasted four series, by the start of series 3, Cleese was growing tired of dealing with Chapman's alcoholism. He felt, too, that the show's scripts had declined in quality. For these reasons, he became restless and decided to move on. Though he stayed for the third series, he officially left the group before the fourth season. Cleese received a credit on three episodes of the fourth series which used material from these sessions, though he was officially unconnected with the fourth series. He remained friendly with the group, and all six began writing "Monty Python and the Holy Grail". Much of his work on "Holy Grail" remains widely quoted, including the Black Knight scene. Cleese returned to the troupe to co-write and co-star in two further Monty Python films, "Monty Python's Life of Brian" and "Monty Python's The Meaning of Life". His attack on Roman rule in "Life of Brian"–when he asks "What have the Romans ever done for us?", before being met with a string of benefits including sanitation, roads and public order–was ranked the seventh funniest line in film in a 2002 poll. Since the last Python film ("Meaning of Life" in 1983) Cleese has participated in various live performances with the group over the years.


title: John Cleese

text: From 1970 to 1973, Cleese served as rector of the University of St Andrews. His election proved a milestone for the university, revolutionising and modernising the post. For instance, the rector was traditionally entitled to appoint an "assessor", a deputy to sit in his place at important meetings in his absence. Cleese changed this into a position for a student, elected across campus by the student body, resulting in direct access and representation for the student body.


title: John Cleese

text: Around this time, Cleese worked with comedian Les Dawson on his sketch/stand-up show "Sez Les". The differences between the two physically (the tall, lean Cleese and the short, stout Dawson) and socially (the public school and the Cambridge-educated Cleese vs. the working class, self-educated Mancunian Dawson) were marked, but both worked well together from series 8 onwards until the series ended in 1976.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese appeared on a single, "Superspike", with Bill Oddie and a group of UK athletes, billed the "Superspike Squad", to fund the latter's attendance at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese starred in the low-budget spoof of the Sherlock Holmes detective series "The Strange Case of the End of Civilization as We Know It" (1977) as the grandson of the world's greatest consulting detective. In December 1977, Cleese appeared as a guest star on "The Muppet Show". Ranked one of the best guest stars to appear on the show, Cleese was a fan of "The Muppet Show" and co-wrote much of the episode. In it he is "kidnapped" before the show begins, complains about the number of pigs, and gets roped into doing a closing number with Kermit the Frog, Sweetums, pigs, chickens and monsters. Cleese also made a cameo appearance in their 1981 film "The Great Muppet Caper" and won the "TV Times" award for Funniest Man on TV – 1978–79. In 1979, he starred in a TV special, "To Norway, Home of Giants", produced by Johnny Bergh.


title: John Cleese

text: Throughout the 1970s, Cleese also produced and acted in a number of successful business training films, including "Meetings, Bloody Meetings," and "More Bloody Meetings". These were produced by his company Video Arts.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese achieved greater prominence in the United Kingdom as the neurotic hotel manager Basil Fawlty in "Fawlty Towers", which he co-wrote with his wife Connie Booth. The series won three BAFTA awards when produced, and in 2000 it topped the British Film Institute's list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes. In a 2001 poll conducted by Channel 4 Basil Fawlty was ranked second (behind Homer Simpson) on their list of the 100 Greatest TV Characters. The series also featured Prunella Scales as Basil's acerbic wife Sybil, Andrew Sachs as the much abused Spanish waiter Manuel, and Booth as waitress Polly, the series' voice of sanity. Cleese based Basil Fawlty on a real person, Donald Sinclair, whom he had encountered in 1970 while the Monty Python team were staying at the Gleneagles Hotel in Torquay while filming inserts for their television series. Reportedly, Cleese was inspired by Sinclair's mantra, "I could run this hotel just fine if it weren't for the guests." He later described Sinclair as "the most wonderfully rude man I have ever met," although Sinclair's widow has said her husband was totally misrepresented in the series. During the Pythons' stay, Sinclair allegedly threw Idle's briefcase out of the hotel "in case it contained a bomb," complained about Gilliam's "American" table manners, and threw a bus timetable at another guest after he dared to ask the time of the next bus to town.


