England Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

This series only came about because some craven idiot at the BBC

was impressed by an award you won.

It's pretty ridiculous what's happened.

I mean, I've lost my way, and I think if you, if you give people BAFTAs

and British Comedy Awards that's what's going to happen.

I've got no... I don't know who I'm supposed to be any more.

I'm a, who am I? A person who sits every night looking at a mantelpiece

literally creaking with awards,

and yet every single one of those awards is like a vampire bat sucking all the energy out of me.

-It's kryptonite, isn't it? It's kryptonite to your...

-Yeah.

And I suppose it looks now as if you're thrashing about

desperately trying to prove that you have an identity.

You have hoards of writers on the show.

You don't appear to be able to summon a thought.

My only, my only hope is that the final moments

of this expiring talent have been captured and that that in itself will be entertaining in some way.

The same way that it might be interesting to watch

an animal expire after its throat's been slit.

A sort of snuff...?

A kind of snuff comedy, yeah. Yeah.

Let's watch the, let's watch the talent and purpose ebb away from

this character, and maybe there's something comical about that. I don't know.

This programme contains very strong language.

So, I don't want to waste any time faffing around or trying

to create a good atmosphere in the room, so what I'm going to ask you to do in about 30 seconds

is clap for about three seconds.

Not as if it were the top of the show.

I don't want any whooping or cheering,

but just clap as if I'd already been on for about a quarter of an hour

and it was going all right and everyone is in a good mood.

I'd just done something that was OK, and I'll come off the back of that

on the move, as if we're already in the show in full flight

and you'll see that works just as well as if I'd done something good.

So, if you can just do about three seconds, low level clapping,

then I'll go into the first half hour.

If you just do that now. About three seconds clapping.

APPLAUSE

I know. I mean, thing is, that's what I said to them but, um, I don't think people listen, you know?

It's like, it's like, being in Spain.

It was ridiculous, you know? Blokes going, "Oh, where's your, you know, sombrero?"

Man. Now, so I was in a cab on a Sunday night

going from Waterloo to Hackney, and suddenly the cab driver turned around and his opening conversation

or gambit was to say this genuine sentence.

He said, "These days you get arrested and thrown in jail if you say you're English, don't you?"

LAUGHTER

Look, we've all done it. You're probably like me.

Sometimes a cab driver or someone might say something like that and you go, "Yeah."

You know, just for a quiet life.

Or if they go, "My face is made out of electricity and ham,"

and you go, "Yes, it's awful when that happens.

"My friend had that. An electric ham face."

Or if they go, "All mice are gay and they're from space, aren't they?"

You go, "Yeah, the bloody gay space mice. I can't stand them. They make me physically sick."

You're just, you know, for a quiet life.

But on this occasion I thought, "I wonder what he means?"

I said to him, "What did you say?" And he said, "Oh, these days,

"if you say you're English you get arrested and thrown in jail."

I said, "When did this come in?"

And he said, "No," he said, "if you say you're English these days, mate.

"You get arrested and thrown in jail."

I said, "Are you...?

"What, if you say, just if you say you're English you get arrested and thrown in jail?"

He goes, "Yeah. These days," he said,

"if you say you're English you get arrested and you'll be, you'll be just thrown in jail."

I said "In, in, jail." He goes, "Yeah, these days. These days, mate, if you say you're English, right,

"these days, you'll get arrested and you'll be thrown in jail."

"I said, "You'll be thrown...?

"Actually thrown in jail, just if you, if you say you're English."

He goes, "Yeah, these days.

"Say you're English these days, you'll get, you'll be thrown in,

"arrested, and then you'll be thrown in jail."

I said, "You'd be actually be thrown in jail?" He goes, "Yeah."

I said, "Just for saying you're English?"

He goes, "Yeah," he said, "say you're English these days.

"You get arrested and you'll be, you'd be thrown in jail."

I said, "Thrown in, you'll be thrown in jail if you just say, just for saying you're Eng...?"

He goes, Yes, you will."

"These days," he said, "if you say you're English

"you'll be arrested and you'll be thrown..."

I said, "Absolutely, are you saying, what are you saying?

"If you say you're English these days, you'll be arrested and thrown in jail?"

He goes, "Yes, these days, if you say you're English, you just say that, and you'll be arrested

"and you'll be thrown in jail."

I said, "Thrown in, you'll be thrown in a jail?

"Just if you, and arrested, just if you say..."

He goes, "Yeah, you'll be arrested, then thrown in jail just for saying you're English."

I said, "Just for saying you're English you'll be arrested?"

He goes, "Yeah." I said, "Are you cer..." I said, "Are you sure?

"Will you be arrested and thrown in jail these days if you say you're English?"

And he said, "No."

