Proudly displaying his oil portrait, the granddaughter of Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs says she can’t wait for the reboot of the show that made him a star.
Georgina Baillie is thrilled the hit series is returning – although she does wonder how it will navigate the modern world.
In the follow-up to the classic 1970s sitcom, John Cleese will reprise his role as stressed-out hotel owner Basil Fawlty.
Sadly, the new version won’t feature Andrew as hapless Spanish waiter Manuel, as the actor passed away in 2016 at the age of 86.
Georgina, 37, says: “It will be interesting to see how they adapt it for a 2023 audience. It is not going to be like it was in the 1970s.
“The audience will notice that it’s different – it has to be.
“Manuel was very much a character of his time and I don’t think it’s possible to do a character like that now. But John Cleese is clever enough to pull it off.”
Cleese, 83, is set to write and star in the reboot alongside his daughter Camilla, 39, who says the show will “honour the tone” of the original but won’t involve as much “crazy physical, comedic things as before”.
Meanwhile, Cleese has reassured fans it won’t be an “anti-woke nightmare”.
But Fast Show comic Paul Whitehouse is among the stars who have urged Cleese not to rework the show, saying: “Don’t do it, John! Get someone younger in.” News of the reboot comes amid a row over Roald Dahl’s books being censored, with words such as “fat” and “ugly” removed to make them more suitable for modern audiences.
But Georgina reckons that keeping everyone happy will be “a minefield”.
“I don’t know how they’re going to tackle wokery,” she admits. “I don’t envy the position.”
Only 12 half-hour episodes of Fawlty Towers were ever made, but the impact of the show, set in Torquay, Devon, was huge. And Andrew’s portrayal of Manuel brought lots of attention.
Georgina, once a backing singer with Adam Ant & the Good, the Mad and the Lovely Posse, says: “I remember people stopping to speak to him all the time. He was always so gracious.”
But the pair’s relationship soured when Georgina was 23 following the ‘Sachsgate’ scandal.
At the time Georgina, who was battling drug, alcohol and sex addiction, was part of gothic dance troupe the Satanic Sluts and had a liaison with Russell Brand, 10 years her senior.
In a series of prank calls broadcast on BBC radio in 2008, the comic and his co-host Jonathan Ross went on to leave vulgar messages on Andrew’s answerphone, bragging that Brand had bedded Georgina.
The BBC received a record number of complaints and was fined £150,000 by regulator Ofcom.
It led to Brand and Radio 2 controller Lesley Douglas resigning, Ross being suspended and even then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown condemning the “inappropriate and unacceptable” stunt.
The incident hit Andrew hard, and he didn’t speak to Georgina for eight years.
It was only in the final years of his life, while living with dementia in an actors’ retirement home in London, that they reconciled.
Georgina says: “He was from a different generation, born in 1930, and I embarrassed him.
“I got to say goodbye to him in the year before he died, to apologise for causing him pain.
“While I know what happened was not my fault, I wanted to say sorry because I was young, I was stupid, I was full of drugs."
She has also made amends with ex-addict Brand, 47, who paid for one of her stints in rehab.
Now three years sober, Georgina lives in Bedford with her mum Kate, 62, and is dating aspiring personal trainer Dean.
Taking up painting helped her through rehab, and made her feel closer to her late grandfather as she captured some of Manuel’s most hilarious scenes on canvas – such as when he attempted to put out a fire in the kitchen.
“It saved me over lockdown - it gave me something to do on some really boring days where I was still fairly new to recovery. I could have ordered myself some booze - but painting helped me not to do that," she says.
“And I think it was largely my grandad, inspiring me - that's really lovely.”
Georgina will exhibit 16 of her paintings in London later this year, and hopes her grandfather would be proud of her work.
Mum Kate’s favourite is a monochrome close-up portrait of when he was forced to man the phones. She says: “It really captures Dad.”
Picking up a yellow 16" x 12" canvas of Andrew as Manuel in her signature offbeat style, simply entitled ‘Grandad 1’, Georgina adds: “I was a bit of a disappointment when he was alive. So I'm just hoping that I've made up for it now.”