title: John Cleese

text: The first series was screened from 19 September 1975 on BBC 2, initially to poor reviews, but gained momentum when repeated on BBC 1 the following year. Despite this, a second series did not air until 1979, by which time Cleese's marriage to Booth had ended, but they revived their collaboration for the second series. "Fawlty Towers" consisted of two seasons, each of only six episodes; Cleese and Booth both maintain that this was to avoid compromising the quality of the series. The popularity of "Fawlty Towers" has endured, and in addition to featuring high in greatest-ever television show polls it is often rebroadcast. In a 2002 poll, Basil's "don't mention the war" comment (said to the waitress Polly about the German guests) was ranked the second funniest line in television.


title: John Cleese

text: During the 1980s and 1990s, Cleese focused on film, though he did work with Peter Cook in his one-off TV special "Peter Cook and Co." in 1980. In the same year, Cleese played Petruchio, in Shakespeare's "The Taming of the Shrew" in the BBC Television Shakespeare series. In 1981 he appeared in the Terry Gilliam-directed "Time Bandits" as Robin Hood. He also participated in "Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl" (filmed 1980, released 1982) and starred in "The Secret Policeman's Ball" for Amnesty International. In 1985, Cleese had a small dramatic role as a sheriff in the American Western "Silverado", which had an all-star cast that included Kevin Kline, with whom he starred in "A Fish Called Wanda" three years later. In 1986, he starred in the British comedy film "Clockwise" as an uptight school headmaster obsessed with punctuality and constantly getting into trouble during a journey to speak at the Headmasters' Conference. Written by Michael Frayn, the film was successful in the UK but not in the United States. It earned Cleese the 1987 Peter Sellers Award For Comedy at the Evening Standard British Film Awards.


title: John Cleese

text: In 1988, Cleese wrote and starred in "A Fish Called Wanda" as the lead, Archie Leach, along with Jamie Lee Curtis, Kevin Kline, and Michael Palin. "Wanda" was a commercial and critical success, becoming one of the top ten films of the year at the US box office, and Cleese was nominated for an Academy Award for his script. Kline won the Oscar for his portrayal of bumbling, violent, narcissistic ex-CIA agent Otto West in the film.


title: John Cleese

text: In 1989, Graham Chapman was diagnosed with throat cancer; Cleese, Michael Palin, Peter Cook, and Chapman's partner David Sherlock witnessed Chapman's death. Chapman's death occurred a day before the 20th anniversary of the first broadcast of "Flying Circus", with Jones commenting that it was "the worst case of party-pooping in all history." Cleese gave a eulogy at Chapman's memorial service.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese later played a supporting role in Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of "Mary Shelley's Frankenstein" (1994) alongside Branagh himself and Robert De Niro. With Robin Skynner, the English psychiatrist, Cleese wrote two books on relationships: "Families and How to Survive Them" and "Life and How to Survive It". The books are presented as a dialogue between Skynner and Cleese.


title: John Cleese

text: The follow-up to "A Fish Called Wanda", "Fierce Creatures"—which again starred Cleese alongside Kevin Kline, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Michael Palin—was released in 1997, but was greeted with mixed reception by critics and audiences. Cleese has since often stated that making the second film had been a mistake. When asked by his friend, director and restaurant critic Michael Winner, what he would do differently if he could live his life again, Cleese responded, "I wouldn't have married Alyce Faye Eichelberger and I wouldn't have made "Fierce Creatures"."


