Fawlty Towers: The Germans episode to be reinstated by UKTV

A classic episode of the comedy Fawlty Towers will be reinstated to streaming service UKTV with a warning about “offensive content and language”.

A 1975 episode titled The Germans was taken off the BBC Studios-owned platform because of “racial slurs”.

In it, the Major character uses highly offensive language, and John Cleese’s hotel owner Basil Fawlty declares “don’t mention the war”.

UKTV had temporarily removed the episode while it carried out a review.

The move had been criticised by Cleese who wrote on Twitter: “I would have hoped that someone at the BBC would understand that there are two ways of making fun of human behaviour.

“One is to attack it directly. The other is to have someone who is patently a figure of fun, speak up on behalf of that behaviour.”