Stewart Lee

[FalloverBoy]

He’s on tour and I’ve just seen a Twitter post by someone saying he had a dig at Ricky Gervais’ Transphobia. That he hates Ricky Gervais is no surprise (I’m more of a Stewart Lee gal myself) but has anyone seen him live on this tour? I want to stick my fingers in my ears if he is because I bloody love his comedy.

[ShonaAndTheWaterHorse]

I've never liked him. I saw him once and he was extremely tedious and smug. And not funny.

I don't know nor care what his views are on gender critical issues are. He was always an insufferable, "I'm right and you're wrong and I'm better than you" leftie. And that was when time I was left wing too.

His even unfunnier (if that is possible) wife is a complete pain too.

[OhMeows]

Is it the Snowflake Tornado tour? We have tickets for next month, we go to all his shows when he's local.

Oh dear.

[Melioration]

You could give us a review, then we will know.

I sometimes wonder how much thought stand up comedians put in once the moment that put them in the public arena has passed.

[BernardBlackMissesLangCleg]

I saw him live about 10 years ago and thought he was pants. he tried to get the audience to give a round of applause for the IRA. No one did.

I dunno if I liked fist of fun because I was young and stupid then, or if it really was funny, but he ain't funny now.

[Dreamscomingtrue]

I saw him at a comedy show at the Union Chapel in Islington a couple of years ago. It wasn’t just him, there was about 6 different comedians, male and female. Raising awareness for a charity, I can’t remember which one. The ticket was reasonably priced, so I thought why not?

He admitted then that his audiences had been spilt by Brexit, and that he wasn’t getting as many laughs as he previously had.

He was OK, I’ve seen funnier comedians. Personally I prefer Ricky Gervais and I think his last TV series Afterlife was the best thing that he’s written.

[WhereYouLeftIt]

Lee. Hmm. Dh liked him and so I watched him on TV once. Once was enough. "Smug" is certainly the word. Having recently read the thread on purity spirals ( www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3809276-Purity-spirals ), I think he's been in a spiral for all his career quite some time.

There's a few comedians doing the holier-than-thou right now - Frankie Boyle! The man who happily 'joked' about Katie Price's son and Madalyn McCann/Jimmy Saville tweeted

"For the avoidance of doubt, I have zero interest in whatever transphobic neuroses you fill your days with. I have no time for anyone denying anyone else their freedom to live the life they need to live. Gtf."

Shouldn't be surprised really.

[FalloverBoy]

I know he’s not everyone’s cup of tea but I’ve liked what I’ve seen in the past - very surreal and manic at times admittedly.

[ShonaAndTheWaterHorse]

Spot on about purity spiral

[CaptainKirksSpikeyGhost]

He's been sucking at the BBC's teat for years, no one should be surprised.

[HorseWithNoLang]

He's the one with the Eskimo-face from the nineties, yeah?

[isabellerossignol]

Wasn't he the one who used to spend International Women's Day on Twitter replying to all the angry MRA's to tell them that yes, there IS and international men's day?

I always quite liked that. But yes, smug. And apparently not a friend of women unless he is getting woke points for it. But now that feminism is old news and trans rights are where it's at, he has maybe moved on.

[SophocIestheFox]

I went to see him once with a friend who is an uber fan. Hated the show.

His comedy doesn’t do it for me, because so much of it is about wrong footing and discomfiting the audience, then showing them how cleverly he’s led us by the nose to demonstrate his point. Because he’s just so clever! So very clever! I can easily imagine that wokescolding is not a stretch for him. It’s kind of his stock in trade, isn’t it, while he denies that’s what he’s doing?

Sorry if he has gone for the intellectually lazy woke points and it wrecks his comedy for you, OP...all this is a bugger for exposing feet of clay.

[MiniGuinness]

No that’s Richard Herring, who has said some pretty ignorant and misogynistic things too.

[SophocIestheFox]

That’s Richard Herring that does that, isabelle

[LittleRa]

HorseWithNoLang What does that mean, “Eskimo-face”?

[EndoplasmicReticulum]

Isabelle - no, that's Richard Herring. They had a telly programme together back in the 90s.

Have seen Stewart Lee live several times. I thought he was funny, obviously - or I wouldn't have gone back - although he has a tendency to sneer at the insufficiently left wing so the above doesn't surprise me.

The purity spirals thread is really interesting.

[EndoplasmicReticulum]

LittleRa - one of Stewart Lee's stand ups had him reading out a load of insults people had written about him in reviews or on social media and that's where Horse got the quote from.

www.stewartlee.co.uk/online-critiques/

[PlausibleSuit]

I saw this show a couple of months ago. His dig at Ricky Gervais was over-long and far too laboured, but (the show I saw, anyway) didn't speak directly to Gervais's trans stance.

The 'joke' was more about Gervais claiming to be muzzled by PC sorts and therefore unable to say anything coherent. Cue several very long minutes of Lee ambling around the stage speaking nonsense words.

It's just his usual thing about satirically taking the piss out of supposedly more successful comedians.

That show wasn't his best, to be honest.

[LittleRa]

EndoplasmicReticulum Thanks for explaining. I like Stewart Lee’s bits about immigrants and emigrants (“massive prawns, Stu!”), I didn’t know his stuff to that level of detail to get that reference.

[isabellerossignol]

That’s Richard Herring that does that, isabelle

Ah, sorry. I always get them mixed up!

[BernardBlackMissesLangCleg]

so much of it is about wrong footing and discomfiting the audience, then showing them how cleverly he’s led us by the nose to demonstrate his point. Because he’s just so clever!

yes, this is what I was inarticulately trying to say, and why he attempted to get the audience I was part of to applaud the IRA. I was very pleased that we were all having none of it, and he just made himself look like a twat

it's just possible that he's not quite as much smarter than everyone else as he thinks he is.....

[testing987654321]

Spoilers below!

I have seen this show and some bits of it left me feeling very uncomfortable. He does have a go at several comedians for various reasons. With Gervais he does a section on him "saying the unsayable", pointing out that it must be sayable if he's said it. I don't think he mentioned transphobia specifically. He talked about Jimmy Carr doing rape jokes.

Parts of the show were brilliant but I didn't laugh at a section about James Bond raping women then getting a micro penis and raping small animals. Obviously it's surreal humour but I'd rather watch an openly sexist James Bond film than have him say the word rape about 20 times for laughs.

He also did a joke about keeping your woman in a car, but be careful to make sure she has food and leave the window open so she doesn't overheat. It was very much like Ricky Gervais making sexist jokes ironically. Either way you end up with a man making sexist jokes.

[MovingBriskyOn]

I've seen him live twice and have tickets for this tour too. shrugs I like him and find him funny

[ToooRevealing]

I didn't laugh, but I agreed the fuck out of it.

[BernardBlackMissesLangCleg]

I didn't laugh, but I agreed the fuck out of it

well that sounds like a brilliant comedy show. where can I get tickets?