title: John Cleese

text: In 1999, Cleese appeared in the James Bond film "The World Is Not Enough" as Q's assistant, referred to by Bond as "R". In 2002, when Cleese reprised his role in "Die Another Day", the character was promoted, making Cleese the new quartermaster (Q) of MI6. In 2004, Cleese was featured as Q in the video game "", featuring his likeness and voice. Cleese did not appear in the subsequent Bond films, "Casino Royale", "Quantum of Solace" and "Skyfall"; in the latter film, Ben Whishaw was cast in the role of Q.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese is Provost's visiting professor at Cornell University, after having been Andrew D. White Professor-at-Large from 1999 to 2006. He makes occasional well-received appearances on the Cornell campus. In 2001, Cleese was cast in the comedy "Rat Race" as the eccentric hotel owner Donald P. Sinclair, the name of the Torquay hotel owner on whom he had based the character of Basil Fawlty. That year he appeared as Nearly Headless Nick in the first "Harry Potter" film: "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" (2001), a role he would reprise in "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" (2002). In 2002, Cleese made a cameo appearance in the film "The Adventures of Pluto Nash", in which he played "James", a computerised chauffeur of a hover car stolen by the title character (played by Eddie Murphy). The vehicle is subsequently destroyed in a chase, leaving the chauffeur stranded in a remote place on the moon. In 2003, Cleese appeared as Lyle Finster on the US sitcom "Will & Grace". His character's daughter, Lorraine, was played by Minnie Driver. In the series, Lyle Finster briefly marries Karen Walker (Megan Mullally). In 2004, Cleese was credited as co-writer of a DC Comics graphic novel titled "". Part of DC's "Elseworlds" line of imaginary stories, "True Brit", mostly written by Kim Howard Johnson, suggests what might have happened had Superman's rocket ship landed on a farm in Britain, not America.


title: John Cleese

text: From 10 November to 9 December 2005, Cleese toured New Zealand with his stage show "John Cleese—His Life, Times and Current Medical Problems". Cleese described it as "a one-man show with several people in it, which pushes the envelope of acceptable behaviour in new and disgusting ways". The show was developed in New York City with William Goldman and includes Cleese's daughter Camilla as a writer and actor (the shows were directed by Australian Bille Brown). His assistant of many years, Garry Scott-Irvine, also appeared and was listed as a co-producer. The show then played in universities in California and Arizona from 10 January to 25 March 2006 under the title "Seven Ways to Skin an Ocelot". His voice can be downloaded for directional guidance purposes as a downloadable option on some personal GPS-navigation device models by company TomTom.


title: John Cleese

text: In a 2005 poll of comedians and comedy insiders, "The Comedians' Comedian", Cleese was voted second to Peter Cook. In 2006, Cleese hosted a television special of football's greatest kicks, goals, saves, bloopers, plays, and penalties, as well as football's influence on culture (including the Monty Python sketch "Philosophy Football"), featuring interviews with pop culture icons Dave Stewart, Dennis Hopper, and Henry Kissinger, as well as eminent footballers, including Pelé, Mia Hamm, and Thierry Henry. "The Art of Soccer with John Cleese" was released in North America on DVD in January 2009 by BFS Entertainment & Multimedia. Also in 2006, Cleese released the song "Don't Mention the World Cup".


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese lent his voice to the BioWare video game "Jade Empire". His role was that of an "outlander" named Sir Roderick Ponce von Fontlebottom the Magnificent Bastard, stranded in the Imperial City of the Jade Empire. His character is essentially a British colonialist stereotype who refers to the people of the Jade Empire as "savages in need of enlightenment". His armour has the design of a fork stuck in a piece of cheese. In 2007, Cleese appeared in ads for Titleist as a golf course designer named "Ian MacCallister", who represents "Golf Designers Against Distance". Also in 2007, he was involved in filming of the sequel to "The Pink Panther", titled "The Pink Panther 2", with Steve Martin and Aishwarya Rai.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese collaborated with Los Angeles Guitar Quartet member William Kanengiser in 2008 on the text to the performance piece "The Ingenious Gentleman of La Mancha". Cleese, as narrator, and the LAGQ premiered the work in Santa Barbara. The year 2008 also saw reports of Cleese working on a musical version of "A Fish Called Wanda" with his daughter Camilla.


