Frank Skinner

[Sebastian Cobb]

Brand has never seemed like anything to me other than a prick with a thesaurus.

Oh, apart from the time when he said voting was pointless if you're young because you're not represented and he had a chat with David Milliband and changed his mind and that everyone should vote labour after the registration for the electoral roll had finished. Then he came off like a stupid, dangerous prick with a thesaurus.

[Mr Faineant]

Yeah i agree, of course. I still enjoy the radio stuff though.

[phantom_power]

I think Brand is pretty intelligent but he is auto-didactic and an inherent skew towards airy fairy spiritualism and narcissism leads him down some dead ends.

[St_Eddie]

Brand has never seemed like anything to me other than a prick with a thesaurus.

You pecker.

[checkoutgirl]

For me Brand can be very annoying with a tendency to show off but at other times he shows introspection and self awareness. His stand up comedy isn't for me, most of his films don't appeal and I've never listened to his radio stuff. Quite liked Re:Brand which was weird and a bit mad and was quite near the mark even for the early 2000s. His accent and voice and the way he bangs on can be quite tiresome when he's in that mood which is fairly often but in his quieter moments he doesn't seem too bad.

Overall I'd say he's too complicated and has done too many different things to completely dismiss or hold up as some genius but in general I can see few reasons that would draw me to his work as there are usually better alternatives in pretty much any of his various endeavours. I suppose if I was casting a film and was looking for a sexy, promiscuous chimney sweep with hugely inflated self esteem I'd be very interested in talking to him.

[checkoutgirl]

I think Brand is pretty intelligent but he is auto-didactic and an inherent skew towards airy fairy spiritualism and narcissism leads him down some dead ends.

It is a bit worrying how he is let onto discussion panels about various subjects like drug use when he doesn't really have the background and training. Like this worked for me and I was a smackhead so lets push for this. But if there's evidence it doesn't work for most heroin users then he could be doing more damage.

Then again he's gone out to fight against big companies and government corruption and stuff so I'd be behind that. Again he seems to get his fingers in so many pies that it's difficult completely dismiss him.

[Dr Rock]

For me Brand can be very annoying with a tendency to show off but at other times he shows introspection and self awareness. His stand up comedy isn't for me, most of his films don't appeal and I've never listened to his radio stuff. Quite liked Re:Brand which was weird and a bit mad and was quite near the mark even for the early 2000s. His accent and voice and the way he bangs on can be quite tiresome when he's in that mood which is fairly often but in his quieter moments he doesn't seem too bad.

Overall I'd say he's too complicated and has done too many different things to completely dismiss or hold up as some genius but in general I can see few reasons that would draw me to his work as there are usually better alternatives in pretty much any of his various endeavours.

But you haven't listened to his radio stuff which really is tremendous.

[Blinder Data]

Ross' career pre and post-Sachsgate is more or less exactly the same - chat show, radio show, occasional panel show appearances and a few niche programmes about his various interests.

Erm, no it isn't. The substance might be the similar but his status in the public's mind has significantly diminished. He's been supplanted by Graham Norton as the UK's pre-eminent chat show host (he's even got the Saturday morning radio slot). Ross' ITV show is shite.

IMO the Sachsgate call trashed his reputation

[rasta-spouse]

Is Ross still on £6 mil a year like at the time of S-gate?

[up_the_hampipe]

Erm, no it isn't. The substance might be the similar but his status in the public's mind has significantly diminished. He's been supplanted by Graham Norton as the UK's pre-eminent chat show host (he's even got the Saturday morning radio slot). Ross' ITV show is shite.

IMO the Sachsgate call trashed his reputation

I think his decision to tone down his behaviour and clean up his image after Sachsgate ruined things for him. His ITV show is shit because he doesn't take risks like he sometimes did on his old shows. Sachsgate wasn't wildly out of character for him or Brand at the time.

[Stone Cold Steve Austin]

Always feel sad when I see Ross lifelessly going through the motions on cheap filler like Jon Richardson's Dave show nowadays

[Mango Chimes]

I think his decision to tone down his behaviour and clean up his image after Sachsgate ruined things for him. His ITV show is shit because he doesn't take risks like he sometimes did on his old shows.

Yes, massively. I really liked his BBC show, and him being a bit of a cock on it. Didn't listen to his radio show much, but enjoyed the odd listen. I was less enamoured with his serious Film 200x persona, but respected him having different sides to him.

Nowadays (or years ago – I've not watched it in years) doing the chat show in Film mode, just with a half hearted laugh now and again... it feels like someone with one foot always on the brake and as such is utterly bland. He's shifted from Letterman to Leno.

[slicesofjim]

Russell Brand is just a younger David Dickinson.

