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| Ballard Barclay and Bruce Boa on Fawlty Towers. |
There's a classic 1979 episode of the British sitcom Fawlty Towers—and don't worry, I'll circle back to Ed Wood eventually—called "Waldorf Salad" in which a brash, demanding American named Mr. Hamilton (Bruce Boa) stays at the titular hotel and clashes with its harried innkeeper, Basil Fawlty (John Cleese), over nearly everything. Basil deals with Hamilton as he does with all troublesome guests: with a curious mixture of hostility, insincere toadying, and needlessly elaborate lies and excuses. Eventually, Hamilton stages a revolt of all the unsatisfied guests, right there in the lobby of the hotel.
"What I'm suggesting," Hamilton shouts for all to hear, "is that this place is the crummiest, shoddiest, worst-run hotel in the whole of Western Europe!"
At this point, the Major (Ballard Barclay), an elderly gentleman who actually lives at Fawlty Towers and who might reasonably take some pride in his home, steps forward to object.
"No!" he interjects. "No, I won't have that! There's a place in Eastbourne."
The joke here is that, in the Major's estimation, Fawlty Towers is only the second crummiest, shoddiest, worst-run hotel in the whole of Western Europe. But isn't that actually worse than being the worst? If you have no chance of being good, wouldn't you want to be the absolute bottom of the barrel? There's a certain pride in that.
In sticking up for Ed Wood or his films, many fans use what I call "the Eastbourne Defense." That's when you say something can't possibly be the worst of its kind because there are some that are even worse. What about The Room (2003), they say? Or Robot Monster (1953)? Or Troll 2 (1990)? Or some perfectly competent blockbuster they saw recently and didn't like?
To me, this is no defense at all. That's why the Major's line in "Waldorf Salad" is funny. It's the most backhanded of backhanded compliments. Nobody wants to be second worst or sixth worst or fifteenth worst. That's why I'm perfectly fine with Edward D. Wood, Jr. being "the worst director all time" and Plan 9 from Outer Space (1957) being "the worst film of all time." Even if neither one is true.
You've gotta wonder about that place in Eastbourne, though, huh? What is that place like? The mind boggles.