title: John Cleese

text: At the end of March 2009, Cleese published his first article as "Contributing Editor" to "The Spectator": "The real reason I had to join "The Spectator"". Cleese has also hosted comedy galas at the Montreal Just for Laughs comedy festival in 2006, and again in 2009. Towards the end of 2009 and into 2010, Cleese appeared in a series of television adverts for the Norwegian electric goods shop chain Elkjøp. In March 2010 it was announced that Cleese would be playing Jasper in the video game "Fable III".


title: John Cleese

text: In 2009 and 2010, Cleese toured Scandinavia and the US with his Alimony Tour Year One and Year Two. In May 2010, it was announced that this tour, set for May 2011, would extend to the UK (his first tour there). The show is dubbed the "Alimony Tour" in reference to the financial implications of Cleese's divorce. The UK tour started in Cambridge on 3 May, visiting Birmingham, Nottingham, Salford, York, Liverpool, Leeds, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Oxford, Bristol and Bath (the Alimony Tour DVD was recorded on 2 July, the final Bath date). Later in 2011 John took his Alimony Tour to South Africa. He played Cape Town on the 21 & 22 October before moving over to Johannesburg, where he played from 25 to 30 October. In January 2012 he took his one-man show to Australia, starting in Perth on 22 January and throughout the next four months visited Adelaide, Brisbane, Gold Coast, Newcastle, New South Wales, Melbourne, Sydney, and finished up during April in Canberra.


title: John Cleese

text: In October 2010, Cleese was featured in the launch of an advertising campaign by The Automobile Association for a new home emergency response product. He appeared as a man who believed the AA could not help him during a series of disasters, including water pouring through his ceiling, with the line "The AA? For faulty showers?" During 2010, Cleese appeared in a series of radio advertisements for the Canadian insurance company Pacific Blue Cross, in which he plays a character called "Dr. Nigel Bilkington, Chief of Medicine for American General Hospital".


title: John Cleese

text: In 2012, Cleese was cast in "Hunting Elephants", a heist comedy by Israeli filmmaker Reshef Levi. Cleese had to quit just prior to filming due to heart trouble and was replaced by Patrick Stewart. Between September and October 2013, Cleese embarked on his first-ever cross-Canada comedy tour. Entitled "John Cleese: Last Time to See Me Before I Die tour", he visited Halifax, Ottawa, Toronto, Edmonton, Calgary, Victoria and finished in Vancouver, performing to mostly sold-out venues. Cleese returned to the stage in Dubai in November 2013, where he performed to a sold-out theatre.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese was interviewed and appears as himself in filmmaker Gracie Otto's 2013 documentary film "The Last Impresario", about Cleese's longtime friend and colleague Michael White. White produced "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" and Cleese's pre-Python comedy production "Cambridge Circus". At a comic press conference in November 2013, Cleese and other surviving members of the Monty Python comedy group announced a reuniting performance to be held in July 2014.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese joined with Eric Idle in 2015 and 2016 for a tour of North America, Canada and the ANZUS nations, "John Cleese & Eric Idle: Together Again At Last . . . For The Very First Time," playing small theatres and including interaction with audiences as well as sketches and reminisces. In a Reddit Ask Me Anything interview, Cleese expressed regret that he had turned down the role played by Robin Williams in "The Birdcage", the butler played by Anthony Hopkins in "The Remains of the Day", and the clergyman played by Peter Cook in "The Princess Bride".


title: John Cleese

text: In 2017, he wrote "Bang Bang!" a new adaptation of Georges Feydeau's French play "Monsieur Chasse!" for the Mercury Theatre, Colchester, before making its American premiere at the Shadowland Stages in Ellenville, New York in 2018 followed by touring the UK in spring 2020.


title: John Cleese

text: In 2021, Cleese cancelled an appearance at Cambridge University after learning that art historian Andrew Graham-Dixon had been blacklisted by the student union for impersonating Adolf Hitler. His visit to the university was intended to be part of a documentary on wokeism. Cleese said he was "blacklisting myself before someone else does".


