The BBC, in its search for edgy, new and original comedians, has turned up someone called Stewart Lee, presumably someone also thought he was a bit ethnic with a name like Lee and booked him having seen him perform…..
Only joking…he is of course tried and trusted by the Liberal intelligentsia to be a reliable purveyor of right-on comedy to the Guardianista in-crowd since the 90’s…..here he is recently with his little, very little, red book of the Regime’s best jokes…or is that John McDonnell?
but where did it all go so wrong Stew?…..
He’s gone from the bright young thing to that bedraggled tramp shouting abuse at people on the streets.
Steve Martin had some good advice for budding comedians…..
Still, don’t worry Stewie, the Guardianistas don’t have a sense of humour so not having any jokes isn’t much of a problem for you is it?
The BBC is disinterring the old faithfuls such as Alf Garnett but reconfigured for the modern age…anyone want to bet that the new BBC version will be, snigger snigger, ‘Nigel Farage’?…and keeping Stewart Lee on the books seems to be in line with that policy of keeping the oldies on life support despite the fact he seems to have run out of decent material….never mind this recent series had not one, not two, not three but four writers.
The first episode was on wealth and I gave up after 10 minutes or so….it is slow and torturous with pretend angst whilst naturally still targeting the same old, same old.
The funniest thing he said was ironically a right-wing joke about the pretentious language of the left as he talked of his own artistic ambitions…
‘[I aim] to create a secondary character driven narrative that runs both in tandem with, and in dramatic opposition to, the surface level stand-up. I want you to laugh in spite of me not because of me…an example of theatrical practise known as Brechtian Alienation….an incredibly high risk performance strategy that few people seem to appreciate… and no-one is equipped to review me..’
In fact it wasn’t really a joke…that is genuinely the effect he seeks to create. Wonder how that worked out for him.
Moving on from ‘Wealth’ he hits his stride with ‘Islamophobia’ in the second episode. Clearly he left the house in a rush and forget to bring the jokes along….this set consisted mostly of shouting abuse at the ‘home audience’ of Islamophobes who are just ‘awful people’ and shouting out the names of the guilty ones in the Media who incite such hatred towards Moooslims…the Mail, the Sun, Rupert Murdoch, the Telegraph and of course John Whittingdale.
Lee naturally made no attempt to argue his case [He did admit ‘I’ve done no fucking research’], he would have lost, and instead made what he hoped was a poignant and powerful comparison of Quakers to Muslims and our ‘hypocritical’ attitudes and yet managed instead to make a completely spurious and very weak pointless point. ….and the irony being that the Quakers decamped to the US and now are derided and sneered at by the BBC as ‘Bible Belt’ right-wing religious fanatics who probably vote for Donald Trump….however, no comedy routine from Lee defending them against the BBC’s anti-Christian crusade…or is that jihad?
He worked up that whole routine in order to finish on the pithy punch-line that we musn’t expect Muslims to integrate and be just like us. Well no, we don’t expect them to turn into happy-clappy Christians, going to Barmitzvahs, and drinking Stella at the pig roast…the trouble isn’t us…it’s them, to generalise…wanting us, non-Muslims, to integrate with their Muslim culture.
Naturally Lee didn’t dare come up with any jokes critical and satirical about Islam or Muslims…..he’s not a gutless coward he’s just a righteous anti-Establishment lefty as he refuses to comply with BBC corporate orders…..the BBC’s head of religious programming, Aaqil Ahmed, insists on more jokes about Muhammed….so that we can learn more about him and his fantastic religion…
“The day we have people standing up and telling detailed jokes about Muhammad and have the audience understanding that humour, then we will have come a long way in society and we will have a lot more religious literacy about a major world figure.”
Go on Stewie….do it, take a deep breath and be ‘Charlie’….tell the one about Muhammed beheading all the males in a Jewish tribe and enslaving the women and children.
He ended with the line that he was ‘funny once’.….’once’…surely he exaggerates.
Anyway onto the next epsiode….need I tell you? It’s about ‘Patriotism’ for those who have never watched the BBC or one of Lee’s routines….Mark Easton probably co-wrote this one…..should be a laugh….I joke.
Apparently there are three more episodes….as yet subjects unannounced….feel free to list the possibilities in the comments.
> The first episode was on wealth and I gave up after 10 minutes or so
Don’t do yourself down, Alan. You gave up long before that.
Your quote, “‘[I aim] to create a secondary character driven narrative that runs both in tandem with, and in dramatic opposition to, the surface level stand-up…” was part of a routine. He’d just mentioned that Lee Mack had referred to him as an intellectual snob, and so he was trying to sound like one on purpose.
