Patriotism Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle

This programme contains some strong language.

People say, "What made you want to be a comedian?"

I didn't ever want to be a comedian. What I wanted to be was a cow.

I'd seen them in farms and they looked very peaceful

and I liked the fact that from something as simple as grass

they could make something as amazing as milk.

But I felt the next best thing - cos I can't be a cow -

the next best thing I thought was

being a comedian and taking grass-like ideas of experience

and turning them into the milk of comedy.

You sound like someone who went to Oxford

but didn't pay attention all the time.

Well, I think that would sum it up.

It's been a difficult year to try and write six blocks of stuff

cos everything's been so influx in the news.

You get an idea in place and then it changes and you can't

get a grip on it.

For example, as recently as six months ago,

we had no credible opposition party and the Prime Minister hadn't

been accused of having sex with the severed face of a dead pig.

LAUGHTER

And I'll be honest with you,

none of us in the satire community saw that coming.

We didn't have loads of dead pigs-sex face stuff backed up

that we could roll out.

It's been a weird year.

In January last year, I had a good half hour on the go about UKIP

and I thought that would be all right for the records in December

and then in May I was worried they were going to disappear

off the face of the earth for

the elections and wouldn't be able to do the bit.

I was actually out campaigning for UKIP in Kent.

Out of self interest but...

Patriotism has been an ongoing issue, hasn't it?

When he first came in to the Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn was

in trouble, wasn't he, for not attending an England rugby match

and then for not singing the national anthem.

Now, I don't know about you

but my grandfather didn't die fighting fascism in World War II

so that people could be free to not attend England rugby matches

if they didn't want to.

LAUGHTER

All through the election we were played off against each other.

The English against the Scots, the Scots against the English.

I mean, I've got Scottish ancestry, I've got Irish ancestry.

I am English and I'm very happy being English although...

All right, I do have some anxieties about the England flag, OK,

which I know is complicated.

But I kind of think if people wanted me to love the England flag,

they shouldn't have spent the entire 1970s running around waving it

whilst putting dog excrement through Pakistanis' letterboxes.

Ooh, not many laughs there, was there, from the hand-picked audience

of the liberal intelligentsia here in East London.

What can it be? Too young to remember perhaps, or racists?

Or racists out.

OK, I'm sorry...

Right, if you grew up in a big city in England in the '70s,

one of your points of contact with the England flag was with

the far right and the National Front and things like that.

It was a far right symbol.

In the 1970s, if you were flying an England flag off your house,

it meant you were either an admirer of Adolf Hitler or

a member of the royal family.

LAUGHTER

There's two jokes there. Did you spot that? There's two.

Did you spot them at home? Two jokes.

Look, I know it's different now and the England flag is never used

to intimidate anyone today but...

It isn't. It's like a smiley face

but sometimes you're stuck with what a symbol means to you, aren't you?

It's a bit like these old hippies that say, "The swastika, Stew,

"far from being a symbol of Nazism, is in fact a Hindu good luck charm."

And I always think, "Well, good luck with that."

That may be the case but you're

going to need a lot of Hindu good luck

if you're considering wandering around Golders Green waving one.

LAUGHTER

I know that's London-centric.

Don't write in from the North of England going,

"I don't even know where that is.

"I shouldn't have to laugh at the names of places in London."

I know, but we're in London now

so that's why I've done it about London.

I change it when I go round the country, right?

In Glasgow, Manchester, Birmingham, whatever, I'll say to the people

at the theatre, "What's the Jewish part of this town?"

And I change that joke so it lands...

You can't always do it. You know, Truro, Inverness.

If you're Jewish and you're in my audience in Inverness,

you ARE the Jewish area of Inverness.

LAUGHTER

Your seat, that's the ghetto.

But you know, if we're honest about it, the England flag's had

a chequered history in our lifetimes, you know?

So that's why when that Labour MP

got in trouble for saying that a bloke was flying one off his house,

I could see both sides of it and I said as much.

And then, you know, loads of people in my family were ringing me up

and going, "You don't understand.

"You know, you've never flown an England flag off your house."

And I have, actually.

It was about two years back. What happened was... You remember...

I don't know what it's like where you live but where I live,

when England got kicked out of the football, the England flags in all

the corner shops, they went down from about 20 quid to 50p, you know?

And I thought, "It's a big piece of material, it could come in useful,"

so I bought about three dozen of them.

I don't know why, I wasn't planning a far right demonstration.

I thought for the kids, for St George's Day or something.

I'd get all these England flags and I'd put them in the cellar.

And this was June, wasn't it, the summer.

So I got all these England flags and my wife had gone away for a week

with the kids and our cat, Jeremy Corbyn, was...

LAUGHTER

OK, I'll just explain this cos it's...

Right, I have always called my pets after the full names of real people.

OK, I had a Jack Russell terrier

when I was five that I called Enid Blyton.

I did cos I was reading Enid Blyton and then, I've always done it.

And the cat is called Jeremy Corbyn but it's nothing to do with now,

we got it nine years ago, right, and we were...

What happened, we were round

at a dinner party in Islington, obviously, and...

LAUGHTER

..somebody had a thing up - "Vote Jeremy Corbyn."

He was local MP, wasn't he?

And I said to my wife, "Let's call the cat that."

Part of what was funny about it

was the absolute utter obscurity of the bloke's name.

And nobody round the table went, "Ooh, better not call him that.

"What if he becomes leader of the Labour Party?"

LAUGHTER

Back then that was about as likely as if Tony Blair

had become a Middle East peace envoy.