[St_Eddie]

Yes, massively. I really liked his BBC show, and him being a bit of a cock on it.

Back when he was on the BBC, I loved Jonathan Ross asking Ewan McGregor about the then upcoming Revenge of the Sith and saying "well, hopefully it will be good because the last two were awful".  Sadly all evidence of this moment seems to have been lost to the sands of time, much like Ross being a watchable presence.

[dontrunyoullfall]

Ross should make some new programmes about film/film directors etc. For One Week Only and The Incredibly Strange Film Show were great.

[Brundle-Fly]

Ross should make some new programmes about film/film directors etc. For One Week Only and The Incredibly Strange Film Show were great.

Not forgetting Mondo Rosso? I loved it when guest, Rhona Camreron asked him why the show is called World Of Red.

[Schnapple]

His ITV show is shit because he doesn't take risks like he sometimes did on his old shows.

I think or hope Ross would have been smart enough to adapt out of his early 00s 'naughty boy' persona regardless. His ITV show is dreadful, and he looks dead behind the eyes when he's contractually obligated to speak to someone from Corrie, etc.

Agreed that he should get back to making documentaries. I still think he's a really talented presenter, and passionate, too.

[dontrunyoullfall]

Until fairly recently Ross had been presenting The Arts Show on Radio 2, hopefully that has made him think about making more documentaries and vacating the arid wasteland of Saturday night ITV.

[Jumblegraws]

Brand has never seemed like anything to me other than a prick with a thesaurus.

Oh, apart from the time when he said voting was pointless if you're young because you're not represented and he had a chat with David Milliband and changed his mind and that everyone should vote labour after the registration for the electoral roll had finished. Then he came off like a stupid, dangerous prick with a thesaurus.

He seems to let himself get above his station very quickly. I remember an article he wrote criticising so-called New Atheists for cherry-picking cruelties committed in the name of Abrahamic religions in order to condemn religiosity and spiritualism generally. He made the bold claim that Dawkins and co avoided scrutinising Eastern spirituality, citing Gandhi in particular as an overtly religious person that they wouldn't dare criticise. The problem with that is that New Atheists have made a point of dealing with Eastern religions, and Christopher Hitchens and Penn & Teller have had strong words to say about Gandhi. This suggested that he was much more interested in spinning a sesquipedalian yarn than constructing a fact-based argument, something I'll keep in mind if I ever read another earnest article by him, which I probably won't.

[Maurice Yeatman]

What did he say about Stewart Lee?

OK, he didn't mention him directly, however he said some comics play to the lowest common denominator, some are sniffy pretentious tossers and other just twats and he (Skinner) fell into the last camp

I'll try and get the full transcript when I've got less to do

As you say, it was more about the perceived audiences than the comedians specifically, but Lee was the example that sprang to my mind when I first saw Skinner's show. I reckon someone like Skinner for whom the joke is everything could be irritated by what he might see as the audiences in Comedy Vehicle laughing slavishly at Lee's non-jokes.

The bit I guess you're talking about is at 1:14:10 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfjmriMn_vc&t=1h14m10s - with a callback at 1:19:50 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfjmriMn_vc&t=1h19m50s

[Hecate]

I remember on his radio show, Frank mentioned that he bumped into Stewart Lee at a fall gig one night and Lee more or less blanked him and he sounded a bit upset about it, wondering what he might have done wrong.

[c]

As you say, it was more about the perceived audiences than the comedians specifically, but Lee was the example that sprang to my mind when I first saw Skinner's show. I reckon someone like Skinner for whom the joke is everything could be irritated by what he might see as the audiences in Comedy Vehicle laughing slavishly at Lee's non-jokes.

The bit I guess you're talking about is at 1:14:10 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfjmriMn_vc&t=1h14m10s - with a callback at 1:19:50 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfjmriMn_vc&t=1h19m50s

Not a Skinner fan, and love SL - but that callback is ace

[paruses]

I enjoyed that. I haven't seen any of his standup since the Lad years, really. I do find him really funny but generally hated his standup - although I do chuckle about his girlfriend saying they would need a bigger washing machine as they would be washing a lot of nappies soon and him saying "have your arse muscles finally packed up?" (now I've typed that out it doesn't look great but I can assure you when I was 24 it was hilarious).

He did a thing of doing a show with no swearing in didn't he? That must predate this clip so I assume that was a one off exercise.

He does blend high and low brow very well. I said upstream that I am fascinated with his reconciliation of his Catholicism and this sort of material - and thinking about it now I am equally fascinated with his audience - who makes up that audience? They're like a hybrid of Peter Kay types and I don't know - who's less crude than Chubby Brown and mainstream?

