Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

[Guest]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Just weak this week, I thought. So, popular things often lack artistic merit, do they? Right. Cheers for that.

I suppose it would be too obvious to point out how unfortunate it was that the effluent spew, which was just the sort of simple physical humour Lee apparently dislikes, was by far the funniest part of his show.

[Guest]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Sam Wollaston's two cents:

That Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle (BBC2), is an angry man. He's an angry man, that Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle. On BBC2. And he says thing over and over again, getting angrier and angrier, shouting louder and louder. He says them over again, getting angrier and angrier. Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle. On BBC2. He is clever and funny, but everything else and everyone else (especially people who are more successful than him) is stupid and silly. And that makes him very angry. Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle. On BBC2.

Holy mother of christ, who gave this idiot a job?

[Spearmint Rhino]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

vennegoor strokes wrote:

Sam Wollaston's two cents:

That Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle (BBC2), is an angry man. He's an angry man, that Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle. On BBC2. And he says thing over and over again, getting angrier and angrier, shouting louder and louder. He says them over again, getting angrier and angrier. Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle. On BBC2. He is clever and funny, but everything else and everyone else (especially people who are more successful than him) is stupid and silly. And that makes him very angry. Stewart Lee, off Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle. On BBC2.

Holy mother of christ, who gave this idiot a job?

I dunno, that's quite nicely-done. (Except for the fact that you can't get much more successful than Stewart Lee, can you? Without actually being Larry David or something.)

[Guest]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

I thought his stretching-the-point style worked well with the Del Boy thing, but the CH4 / Effluence joke would've been best left as a neat one-liner.

[Twilight Johnny Atom]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

ian.64 wrote:

For me, it wasn't the fact that the people on the sofa got wet, but the underlying, subtextual point that Channel 4 is shit. Over and over again.

A point of obviousness that didn't need Lee to explain it. Effluent or no.

In other words, no argument here, but it was 'yeah, we got the point' writ large.

Left Peg wrote:

I thought his stretching-the-point style worked well with the Del Boy thing, but the CH4 / Effluence joke would've been best left as a neat one-liner.

The way I saw it that really did need to be done again and again. The point I felt he was making there was that no matter how much 'we' moan about the amount of shit pumped out by C4/E4 'we' keep going back and letting them pump shit on us again and again. That point couldn't have been made by just showing it as a neat one-liner.

[Hofzinser]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Sounds like a punishing schedule. If it takes in all of Great Britain then I assume the East to West section will take him to somewhere in Western Fermanagh, and from there up to the Northernmost Isle in Shetland.
Or is he taking the sensible option and sticking to mainland United Kingdom only.

Just to be pedantic, "Great Britain" refers only to the land mass comprising (most of) Scotland, England and Wales. Neither the Shetland Isles nor any part of the island of Ireland are part of Great Britain (they are, however, part of the British Isles).

Hence "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland".

[Ek weet nie]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

How are the Scottish Isles treated in terms of the Union? Is the political meaning of "Great Britain" different to the geographical meaning?

[Wyatt Earp]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

There's not really a political meaning, strictly, though "GB" is used in certain contexts as an abbreviation for the whole UK. I've never thought it should be.

In words, the correct short form of "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" is simply "Britain".

Meaning that, paradoxically, "Great Britain" is smaller than "Britain". Mind you, "America" is smaller than "North America".

The Scottish Isles are part of Scotland, and Britain, and the UK, but not of Great Britain, which is just the largest island of the troublesome little archipelago we share.

[Ek weet nie]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

The Scottish Isles are part of Scotland, and Britain, and the UK, but not of Great Britain, which is just the largest island of the troublesome little archipelago we share.

I know but the name of the country is "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland". If Great Britain is the landmass from John O'Groats to Land's End (which is what I thought it was) where do the Scottish Isles come into it? Or is "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" itself a shortened form of the country name?

I'm not trying to annex any of the Islands - I was just curious to the official name of the United Kingdom. I know that the Queen's official title goes on for about three pages detailing her offices and territories.

[Ek weet nie]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Looking at Wikipedia (sorry for the source) this is what they have for Great Britain:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Great_Britain.svg

Now that includes the Scottish islands as well as the land mass.

Just to be pedantic, "Great Britain" refers only to the land mass comprising (most of) Scotland, England and Wales. Neither the Shetland Isles nor any part of the island of Ireland are part of Great Britain (they are, however, part of the British Isles).

Whereas Hofzinser said that the Shetland Isles (I presumed that meant Orkney and the other Scottish Islands was exempt too) wasn't part of Great Britain .

This is just being pedantic, I fully accept that the Republic of Ireland is part of the British Isles just in case you thought my questions were for that reason.

[Taylor]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Nil Arshavin wrote:

I know but the name of the country is "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland". If Great Britain is the landmass from John O'Groats to Land's End (which is what I thought it was) where do the Scottish Isles come into it? Or is "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" itself a shortened form of the country name?

I think - but I might be wrong - that "Great Britain" is a more a geographical term than a political one (because "Great Britain" is not a political entity in itself). "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" is political, in that it's a description of the area governed from Westminster, so for this purpose the Scottish Isles are included as part of Great Britain, which politically, they are.

[Sean of the Shed]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Sean of the shed wrote:

Sounds like a punishing schedule. If it takes in all of Great Britain then I assume the East to West section will take him to somewhere in Western Fermanagh, and from there up to the Northernmost Isle in Shetland.
Or is he taking the sensible option and sticking to mainland United Kingdom only.

I seem to have turned a discussion on current BBC2 comedy into geographical nit-picking regarding our nations political boundaries. Maybe that will teach me to research my smart-arse comments before posting them.