Something that one could quite easily grasp even if one were only paying half-attention to it. Not Alan, though – he was too busy writing the reasons he hates Stewart Lee to bother with things like context.
The truth? The truth is for wimps and left wing thugs!
Let’s have a bit of the usual Biased BBC trope: “none of our commenters will check this bullshit will they? Oh well, if they do, we’ll just get the usual rabble of undereducated halfwits to turn on the people who care about things like the truth, and call them trolls. That way, Vance can carry on decrying the licence fee while desperately pocketing any appearance fees that will get his visage on programmes talking about any subject he has no knowledge of, and Alan can continue vomiting the odd thousand words of bullshit onto his keyboard in that pretence that he’s an intellectual, while he’s waiting for the next episode of In The Night Garden to start.”
Jerrod….In your usual rush to gainsay everything on this site and proof how wonderful you are you should really pay attention….for instance this from you……..
‘Your quote, “‘[I aim] to create a secondary character driven narrative that runs both in tandem with, and in dramatic opposition to, the surface level stand-up…” was part of a routine. He’d just mentioned that Lee Mack had referred to him as an intellectual snob, and so he was trying to sound like one on purpose.
Something that one could quite easily grasp even if one were only paying half-attention to it. Not Alan, though’
Obviously you didn’t spot this…..
‘In fact it wasn’t really a joke…that is genuinely the effect he seeks to create. ‘
There’s even a link to the article in the Radio Times where he explains his ‘art’….but you beng too lazy and overexcited couldn’t be arsed to read it. Same old you.
As with our other suspect contributor truth, accuracy and actually reading what I have written seems beyond your capabilities.
> Obviously you didn’t spot this…..
>
> ‘In fact it wasn’t really a joke…that is genuinely the effect he seeks to create. ‘
I did see you make that assertion. But given that it’s you, it’s really not safe to assume that what you write has any basis in fact.
> There’s even a link to the article in the Radio Times where he explains his ‘art’
Which he explains with far more subtlety and concision than you can muster, and much of which appears to go over your head.
May I suggest that the good people of this site just stop replying to this prick’s la la land comments.
Oh well, if they do, we’ll just get the usual rabble of undereducated halfwits to turn on the people who care about things like the truth…
Ehhh, you’d think it impossible to squeeze so much pomposity, arrogance and contempt into one sentence.
You know, lad, you don’t do yourself any favours.
He might have a point, johnny. 7 of the ‘halfwits’ upticked him. (allegedly)
The Lord
They all work at Al Beeb. Simples!
Work?
>He’d just mentioned that Lee Mack had referred to him as an intellectual snob, and so he was trying to sound like one on purpose
No, Jerrod. He mentioned that he had inferred that Mack had referred to him as an intellectual snob (Mack never named Stewart Lee in particular). I’ve seen Lee 4 times at The Stand in Edinburgh (just up the road from my flat), and if you think that his character’s intellectual snobbery was a mere reaction to Mack, then maybe you need to look at what Lee has been doing for the past decade in his stand up. Just as a catch up, like.
I’m sort of with chrisH on this: although I wouldn’t ever hold him in as high a regard as Chris Morris, I have immensely enjoyed seeing him live, as he’s a funny man. He’s got brilliant timing. I am sick of his current method, though. Seen it all.
But I remember once he seemed to come out of character completely (it could have just been a very good Johnny Vegas style of sad clown, of course) toward the end of his Carpet Remnant World routine, where whilst drinking from a bottle of white wine, he read out some of the insults that had been written about him (and had a pop at the fascism of twitter users), and tears started to form in his eyes. The audience laughed and laughed.
The thing I always remember about Lee is a sketch from This Morning with Richard not Judy – The Ironic Review.
The more you appreciate him, the more of a cunt he thinks you are.
Anyway, I don’t rely on Alan to think for me, nor speak for me, btw.
The Telegraph previewed this series along the lines of ‘nothing and nobody is sacred when it comes to Lee’s vitriolic comedy’.
Funny, if you’re a Muslim or any of the other of the Left’s sacred cows, I’d have said you are very safe indeed. Biting satire pointing out the creeping erosion of women’s rights in this country at the hands of Islam e.g. gender segregation, arranged marriages etc. will, I can confidently predict, stay well off his agenda – just as one example. The great ‘climate change’ myth will be another.
Saw Stewart Lee in a small venue where he rehearsed much of what I`ve seen in these two episodes.
I do like him…he tries to be self referring and clever enough to shaft liberal pretentions to a point.
Like Marcus Brigstocke at times, Chris Morris and Gervais.
But none of them are brave enough to follow the logic to its conclusions.
Lee said that his topic was Islamophobia-but even at his rehearsals he had no intention of being brave enough to actually DO a joke about Muslims.
