Python star cancels Montreal gig

John Cleese has been admitted to hospital suffering from an inflammation of the prostate gland.

The 69-year-old is undergoing treatment in Montreal, where he had been due to host last night’s Britcom gala at the Just For Laughs comedy festival.

The event’s chief executive, Bruce Hills, came on stage at the start of the show to announce the bad news to fans who had paid up to £100 a ticket to see the Python star.

‘This is the first time this has happened in 25 years,’ he told the 2,300-strong audience. ‘This is something John Cleese has worked on for four months.’

The festival declined to go into details about Cleese’s condition, medically known as prostatitis, and asked the media to respect his privacy.

However, it is expected that he will have sufficiently recovered by Sunday to host an extra gala in Montreal, which will be free to all ticket-holders from last night’s gig.

Hills added the Cleese had planned ‘a special night and really wants to perform it, so he has agreed to extend his stay here for four days’.

Lewis Black, who was drafted in to host the show, told the audience: ‘To go from John Cleese to me – now that’s wrong, and you know that’s wrong.

‘You brought a ticket for John Cleese and I show up. It’s probably the same as you feel when you vote.’

Ross Noble, who was on the bill, cracked joked at Cleese’s expense, imagining him dying and being wheeled into hospital, only to be met by a doctor insisting: ‘He’s not dead, he’s resting… he’s pining for the gala.’

Last time Cleese was at the Montreal festival, three years ago, he performed a sketch imagining his own eulogy.

Cleese, who has just come out of an expensive divorce with Alyce Faye Eichelberger, was in hospital only last month for an operation on his left eye.

Published: 23 Jul 2009