Meaning that, paradoxically, "Great Britain" is smaller than "Britain". Mind you, "America" is smaller than "North America".

Keeping up with the current pedantic tack, is America smaller than North America, or would this just be The United States of America.
I make a point of asking the question as opposed to making a statement to avoid falling flat on me fanny again.

[Mumpo]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

When I watch this show, my immediate thoughts are that for all his well-intentioned vitriol, there are so many people I read on the web that do a better job of dissecting Stewart Lee's targets.

Then, I'm reminded of Bob Dylan's quote, that "I could of have written Satisfaction, but Mick and Keith could have never written Like a Rolling Stone".

Yeah, Bob; but you never perform it with an iota of Mick Jagger's swagger and panache.

[Lucia Lanigan]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Well, I thought it was excellent again, albeit marked by a couple of lulls (which in themselves have become a pleasure in the context of any television programme these days). And I still think some of you are weird about comedy.

[Ray de Galles]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Yes, just watched it on iPlayer and I was far happier with it than the first one, far closer to his live shows. The Del Boy routine and sketch being real highlights and I thought nearly all the sketches worked better this time (apart from the C4 effluent one which just seemed like a tribute to Mr Creosote).

[Lucy Waterman]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

So having chickened out of commenting in the first week, Wollaston is still passionately committed to not expressing an opinion on this programme. At least he's consistent.

[Lucy Waterman]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Except for the fact that you can't get much more successful than Stewart Lee, can you?

I think he has to work pretty hard to make a living.

[NHH]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

I sat down to watch it last week really looking forward to it, and came away slightly disappointed. Not to worry, I thought; next week will be better. I was excited coming home from work on Monday knowing this was on - I can't remember the last time I actually looked forward to a TV programme having seen it in the schedules.

And what a let down it was. As Horse says, things which are popular often not as artistic as things which are, er, artistic. Well fuck me! This was just snobbery masquerading as iconoclastic skewering. This was more than unfunny - it was distastefully condescending snobbery. How terribly radical.

The Del Boy one was awful. So it gets played too often, but it makes people laugh. What a pack of utter cunts for doing that the makers were, and what an even bigger pack of cunts the people who like that sketch are. Enjoying oneself, I ask you.

[Gerontophile]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

NHH: You are a journalist for the Daily Mail, and I claim my ... right to be hanged.

It wasnt brilliant, but there were some funny things in it. Your reaction is possibly an overreaction, but thats none of my business. Everyone has the choice to turn it off.

Did you sit through it all? Did you?

"it was distastefully condescending snobbery"

Oh fuck off. Many more intelligent people than I, on here, would have already found him out. I disagree vehemently with your argument.*

*point of view

[Wyatt Earp]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

NHH's case needs answering, I think. There's more than a whiff of "Aren't the vulgar really vulgar?" about what Lee seems to be up to at the moment. And, well, yes they are, and there are things worth saying about that: the growth in the television of cruelty, for example, and the erosion of the sense that some things are best considered private. But one of the things worth saying about that isn't that the vulgar are really vulgar for liking a bit of well-timed physical comedy better than the Parrot Sketch. That's really really really OK.

Nonetheless, I found that if you bought into those dodgy assumptions for the sake of argument, as it were, the sheer relentlessness of Lee's manic repetition acquired a certain grandeur. It's that that'll probably keep we watching. (I can live with that making me a cunt, I think, if it does...)

[NHH]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

I'd agree with that Wyatt - Lee's delivery sets him apart, and for thinking that there's more than just standing in front of an audience and speaking, he deserves credit. I just think the delivery deserves much better material.

And Gerontophile - I sat through it all. I sat through last week. I sat through Lee's DVDs. There were some funny things in it, but my complaint is that they aren't actually that funny, and certainly not enough to compensate for the underlying vibe which was distasteful and condescending.

Charlie Brooker has a similar vibe, but manages to be much funnier with it, makes sure he skewers the contemptuous schedulers and commissioners as well as the people who like whichever vile crap he's having a pop at. Brooker does critique with humour, whereas Lee's looks awfully like FR Leavis at the Comedy Club.

[Ginger Yellow]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

But one of the things worth saying about that isn't that the vulgar are really vulgar for liking a bit of well-timed physical comedy better than the Parrot Sketch.

I'm sympathetic to this argument, and indeed to the idea that there's a bit too much "vulgar stuff is vulgar" about the show, but I still found the reenactment utterly hilarious. And to be fair to Lee, the point wasn't so much that people finding it funny is bad, but that it's constantly rammed down our throats that it's supposed to be the funniest thing ever. Mostly through clip shows on Channel 4 and E4, incidentally.

[Wyatt Earp]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Yeah, that's a good point. I also liked the way he blamed "you" (looking to camera) for the fact that that clip is apparently so popular.

[Spearmint Rhino]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Yeah, I agree with most of the criticisms here. Episode 2 was pretty weak. Throughout his overcooked routine about Del Boy (which wasn't as much of a masterpiece as he clearly thought it was, bashing his head on the floor and hanging from the railings like a bad Michael Barrymore impersonator), a voice in my head kept screaming "Yeah, Stewart Lee, but you've never done anything as funny as Del Boy falling through the bar, ever, so shut up."

[E10 Rifle]

Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

Yeah, that tearing-the-arse-out-of-a-point routine worked really well with the Chris Moyles book sketch, and the rap singers thing, but as wingco says earlier by the end of the Del Boy routine you find yourself thinking, "I tell you what, Del falling through the bar was at least way funnier than this."

I mean, that Only Fools scene is part of a general routine in which a relatively unfunny part of an otherwise good show is over-lauded. See also The Parrot Sketch, "Don't mention the War" and the "I demand to have some booze" line from Withnail.