title: John Cleese

text: In April 2022, he was cast in Roman Polanski's upcoming drama film "The Palace". In October, it was announced that Cleese will present a news show on GB News in 2023, alongside Andrew Doyle. He said he wanted to promote "proper argument".


title: John Cleese

text: In his "Alimony Tour" Cleese explained the origin of his fondness for black humour, the only thing that he inherited from his mother. Examples of it are the Dead Parrot sketch, "The Kipper and the Corpse" episode of "Fawlty Towers", his clip for the 1992 BBC2 mockumentary "A Question of Taste", the Undertakers sketch, and his eulogy at Graham Chapman's memorial service which included the line, "Good riddance to him, the freeloading bastard! I hope he fries." On his attitude to life he states, "I can take almost nothing seriously".


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese has condemned "woke jokes" and criticised political correctness, saying it has become "a sort of indulgence of the most over-sensitive people in your culture, the people who are most easily upset [...] if you have to keep thinking which words you can use and which you can't, then that will stifle creativity." According to Cleese, "The main thing is to realise that words depend on their context [...] PC people simply don't understand this business about context because they tend to be very literal-minded." He has also argued that political correctness and wokeism are a threat to humour, creativity, and freedom of thought and expression.


title: John Cleese

text: In 2020, following a controversy over the content of the "Fawlty Towers" episode "The Germans", Cleese criticised the BBC, saying "The BBC is now run by a mixture of marketing people and petty bureaucrats. It used to have a large sprinkling of people who'd actually made programmes. Not any more. So BBC decisions are made by persons whose main concern is not losing their jobs... That's why they're so cowardly and gutless and contemptible." He likened the style of humour in "Fawlty Towers" to the representation of Alf Garnett from another BBC sitcom, "Till Death Us Do Part", saying "We laughed at Alf's reactionary views. Thus we discredited them, by laughing at him. Of course, there were people—very stupid people—who said 'Thank God someone is saying these things at last'. We laughed at these people too. Now they're taking decisions about BBC comedy."


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese (and the other members of Python) have contributed their services to charitable endeavours and causes—sometimes as an ensemble, at other times as individuals. The cause that has been the most frequent and consistent beneficiary has been the human rights work of Amnesty International via the "Secret Policeman's Ball" benefit shows. The idea of the "Ball" was conceived by Cleese, with "Huffington Post" stating "in 1976 he "friended" the then-struggling Amnesty International (according to Martin Lewis, the very notion of Human Rights was then not the domain of hipsters and students, but just of foreign-policy wonks) first with a cheque signed "J. Cleese" — and then by rounding up "a few friends" to put on a show." Many musicians have publicly attributed their activism—and the organisation of their own benefit events—to the inspiration of the work in this field of Cleese and the rest of Python, such as Bob Geldof (organiser of Live Aid), U2, Pete Townshend, and Sting. On the impact of the Ball on Geldof, Sting states, "he took the 'Ball' and ran with it."


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese, as of 2022, is a member of the revival Social Democratic Party, and spoke at their 2022 party conference. Previously, he was a long-standing supporter of the Liberal Democrats and before that was a supporter of the original SDP after their formation in 1981. During the 1987 general election he recorded a party political broadcast for the SDP–Liberal Alliance, in which he advocated for the introduction of proportional representation. Cleese subsequently appeared in broadcasts for the Liberal Democrats in the 1997 general election and narrated a radio election broadcast for the party during the 2001 general election.


title: John Cleese

text: In 2008, Cleese expressed support for Barack Obama and his presidential candidacy, offering his services as a speech writer. He was an outspoken critic of Republican Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin, saying that "Michael Palin is no longer the funniest Palin". The same year, he wrote a satirical poem about Fox News commentator Sean Hannity for "Countdown with Keith Olbermann".