And-to be fair-he does show his own self loathing and lack of courage by doing an impression of we “Daily Mail” readers at home who castigate him for not doing so.
But-under the Trades Description Act-Lee served up a fraud last week.
And-seeing as he affects the Brummie-he mentions Trojan Horse but moves swiftly on without a joke about it.
But AGAIN-to be fair-again-he`s honest about his kids school fees and the right catchment area if he doesn`t earn enough!
So-funny?…no….better than all the rest of them, in that he lifts the lid on his tribe of Islington and Hackney lefties?…I`d still say yes.
Might be worth setting the stop watch for the “Patriotism” one-UKIP and Farage within three minutes….?
Does Paddy Power do such bets?
Sorry to disagree on a small point, ChrisH, but Marcus Brigstocke is an utter, utter, utter unfunny cnut imho.
Correct in all ways sir.
Just trying to give the lad a crumb of encouragement in that he`s turning on his own these days in small ways.
Yes-self loathing guilt tripping of the privileged.
But that he does it at all these days does risk him losing all the Guardian luvvies, which is unusual in that fetid world of theirs.
Not funny-but is growing up.
I don`t foresee him writing “Thatcher ate my trousers”…which is Alexei Sayles latest gift for all the Ages.
The bald maoist chose to smash capitalist bourgeois structures today…undercover of course in his march through Steve Wrights studio earlier this afternoon.
Thought Wrighty would have done his duty, and slapped the fat fraud…but our greatest living DJ has too much class I guess.
Tub for Sayle…
Yes, we’ll never get over the those planeloads of angry Quakers flying through office windows in New York, or the ceaseless videos of them beheading their victims.
And of course Mr Obama is there to tell us Christians not to get on our high horse every time muslims commit yet another atrocity.
or as A A Gill put it, with a scalpel in his hand and contempt in his eyes: (from sunday times review)
I’d given up on ever again finding stand-up on TV funny, so Stewart Lee’s Comedy Vehicle didn’t arouse antic expectations. But actually it is properly funny, and what makes him funny is instructive. He plays a character. It’s not him, it’s a performance. He’s not just a spooky, needy fat man telling jokes; Lee’s character is a spooky, needy fat man, a metropolitan socialist with a bucket of self-loathing, insecurity, thin skin and well-deserved doubts, telling jokes. He is a Corbynista Tony Hancock, and it’s a good creation, delivered with astute vehemence.
Lee points out that comedy has made him a member of the middle class, where he is hated, and you know this is an act because, in real life, Lee went to a public school — he was a contemporary of Richard Hammond, whom he once hilariously wished was dead — and then to Oxford; and he writes musicals. His mockable working- class persona is tee-hee gold. If you regret the passing of really whiny political humour and wondered who on earth was going to pick up the jester’s cap, look no further.
“Lee points out that comedy has made him a member of the middle class, where he is hated, and you know this is an act because, in real life, Lee went to a public school”– Killer punch, AA & scribblingscribe, Lee did indeed make a lot of his recent admission into the middle classes in his last programme.
Lee’s character is a spooky, needy fat man, a metropolitan socialist with a bucket of self-loathing, insecurity, thin skin and well-deserved doubts, telling jokes.
Warren Mitchell played a character – Alf Garnett; Al Murray plays a character – The Pub Landlord; it is easy to see with both of these characters who they are mocking i.e. a right-wing stereotype, though to some degree they have both backfired.
If Lee genuinely wanted to take the rip out of the ‘metropolitan socialist’ his material would have to be a lot more daring in order to expose the contradictions and hypocrisies regularly featured in posts on this site – for example, the Left’s unequivocal support for Islam in Britain whilst turning a blind eye to the abuse of women’s and gay rights inherent in Sharia and so widely practiced in the UK.
I’m not convinced, especially given Gill is so right-on himself these days.
Note also that Stewart Lee is married to feminist comedian Bridget Christie, something of a regular on Radio 4.
Also I notice she is one of the far lefty ‘comedians’ involved in the JC4PM tour. Along with other usual funny-as-an-orphanage-on-fire bbc types like Jeremy Hardy and Mark Steel.
They were in Scotland recently, preaching to the converted mixture of Student Gwant and aging guardianista types.
It was supposed to be pro Labour but apparently they were bigging up wee Jimmy Sturgeon instead.
Right-onnn, Bridget!!
“…we musn’t expect Muslims to integrate and be just like us. Well no, we don’t expect them to turn into happy-clappy Christians, going to Barmitzvahs, and drinking Stella at the pig roast…the trouble isn’t us…it’s them, to generalise…wanting us, non-Muslims, to integrate with their Muslim culture.”
Careful now. Facebook is watching. And Twitter.