A tall, long-legged, and jut-jawed English comic actor/writer/producer who specialized in playing thin-skinned Establishment figures as a member of the celebrated, ground-breaking comedy troupe Monty Python's Flying Circus, John Cleese began his comedy career with The Footlights, the famed performing society at Cambridge, where he first worked with future Pythoners Eric Idle and Graham Chapman. Other members included Cleese's future collaborator (and renowned humorist and interviewer) David Frost, future director of the Royal Shakespeare Company Trevor Nunn, and future NATIONAL LAMPOON editor