title: John Cleese

text: In 2011, Cleese declared his appreciation for Britain's coalition government between the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, saying: "I think what's happening at the moment is rather interesting. The Coalition has made everything a little more courteous and a little more flexible. I think it was quite good that the Liberal Democrats had to compromise a bit with the Tories." He also criticised the previous Labour government, commenting: "Although my inclinations are slightly left-of-centre, I was terribly disappointed with the last Labour government. Gordon Brown lacked emotional intelligence and was never a leader." Cleese also reiterated his support for proportional representation.


title: John Cleese

text: In April 2011, Cleese said that he had declined a life peerage for political services in 1999. Outgoing leader of the Liberal Democrats Paddy Ashdown had put forward the suggestion shortly before stepping down, with the idea that Cleese would take the party whip and sit as a working peer, but the actor quipped that he "realised this involved being in England in the winter and I thought that was too much of a price to pay." Cleese also declined a CBE title in 1996 as he thought, "they were silly."


title: John Cleese

text: In an interview with "The Daily Telegraph" in 2014, Cleese expressed political interest about the UK Independence Party, saying that although he was in doubt as to whether he was prepared to vote for it, he was attracted to its challenge to the established political order and the radicalism of its policies on the United Kingdom's membership of the European Union. He expressed support for immigration, but also concern about the integration of immigrants into British culture.


title: John Cleese

text: Talking to "Der Spiegel" in 2015, Cleese expressed a critical view on what he saw as a plutocracy that was unhealthily developing control of the governance of the First World's societies, stating that he had reached a point when he "saw that our existence here is absolutely hopeless. I see the rich have got a stranglehold on us. If somebody had said that to me when I was 20, I would have regarded him as a left-wing loony."


title: John Cleese

text: In 2016, Cleese publicly supported Brexit in the 2016 referendum on leaving the European Union. He tweeted: "If I thought there was any chance of major reform in the EU, I'd vote to stay in. But there isn't. Sad." Cleese said that "EU bureaucrats" had taken away "any trace of democratic accountability" and suggested they should "give up the euro, introduce accountability."


title: John Cleese

text: During then-Republican nominee Donald Trump's run for the US presidency in 2016, Cleese described Trump as "a narcissist, with no attention span, who doesn't have clear ideas about anything and makes it all up as he goes along". He had previously described the leadership of the Republican Party as "the most cynical, most disgracefully immoral people I've ever come across in a Western civilisation".


title: John Cleese

text: In 2017, Cleese stated that he would not vote in that year's general election because "I live in Chelsea and Kensington, so under our present system my vote is utterly worthless." In July 2018, Cleese said that he was leaving the UK to relocate to the Caribbean island of Nevis, partly over frustration around the standard of the Brexit debate, including "dreadful lies" by "the right" and a lack of reform regarding the press and the voting system. He relocated to Nevis on 1 November 2018.


title: John Cleese

text: In May 2019, Cleese repeated his previous statement that London was no longer an English city, saying "virtually all my friends from abroad have confirmed my observation. So there must be some truth in it... I note also that London was the UK city that voted most strongly to remain in the EU." London Mayor Sadiq Khan responded, "These comments make John Cleese sound like he's in character as Basil Fawlty. Londoners know that our diversity is our greatest strength. We are proudly the English capital, a European city and a global hub." Cleese added, "I suspect I should apologise for my affection for the Englishness of my upbringing, but in some ways I found it calmer, more polite, more humorous, less tabloid, and less money-oriented than the one that is replacing it."


title: John Cleese

text: In 2020, Cleese opposed the BBC's removal of the "Fawlty Towers" episode "The Germans" from the UKTV streaming service after protests following the murder of George Floyd, stating that the program was mocking prejudice with its use of a character who uttered racial slurs. "If they can't see that, if people are too stupid to see that, what can one say," said Cleese. UKTV later restored the episode with a disclaimer about its content.


title: John Cleese

text: In November 2021, Cleese protested against perceived cancel culture by blacklisting himself over a Hitler impersonation controversy at the Cambridge Union.


title: John Cleese

text: In 1992, the UK Health Education Authority (subsequently the Health Development Agency, now merged into the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) recruited Cleese—an ex-smoker—to star in a series of anti-smoking public service announcements (PSAs) on British television, which took the form of sketches rife with morbid humour about smoking and were designed to encourage adult smokers to quit. In a controlled study of regions of central and northern England (one region received no intervention) the PSAs were broadcast in two regions, and one region received both the PSAs, plus locally organised anti-tobacco campaigning. The study found that smokers in regions where the PSAs were broadcast were about half again as likely to have quit at the 18-month follow-up point as those who did not see them, irrespective of the local anti-tobacco campaign.