[Utter Shit]

When I went to see him on the Man in the Suit tour it was definitely a comedy crowd rather than an entertainment crowd, mostly people in their 30s and 40s.

His act changed a lot in the fallow years when he lost all his money with AIG (or as he put it, "found his old passion for stand up"), it's still dirty but the joke is always on him, whereas in his older stuff it was a lot more misogynistic, the joke was generally "check out this funny thing I said to this stupid slag". I'd recommend both of the later era stand up shows, but the first one is better than Man in a Suit IMO.

[up_the_hampipe]

I enjoyed that. I haven't seen any of his standup since the Lad years, really. I do find him really funny but generally hated his standup - although I do chuckle about his girlfriend saying they would need a bigger washing machine as they would be washing a lot of nappies soon and him saying "have your arse muscles finally packed up?" (now I've typed that out it doesn't look great but I can assure you when I was 24 it was hilarious).

That just made me choke on my drink, so yeah it's still funny. That said, I'm 25 so maybe I'm just still at that level.

[yesitsme]

Frank Skinner is without doubt the funniest stand up I have ever seen.  The tour he did that had the FRANK in lights like Elvis - he had a reddish cowboy shirt and white (I think) jeans on the VHS box - that one, well I genuinely nearly pissed myself I was laughing so hard.  Genuinely hilarious.  Would not let you stop laughing from the second he walked on stage to the second he walked off.

The one where he's a leather jacketed boxer (his first VHS? Was this his first Edinburgh run?  That and the one with 'My mate Ali was a dentist' routine not as good but still great.  Man in a Suit...? You can tell he's had some time off but still good.

Good interviewer too.  He's one with TPT and Britney are up there with anything Jonathan Ross or Tim Lovejoy have ever done.  Of course I'm kidding, I think his chat show was great.  The one with Britney, you could see she was going through the motions, running the same old answers to the same old questions then she suddenly melted and had a real conversation about things.  The pressures of being Britney Spears and the good things about it too all came out and there was genuine warmth from her because of him.

Room 101?  Better than Merton not as good as Hancock (fuck me, that's something I never thought I'd say).

I like his art show, I loved Fantasy Football and watched Badiel and Skinner enjoying the Frank parts more than the Badiel ones.

Packet of Three, Blue Heaven and all the other documentary/comedy stuff - yeah all good.

Who gives a shit if he's a pre-Madonna?

I like to think he's more of a 'let's get this right' sort of guy.  When you're in charge and someone does something that you shouldn't have to deal with then of course you're not going to be happy.  I'm sure he asks nicely once, tells someone twice and then how many times do we have to go over this...?

All conjecture of course but what the fuck do you know about performing in front of 5,000 people?  Who knows what can knock him off his stride?  If he's trying to think of funny but instead he's thinking of bottled water temperature then who can blame him for losing the rag?

He's fully aware of his troubles - look at his routine about his jealousy?  Admits it, faces it and is able to get a laugh out some of the darkest, bleakest stuff you'll see.

He plays the Uke for comedy not for self-gobbling-off reasons like twats like McIntyre or Evans play the piano.

He will insist on singing though.  He can't sing and someone should tell him so.

However, if that's the only thing I don't love about him then that's a small indulgence.

[Mr Faineant]

I've been listening to the back catalogue of the podcast. It's very good. At first, i found Emily Dean grating, but she is actually very funny. She is incredibly quick witted, and pulls out some fantastic references quick as a flash.

[Hecate]

I love Emily so much!

Frank: Prince William is in the army in the same way that ...
Emily: ... in the same way that Status Quo are in the army.

Frank: So Tom Cruise is single again
Emily: Lock up your daughters.

Enjoy the Gareth Richards wonder years, you've got Alun Cochran beckoning you over the horizon.

[Mr Faineant]

Actually I've been working backwards, so maybe the alun Cochran years are almost over for me. I don't dislike him, but he doesn't add much. There have been many Emily comments that really made me laugh, but can't remember any. I think she is quicker than Frank a lot of the time, almost suspiciously fast to make funny and clever references mid conversation.

Edit: actually, I've just had a look and the only ones available on the podcast feed are with alun. They start at the end of 2016. That's a shame.

[Mr Faineant]

Who gives a shit if he's a pre-Madonna?

Idiot eureka moment?

I'm genuinely not being a cunt here, but I'm excited because recently I saw this phrase written down for the first time. I had assumed it was "pre-Madonna" for a long time, and never really understood the reference and what it had to do with Madonna...i thought it had something to do with feminism. I think it is actually "prima donna." I'm still not confident, but i felt silly when i read it so I'm excited to see someone else spell it the same way as i would have done until recently. I just told my wife about this and she looked at me in a way that I've never seen before.