LAUGHTER

Right. I'd worn him down, "But..." he said,

"but.." he said, "if on an official form where it says

" 'nationality' you cross out British and you write in 'White English'

"they will send that form back." Now, that's not strict...

It's not the same as being arrested, is it?

But it is a very thin line, to be fair. It is.

Earlier this year I was applying for a new passport

and on my passport photo, before I sent it in, on my face, in pen,

I wrote, "There ain't no black in the Union Jack."

Stupid load of fuss. I was banged up.

The next thing I knew Amnesty International had had to fly Micky Flanagan out to Carnegie Hall

to tell New Yorkers about fingering a woman in a fish market

in order to draw attention to my incarceration.

But look, it worked. I stand before you. I'm free. Look, free man.

So there's no truth at all in, what's more than a rumour, that you, you give a taxi driver something

dreadful to read out, and then pay him to read it out

so that you then have the supposed authenticity of having gathered a kind of, a folk bigotry into your...

-Well...

-..cynical little sack.

I didn't initially do that.

Initially, the ideas that I got from cab drivers are from things they've

said, but pretty soon on, in between the second and third series,

I realised that what I really, I needed them to say particular things

to make the routines work, and I wanted the routines to have the, the, the feeling of...

This is, I mean, this is unbelievable.

This is, this is, the Jeremy Kyle argument. It is.

"I get them in the studio. They do it anyway, but I just put them in front of a camera and what's more,

"they get paid at the end of the day,

"and then they get some therapy afterwards to make absolute idiots of themselves at my behest."

That's what he says. That's what you say.

You're the same.

I don't, I don't film them doing it. I just remember what they've said.

-You film yourself remembering what they said.

-I film myself remembering what I told them to say.

Which gives you the advantage because they're not there to answer for themselves.

No, well, if they were I wouldn't do it, because I think they would...

They'd have you.

Well, what are you going to do? I mean, in fact I don't... I don't have time now to have adventures or

experiences or ideas, so it's best if I can provoke the response

I want from a person and then pass it off as something that actually happened.

I mean, it didn't, it didn't not happen.

It just didn't happen really.

But a lot of people have anxieties about cultural identity, and that explains the rise of UKIP.

The UKIPs, that and the fact that Nigel Farage of the UKIPs

is what we in England call a character.

He's a character, isn't he? Nigel Farage.

The character. But remember, a character is defined in the Dictionary of Theatre

as being "something that gives the illusion of being a person."

LAUGHTER

Now, a lot of people have been saying their voting UKIP was a protest vote.

Which I sort of understand,

but when we were young, a protest vote, you voted for someone nice

who might not get in, like the Greens, didn't you,

or some funny, silly, amusing party like the Raving Monster Loony Party or the Liberal Democrats.

Something like that. But people have been voting for

the UKIPs as a protest vote, and they're nasty,

and they might get in, and then what kind of protest is that?

That's like shitting your hotel bed as a protest against bad service,

and then realising you've now got to sleep in a shitted bed.

Paul Nuttalls is the Deputy Leader of the UKIPs

and he's from Liverpool, and he's very worried about all these Bulgarians coming over, and in July,

he said, "Bulgarians need to ensure that their brightest and best people stay in Bulgaria

"and make it economically prosperous instead of coming to the UK to serve tea and coffee."

Now, that's all very well for Paul Nuttalls of the UKIPs, because he lives in Liverpool.

But I live in London, and what I want to know is how am I supposed to get cheap tea and coffee,

unless there's a massively overqualified East European philosophy professor

prepared to make it for me for significantly less than the living wage?

Selfish, selfish Paul Nuttalls of the UKIPs.

Paul Nuttalls of the UKIPs' clearly genuine concern for domestic economic prosperity in Bulgaria.

I don't doubt that for a minute, but that is threatening my

access to cheap hot beverages in the central London area,

and what I say to Paul Nuttalls of the UKIPs from Liverpool is this.

Paul Nuttall of the UKIPs, from Liverpool,

abandon your parliamentary hopes and your dreams of London

and stay in Liverpool where you belong.

For you are clearly the brightest and best

that Liverpool has to offer.

So stay in Liverpool

and concentrate instead on making Liverpool economically prosperous,

and not just by climbing over the hotel toilet cubicle doors

and stealing people's coats, either.

But how to make Liverpool economically prosperous?

If only there was some way for Liverpudlians

to profit from going on and on about the past in a whiny voice.

What you've done is evolve a system

that knowingly operates the levers that make people laugh

by using any means possible

apart from actually saying anything funny.

-Yeah, I know.

-You make them feel awkward.

-Yep.

-You make them feel a bit afraid.

-Yep.

-You make them feel nervous.

-Yep.

And that is the only reason they laugh.

But what's the last thing that they would expect?

Something funny actually just being said,

-and that's what I've tried to do in this series.

-Again and again.

Again and again I've tried to just do a joke that will make people laugh

and you can see the fear and confusion on their faces.

