It has now officially all gone wrong for stand-up’s sex god. Ahead of Saturday
night’s Channel 4 documentary about Russell Brand, and the newspaper
disclosures in the Sunday Times, there was speculation that the witnesses could
be opportunistic attention-seekers. The first complainant demolished that idea.
On the same day as her alleged encounter with Brand, she visited a rape crisis
centre, according to medical records, and accused him of wrongdoing. If the
case reaches court, her testimony could be hard for Brand – who denies the
allegations against him and has said his relationships have all been consensual
– to explain.

One oddity of the Dispatches documentary was the identity of the chief
accuser: Brand himself. We saw him making gross statements in public that
sounded like throwaway satire. On TV, he told a guest, ‘don’t be afraid of your
own sexuality. Do be a bit afraid of mine though.’ He told an American chat-
show host: ‘You don’t want to be around when the laughter stops.’

Brand was never censured for this banter. His fans laughed along. Why would
a handsome, intelligent, rich and amusing superstar need to prey on women?
His light-hearted attitude to rough sex had to be a joke, right? A spot of
laddish exaggeration to titillate the gallery. He was excused because his
audience regarded themselves as cynical, worldly sophisticates. A BBC clip
showed him unequivocally denying sexual malpractice. ‘Don’t get so worked
up about it,’ he said. ‘It’s only a rhetorical device, my dear.’ The questioner
was Emily Maitlis.

Brand is an anthropological oddity, a mass of contradictions. At first glance,
he’s as sexy as Heathcliff. Those cavernous, tortured eyes, that brooding,
sculpted profile, the dark crown of uncombed hair, and the ripped-open shirts
that reveal a suntanned torso hugged by a silver studded belt. And physically
he’s not intimidating. His vocal pitch is high, girly even, and his mannerisms
suggest the fey and sexually inert Kenneth Williams. He’s a hunk who talks
like a hair-dresser. He affects a dated Dickensian accent and he has a
preference for scholarly vocabulary, and these quirks which place him in the
harmless world of the music hall.

But is there another side to Brand? On stage he mimed having oral sex with a
female who was evidently choking and weeping. He imitated the sound of
her gag-reflex and he celebrated the moment when she started to sob.
During his stint at BBC Radio 2, he made sexual remarks on air about a
journalist. ‘She’s erotic that newsreader,’ drooled Brand in his lascivious, self-
mocking way. ‘We’re going to get under that desk and we’re going to unleash
hell on your thighs.’

Even more troubling was a telephone interview with Jimmy Savile who asked Brand to send over his sister for an assignation.

‘I’ve got a personal assistant,’ said Brand helpfully, ‘and…anyone I demand
that she greet, meet, massages – she has to do it.’
Savile sounded keen, unsurprisingly, and Brand asked him what costume she
should wear. ‘Nothing,’ said Savile.

This locker-room jabber isn’t criminal, of course, but it profoundly damages
Brand’s reputation to be heard joshing with Savile and referring to women like deliveries of meat.

A reckoning will follow across many sections of media. The world of stand-up
comedy needs to straighten out its procedures. The Beeb is in hot water, yet
again. Why did it consider Brand the sort of person fit to hire? Charles Moore,
of this parish, made this point more powerfully than anyone. In 2010, he
criticised the BBC for its handling of a Radio 2 broadcast in which Brand and
Jonathan Ross made obscene and threatening telephone calls to the
answering machine of the elderly actor Andrew Sachs. The calls were about
how Brand had slept with Sachs’s granddaughter. The ‘joke’ wasn’t funny at
the time. It certainly isn’t now.

https://www.spectator.co.uk/wp-conte...resize=100,100

WRITTEN BY
Lloyd Evans
Lloyd Evans is The Spectator's sketch-writer and theatre critic

To be 100% fair an transparent, I do think the Saville conversation is a red herring, especially having heard it on the documentary. In that instance, I think he's mocking/goading Saville - ironically, I think he probably saw Saville as a dirty old deviant, not at all like himself. I highly doubt he was actually being chummy with Saville. It simply doesn't fit his quite obvious self-image.

You make some very interesting and valid points !!


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I can also see your point of view .. and indeed share it as regards bands like The Lost Prophets..


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Don't get me wrong, im not defending the bloke, i've never liked his style of humour, it was never funny to me. All im saying is im not shocked a celeb with his power and reach back then was shagging around.

Of course he's vile and disgusting for having a 16 year old child picked up from school. He's revolting for forcing himself upon women against their will. And i know innocent until proven guilty and all that, but i have no doubt whatsoever that when told "no" he would have either convinced the woman, or just done it anyway. Knobs like him aren't used to the word no.

I do think he's guilty, and i hope justice is served. I was merely pointing out that this doesn't shock me in the slightest. Zizu asking "where does this end" well i bet there's plenty of male celebs from back then sh!tting themselves right now.

It's called "separating the art from the artist" - it's become a sadly almost vital concept since people started being held to account a bit more, otherwise we wouldn't be able tow atch or listen to anything.

Sometimes I think it's easier than other times though. For example, Brand was at times (IMO) genuinely side-splittingly funny with his BB observations on Big Mouth. Those things will still be funny. His "slightly rapey" sex jokes - not so much.

But yeah. So many abusers in Hollywood for example, at both actor and production level, that many great movies would be out the window if we had to write every abusive bastard out of history.

i will just leave this here....

Especially the pop and rock stars …


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All I can say again is that both things can be true.

On the one hand yes, you're pointing out that this is hypocrisy; the accusations against Brand shouldn't have been ignored back when he was a Lefty darling but they were, for much the same reasons that they're being denied/ignored by the Truthers now.

On the other hand -- you're admitting and pointing out that there were accusations of abuse against Brand back in 2015 (and beyond) when he was a Lefty darling and NOT part of the Truther "anti-MSM" cult ... so the argument that all of the allegations have been fabricated to "take him down" now that he is completely fall apart.

Which is it? Have all of the allegations been fabricated recently by a conspiratory elite because of his current views around Covid/MSM etc. or were there viable abuse allegations against him in 2015 when this tweet was made?

You do an awful lot of cake-eating for someone who wants to keep their cake.

There's one bloke who was very popular back then when Brand was at it, and carried on that fame well into the 2010's (not sure how famous he is now, but still a household name) who i think is probably quaking in his boots.

Give us a hint

:umm2:

Had a huge show in the 2000's on UK TV, wanna say mid 2000's, as a duo with another mainstream name. One is tall, the other is short. Im talking about the tall one :laugh:

les dennis? :laugh:

Nah, he was a judge too on a very popular programme. The show he's most well known for was "cancelled" a year or so ago. Though it had long since ended.

I'd literally pay good money to be a fly on the wall while Sheriff watches this video.

What show was that? :o

Is it Gropey Walsh?

Is he by any chance ,married to another TV presenter?

God only knows

No lol
Erm, i just googled and i don't think so no.

Ohhhhhhhhhhh I know I think, Walllllllll

Yes I see that

Yeah, him :laugh:

He's got it written all over him imo.