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese met Connie Booth in the US and they married in 1968. In 1971, Booth gave birth to their only child, Cynthia Cleese, who went on to appear with her father in his films "A Fish Called Wanda" and "Fierce Creatures". With Booth, Cleese wrote the scripts for and co-starred in both series of "Fawlty Towers", although the two were actually divorced before the second series was finished and aired. Cleese and Booth are said to have remained close friends since. Cleese has two grandchildren, Evan and Olivia, through Cynthia's marriage to writer/director Ed Solomon. Cleese married American actress Barbara Trentham in 1981. Their daughter Camilla, Cleese's second child, was born in 1984. He and Trentham divorced in 1990. During this time, Cleese emigrated to Los Angeles.


title: John Cleese

text: In 1992, he married American psychotherapist Alyce Faye Eichelberger. They divorced in 2008; the divorce settlement left Eichelberger with £12 million in finance and assets, including £600,000 a year for seven years. Cleese said, "What I find so unfair is that if we both died today, her children would get much more than mine ... I got off lightly. Think what I'd have had to pay Alyce if she had contributed anything to the relationship—such as children, or a conversation".


title: John Cleese

text: Less than a year later, he returned to the UK, where he has property in London and a home on the Royal Crescent in Bath, Somerset. In August 2012, Cleese married English jewellery designer and former model Jennifer Wade in a ceremony on the Caribbean island of Mustique.


title: John Cleese

text: In an interview in 2014, Cleese blamed his mother, who lived to the age of 101, for his problems in relationships with women, saying: "My ingrained habit of walking on eggshells when dealing with my mother dominated my romantic liaisons for many years." Cleese said that he had spent "a large part of my life in some form of therapy" over his relationships with women.


title: John Cleese

text: In March 2015, in an interview with "Der Spiegel", he was asked if he was religious. Cleese stated that he did not think much of organised religion and said he was not committed to "anything except the vague feeling that there is something more going on than the materialist reductionist people think".


title: John Cleese

text: Cleese has a passion for lemurs. Following the 1997 comedy film "Fierce Creatures", in which the ring-tailed lemur played a key role, he hosted the 1998 BBC documentary "In the Wild: Operation Lemur with John Cleese", which tracked the progress of a reintroduction of black-and-white ruffed lemurs back into the Betampona Reserve in Madagascar. The project had been partly funded by Cleese's donation of the proceeds from the London premier of "Fierce Creatures". Cleese said "I adore lemurs. They're extremely gentle, well-mannered, pretty and yet great fun ... I should have married one".


title: John Cleese

text: The Bemaraha woolly lemur ("Avahi cleesei"), also known as Cleese's woolly lemur, is native to western Madagascar. The scientist who discovered the species named it after Cleese, mainly because of Cleese's fondness for lemurs and his efforts at protecting and preserving them. The species was first discovered in 1990 by a team of scientists from Zurich University led by Urs Thalmann but was not formally described as a species until 11 November 2005.


title: Amal Clooney

text: Her clients include Filipino and American journalist Maria Ressa; former President of the Maldives Mohamed Nasheed; Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks; former Prime Minister of Ukraine Yulia Tymoshenko; Egyptian-born Canadian journalist Mohamed Fahmy; and Iraqi activist Nadia Murad.


title: Amal Clooney

text: Amal Alamuddin Clooney was born in Beirut, Lebanon. Her first name is from أمل, "" in Arabic, meaning "hope".