They go, "Oh, what's this? What's happening now?"

This is quite a complicated brew

because I'm not sure whether that's smug or psychotic.

Yeah.

Now I am aware,

right, it's now December 2013

and I'm recording this

but by the time this goes out, it will be 2014,

by which time, if the UKIPs are right,

we will have been swamped by Bulgarians,

and I do appreciate

that I will now look like the worst kind of BBC liberal apologist idiot

if you're all sitting at home watching this dubbed into Bulgarian.

LAUGHTER

With Romanian subtitles.

But the UKIPs seem to object to the Bulgarians

on the grounds that they are skilled,

which is a whole new angle in the anti-immigration debate.

Here they are, coming over here, their skills.

A lot of people say, um, that we need mass immigration

if we're going to have economic growth.

Other people say it will always cost the infrastructure

more than it brings to the country.

Whatever the truth of those two positions,

the way people are talking about the Bulgarians,

we've seen it all before, haven't we?

We've seen, ten years ago, with the Poles.

People going, oh, bloody Poles, coming over here.

Bloody Poles, coming over here,

being all Polish and mending everything.

Coming over here, fixing all the stuff we've broken

and are too illiterate to read the instructions for.

Doing it better than us in a second language. Bloody Poles.

Coming over here.

When I was a kid. 40, 45 years ago, it was the Indians, weren't it?

Bloody Indians, Pakistanis and Indians, coming over here,

inventing us a national cuisine.

LAUGHTER

Before that, in the 16th century,

it was bloody Huguenots, weren't it? Bloody Huguenots.

Coming over here from medieval France. Bloody French.

Religious heretics coming over here, doubting transubstantiation.

LAUGHTER

Bloody French Huguenots coming over here

questioning the Eucharistic symbolism

with their famed ability to weave little jerkins out of lace.

We don't want your lace here.

We've got corduroy.

My name's Paul Nuttalls of UKIPs

and I say we need to ensure the brightest and best Huguenots

stay in medieval France and concentrate on

revising its relationship with the Eucharistic tradition,

instead of coming over here to the UK

and teaching us to make hats out of lace.

And before then, in the 5th century, was the Anglo-Saxons, weren't it?

Bloody Anglo-Saxons,

coming over here,

from Northern Continental Europe.

Bloody Anglo-Saxons with their inlay jewellery

and their shit burial traditions,

and their miserable epic poetry.

RECITES ANGLOSAXON POEM

To come over here, Anglo-Saxons,

learn to speak the fucking language.

APPLAUSE

My name's Paul Nuttall from UKIP

and I say we need to ensure the brightest and best Anglo-Saxons

stay in 5th century Northern Continental Europe

instead of coming over here to the UK

and laying down the basis of our entire future language and culture.

And before them, 2000BC, 4,000 years ago,

was the Beaker folk, weren't it?

Bloody Beaker folk.

The Beaker folk.

Coming over here,

rowing up the Tagus Estuary from the Iberian Peninsula

in improvised rafts.

The bloody Beaker folk, coming over here with their beakers.

With their drinking vessels.

What's wrong with just cupping up the water in your hands?

And licking it up like a cat?

My name's Paul Nuttall of UKIP and I say

we need to ensure the brightest and best Beaker folk

stay in the Iberian Peninsula and fill it with beakers

instead of coming over here to the UK

and teaching us to drink liquid out of cups.

And before them, 4500 BC,

6,500 years ago, the Neolithic people, weren't it?

Bloody Neolithic people,

coming over here from Continental Mediterranean.

Neolithic people.

Coming over here with their pictograms,

and their primitive wheat farming innovations,

and their astrological stone circle temples

with all the rocks aligned with the movements of the planets.

What's wrong with just worshipping a tree?

LAUGHTER

My name's Paul Nuttall of UKIPs

and I say we need to ensure the brightest and best Neolithic people

stay in Mediterranean Continent

instead of coming over here to the UK

and teaching us to make and eat bread.

And before them, 400 million years ago,

when the first fish crawled up onto the land.

Our land.

You get back in the sea.

You finned cunt.

Coming up here, onto our land

with your barely developed lungs

and your hopes and dreams of a better tomorrow for fish.

Get back in the sea.

My name's Paul Nuttall of UKIP

and I say we need to ensure the brightest and best fish

stay in the sea and concentrate on making it aquatically prosperous

instead of coming up here onto the land

and beginning the process of evolution

that will eventually lead to all life on Earth as we know it.

It's too full, isn't it?

Not Britain. Reality is too full.

Reality is too full, isn't it? Reality.

There's too much stuff everywhere.

In reality, isn't there?

I liked it when there was nothing. Remember?

Remember when nothing existed at all? There was nothing.

And it was just an infinite void of nothing, and nothing existed.

