Manuel (Fawlty Towers)

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Andrew Sachs as Barcelona's infamous waiter

Manuel is a fictional character from the hit BBC sitcom Fawlty Towers. He is played by Andrew Sachs. He is arguably one of the most iconic characters in British comedy history.

[edit] Personality

Manuel, a waiter, is a well-meaning but disorganized and constantly confused Spaniard (from Barcelona) with a limited grasp of the English language and customs. He is constantly verbally and physically assaulted by his boss. He is afraid of Mr. Fawlty's quick temper and violent assaults, yet often expresses his appreciation for being given the position. When told by either Basil, Sybil or Polly what to do, he answers "¿qué?", which means 'what?', and "sí" which means 'yes'.

He is known for his passionate patriotism, amplified in The Anniversary when he tries to make Terry see sense, trying to let him cook paella to his mother's recipe. Manuel has a large family in Spain, mentioning in The Wedding Party that he has five brothers and four sisters. A quite famous line of his is "I know nothing", which he used in the episode Communication Problems.

Basil hired Manuel because he was very cheap labour, but Manuel was variedly able to try and bend the situation around on Basil, and then became the brut of extreme violence: from being hit on the head with various objects like spoons, saucepans, and a moose's head - to being picked up like a ragdoll and forced to do a chore - Manuel has had much violent harassment. Although as a consequence of the violence he briefly decided that he didn't want to work here anymore, he nevertheless remains loyal to Basil.

[edit] Origins

When writing the series, John Cleese was adamant on having a dumb foreigner as the program's central comic relief. This came in the form of Manuel, who was to be played by German-born British actor Andrew Sachs. Sachs claims that he only had a few weeks to learn the difficult and complex accent that Manuel is so famous for, but loved his experiences on the show (even after he was physically hurt twice on screen, see The Wedding Party and The Germans for more information); Sachs still has Manuel's attire today.

Sachs's less than flattering portrayal of the Spanish resulted in the character's nationality being switched to a Italian from Napoli called Paolo for the Spanish dub of the show broadcasted in Spain.

Fawlty Towers

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