Q&A: Stewart Lee
The Stage - January 2007

Comedian, writer and director Stewart Lee is well known for his controversial show Jerry Springer - the Opera, as well as being and established comedy writer, stand-up and one half of the comedy partnership Lee and Herring.
He speaks to The Stage between performances at the Bush Theatre, to talk about his recent move towards theatre.

You’ve returned to the topic of Christianity for your new show What Would Judas Do? Were you secretly missing all the attention from the religious fundamentalists?

Well, they’re stories everyone knows so they’re a good way of looking at other ideas. I don’t miss the attention from fundamentalist groups and it’s quite put me off any kind of high-profile exposure. One of the nice things about the Bush Theatre is it’s not the kind of place that psychopaths find out about, although some of the responses to questions I ask in the show have, in the last few days, suggested there might be people coming to try and make some kind of point, who are then a bit confused that it isn’t what their prejudices would lead them to expect.

Has this show received any negative interest from religious groups or protesters?

No. The religious right in the UK is only interested in things that will get its hate agenda into the mainstream and hassling someone in an 80-seater room achieves little.

You’ve used Christian beliefs as material since your early days but it has matured from simple jokes through to an expression of ideas which happen to use comedy as a tool to help make a point. Is this your comedic abilities and tastes evolving or more the case that, in order to express yourself in the current social climate, the nature of expression has to change in order to be viewed as acceptable, or to be viewed at all?

It’s just getting older, and doing more complex things, I think. That said, in the current climate, you do need to be able to justify what you are doing more as it is likely to be subjected to aggressive scrutiny in a way things weren’t when I was growing up.

By staging this as a theatre piece, rather than stand-up or presenting it as outright comedy satire, is this a slightly less provocative way of reworking themes you’ve touched on in your previous work, such as the Sunday Heroes portion of This Morning With Richard Not Judy, to inspire a discussion? Were you deliberately setting out to diffuse any fundamentalist reactions to the work after your previous experiences in regards to Jerry Springer - the Opera?

I don’t understand what provokes people. Negative responses to Jerry Springer - the Opera were mainly based on things that weren’t even in it, or on wilfully or accidentally ignorant misreadings of things. I wasn’t setting out to diffuse fundamentalists with What Would Judas Do?, nor were we trying to provoke them with Jerry Springer - the Opera. I’ve got better things to think about. Who cares?

Are those back references simply a hidden extra for the long-term fans to enjoy?

They’re there because they fit the story and got me around a couple of holes.

Your show suggests that the motives behind Judas’ actions weren’t quite as clear cut as many of us may have been previously taught. Do you see your show almost a parable in itself - serving to both tell the audience a story and to educate or make a statement?

I’m not really interested in the truth or not-truth of the bible story. I just wanted to use it as a way to look at obsession, fan worship, loyalty and how reputations are made.

Are you slowly edging towards drama and straight theatre or will the temptation to make people laugh always define your work for the foreseeable future?

I’d like to do both and this has been a kind of experiment in working out if people will accept that when the lines start to blur.

Do you worry there is almost a danger that any serious comment you are making or might wish to make will be lost among the humour, or the expectations people have for you to be ‘funny’?

Yes. I am surprised at some of the bits that get laughs from the What Would Judas Do? audience when, to me, they are tragic.

Do you think comedy is still seen as the one thing that guarantees an audience to anything you wish to raise, where a seminar or debate may fail?

I don’t know. Live stand-up is the one thing that guarantees me an income.

Do you think alternative comedy itself is shifting away from stand-up and more towards comedic theatre with more comedians choosing to take themed shows on tour?

Well, the better people are but there are more Jongleurs/Comedy Store franchises than ever and more and more comics that want to play them, so there is no danger of ‘chicken in a basket’ stand-up being wiped out by themed shows just yet. Most people’s stand-up experiences will still be being drunk at a stag night at Jongleurs. We are still a minority.

How much of comedy do you find is performance in relation to the actual material?

Most of it. I think critics focus on material because it’s easier to understand and write about that the vague nuances of timing, rhythm, tone and trust, which are probably more important elements of stand-up.

You’ve mentioned before that the German Stand-Up Show changed your approach to comedy, did it hone your physical comedy or merely the structure of your comedy?

It meant I wanted to get away from puns and wordplay and structures that are funny - ie; the kind of ‘pull back and reveal, Joe Pasquale is on a bus all along’ type gag and do more stuff about inherently funny ideas.

Are there any plans to bring the German stand-Up Show to the UK?

Richard Thomas (the composer) wants to do it here in English, and so do I but we need funding and can’t work for free anymore.

You’ve also shown your abilities as a director, both in TV with Simon Munnery’s Attention Scum and also live work such as Jerry Springer - the Opera and Talk Radio. How did you start directing, did you have any training or experience in directing?

It was a kind of accident. I thought I was script-editing the Mighty Boosh’s 1999 show and it kind of became directing it. I was in the office when the director of Attention Scum dropped out at the last minute and I knew the material. I thought I was co-writing Jerry Springer - the Opera but there wasn’t any money for a director at BAC and so I kind of did it. I sought out Talk Radio to try and do a square normal theatre directing job, so that when I’m next offered one I can take it if I need to earn money. I had no proper directing experience prior to Talk Radio, just doing things that I’d already been kind of collaborating on. I’m not desperate to do more, unless it’s things I’m devising or writing or co-writing.

So, what’s next? Are you taking What Would Judas Do? to Edinburgh this year?

I’m doing a new stand-up show at the Underbelly, called March of the Mallards. People want me to do Judas but my wife has a show on in Edinburgh too, and at the moment we are planning to split the child-minding and that may not be possible if I end up doing two shows a day.

* Stewart Lee’s What Would Judas Do? is on at the Bush Theatre, London until February 3.
His DVD of Stewart Lee - 90’s Comedian is available exclusively online from www.gofasterstripe.com, priced £10.