Brilliant. Remember?

Remember the old nothing?

The old times of nothing.

Remember? When there was nothing.

Remember? The old nothing.

Remember when there was nothing?

Remember?

# Oh, oh there's nothing

# There's nothing

# Oh, remember. Oh, remember

# Oh, there's nothing at all

# Anywhere

# Oh, there's nothing

# Nothing. Nothing

# Oh, there's nothing anywhere at all

# Remember the old...

# Oh, is there anything over there?

# No, there's nothing

# What about round over there?

# There's nothing there either

# Is there anything over there?

# No. There's nothing

# What about over there?

# No, there isn't There's nothing. #

Remember in the old? Remember, nothing.

# Oh, nothing, nothing, nothing Nothing, oi!

# There's nothing, nothing at all

# Ah, nothing at all

# Nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing

# Nothing

# Nothing

# Nothing

# Nothing out there

# There's nothing at all

# Out there is nothing

# Oh, there's nothing

# There's nothing. #

The old nothing times. Remember?

When there was nothing. Oh, it's brilliant.

There was no planets, was there? No.

And there was no suns, was there? No.

There was no crime.

LAUGHTER

Make of that what you will.

Could leave your house unlocked, couldn't you?

Cos it didn't exist.

There was nothing and it was bloody brilliant, and now, oh...

There was a big bang, wasn't there?

I don't remember anyone asking me if I wanted a big bang.

And now there's all this matter, isn't there?

Coming over here

and existing.

My name's Paul Nuttall of UKIP

and I say we need to ensure the brightest and best

particles of energy

that are yet to find a physical form

stay in an infinite void of nothing instead

of somehow coming together

and forming the basis of everything

that will ever exist.

LAUGHTER

It's not fair to make fun of Paul Nuttall from UKIP though,

because he's only trying as best he can

to ensure the future domestic prosperity

of Bulgaria. I don't doubt that for a minute.

And that is the main thrust of all UKIP policy.

That and bring back smoking in pubs.

And all the other stuff -

the homophobia, the climate change denial,

hitting people over the head with magazines.

That's all incidental to the main

pro-Bulgaria, pro-smoking thrust.

I appreciate that I am protected from many

of the stresses and strains that turn people against one another

but I do think we can all get on.

I live here, in the people's republic of Hackney

in North East London. It's very culturally diverse.

They're not really in this audience, but...

LAUGHTER

But I've had kids at nursery and playgroup here.

And what they do at the nurseries and playgroups in

Hackney... They celebrate all the different kids' festivals

and cultural events in what you might call a logical, sensitive

and pragmatic approach to cultural diversity

gone mad.

LAUGHTER

They celebrate Christian Christmas,

Chinese New Year, Muslim Michaelmas,

Atheist April Fool's day,

Pantheus' Pancake Day,

Odinist Oatcake Day

and Lesbian Gay and Bisexual Harvest Festival,

which is a fantastic day -

full of fruit for all the family.

But EDL members and Daily Telegraph readers, relax,

they do celebrate St George's Day as well.

On St George's Day they told me I had

to send my little two-year-old girl into the Hackney playgroup

dressed in traditional English costume,

so I sent her in dressed

as a 1970s English football hooligan

with a cross of St George and all swastikas drawn on her face,

and I had her drunk on Special Brew

and high on amphetamines.

I gave her sharpened coins to throw at horses,

and I had her shouting,

"I'm English, I'm English! Want to make something of it?"

Now, that led to a misunderstanding

and the police became involved.

Apparently, if you say you're English these days

you get arrested and thrown in jail.

APPLAUSE AND LAUGHTER

And what I've realised lately

is audiences that come out to things, they do want to enjoy themselves,

and my job is to allow them to.

And previously I've spent too much time trying to stop them

from enjoying themselves, I think.

You've become a sort of traffic warden for their laughter.

You're going, laugh for five seconds, stop.

This one's really hilarious. Make a lot of noise.

-Yep.

-I mean, I've seen you do that for hours.

I know, well, the laughter is in the room like a resource

that's bottled up.

My job is to decant,

to decant enjoyment from a collective body of people.

But to decant it at a rate that is

just enough to eke out

half an hour of laughs for BBC Two.

It's like being a surgeon.

A trepanning sort of...

It's like being a...

A man with a drill.

A surgeon or someone

that milks semen out of a pig for, um,

for artificial insemination.

The laughter is like the pig semen

and the audience

are like the genitals of the pig

and the comedian

is the person milking the pig semen out

with a view towards selling it on

for use in industrial farming techniques.

SOMBRE MUSIC PLAYS

MUSIC CONTINUES

THRUMMING

SIZZLING

CHIMING

ROMANTIC MUSIC PLAYS

DRONING

WHIRRING

MUSIC STOPS

ROARING

MUSIC: "Jerusalem"