You think, "A lot of people are going to have to die

"before that happens."

Yeah, listen to them clapping. Loony left terrorist sympathisers.

A woman's walked out at that point, furious.

So the cat's called Jeremy Corbyn

and I've always called my pets after real things.

I won a hamster in a drawing competition in 197...

I did, in 1979, in my mum's magazine, She, when this...

I did, I won a hamster in a drawing competition.

They didn't send it me through the post,

if that's what you're thinking, you got sent a hamster voucher. You did.

I had to take it to Acocks Green Pet Shop, hamster voucher.

Remember that in the '70s, hamster vouchers?

"Oh, not hamster vouchers again, Gran."

"I got you hamster vouchers because

"you know what kind of hamster you like, don't you?

"And I'd get the wrong one probably."

So...

Not like today. They download codes, don't they, the kids?

Download codes and a 3-D printer but...

Yeah, I know, it's a bit modern for me, that joke, isn't it, but...

So... And I called the hamster Karlheinz Stockhausen...

..after the post-war German electro-acoustic avant-garde...

Yeah, I was precocious 11-year-old.

And about one in five adults would go, "Your hamster is called

"Karlheinz Stockhausen, who wrote Stimmung?"

And I would go, "Yes, ha!"

You know, my sense of humour has not changed in many ways.

Um...

I had a dachshund,

a female dachshund in the '90s which I called Matthew Broderick.

After the then already largely forgotten...

..1980s American character comedy actor from Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

It died, actually, that dachshund, rather sadly.

It did its back in, in about '95, '96, jumping up to the shelf

where I kept my guinea pig, Blind Lemon Jefferson.

You grow older, your tastes change, don't they?

Blues has always seemed a very truthful music to me.

But...

..about a year...

About a year after the dog died...

I'd written a film script for Hollywood.

It didn't get made, obviously.

I wouldn't be here doing this, would I? I'd be in Hollywood,

but it nearly got made and I got asked out to Hollywood to meet

all these actors that wanted to be in it.

And I was in this posh hotel in Hollywood.

I was walking along the aisle of the corridor, you know, and I saw a

door and on the door there's a sign and it said,

"Today, press interviews.

"Matthew Broderick. Inspector Gadget."

And it's a bit sad because Matthew Broderick was now

having to do interviews to promote some kids' film where he's like

a miniature magnetic-faced policeman or something.

It's sad, isn't it?

And I walk past and I look through the door

and saw Matthew Broderick on his own sitting on the edge of a bed

with his hands on his knees staring at the floor

and just sort of opening and closing his mouth on his own going...

HE MOUTHS SILENTLY

And I thought now is not the time to go, "My dog's named after you."

LAUGHTER

"But it died, Matthew...

"..jumping up for something it could never have."

LAUGHTER

Do you know what? It's mainly true, that story.

There's only one thing I've changed...

I'm not telling you what that is.

It has been noted that you...

I don't think you say a single thing that you mean

and probably haven't done in the last 25 years.

It's based on a lie.

-The whole routine's based on a lie but, you know...

-It's a good lie.

It's a good lie. It's expedient. It serves a comedic purpose.

So you've set out to do a job that was way beyond your abilities.

You worked out a way of trying to capture mistakes and turn them

into something that looked intentional and you've sold that

to a certain audience who you now despise for believing your lies.

Yeah.

But, I mean...

..it's a living.

So the cat's called Jeremy Corbyn, right, and this means nothing.

It's from nine years ago and it had no meaning but it is

a bit weird now, obviously, cos I have to go out in the garden

at night and I'm going, "Jeremy Corbyn!

"Come on in now.

"It's midnight.

"It's time for your worming medicine."

He knows his name now. I'm not going to change it. It's not his fault.

I won't have him put down cos he's got a weird name.

Like the dog in Downton Abbey, did you notice that?

Yeah, Christmas last year,

the dog in Downton Abbey mysteriously died, didn't it?

And Lord Downton was going, "Why is my dog dead? Why?"

And the reason that dog died - as Lord Downton knows full well -

is because its name, if you remember,

was Isis, wasn't it, right?

Yeah, which two years ago was an Egyptian moon goddess

but is now an awful terrorist group.

So that dog in Downton Abbey had to die in Edwardian England...

..because it was named after something which would be

unacceptable in 90 years' time.

It's not the dog's fault, is it?

That was the best actor in the programme, that dog.

I can't watch Downton Abbey now the dog's died.

I watch it now and it just seems like thinly veiled

Conservative propaganda.

You know?

"Why can't you be happy below stairs?

"They obviously have your best interests at heart.

"Why must you make such a fuss?"

So...

The...

So the cat's called Jeremy Corbyn and it's not for any reason,

it was just from this party.

Anyway, my wife had gone away and our cat, Jeremy Corbyn,

had terrible diarrhoea.

He'd not been very well at all.

And what he would normally do, Jeremy Corbyn, is he would

wriggle through his little flap, Jeremy Corbyn, and he would go...

Jeremy Corbyn would go in the garden...

AUDIENCE GIGGLES

..Jeremy Corbyn, and he would dig a little...

Don't...

Don't giggle at Jeremy Corbyn cos these are being recorded.

I need...to get these in for time, right?

And I've explained to you that the name of the cat is irrelevant

and I would...

So just try to...

grow up.

LAUGHTER

Then, Jeremy Corbyn would do all his muck in the hole, he'd dig a hole.

And he was very clean and he would bury it.

But because he wasn't very well, Jeremy Corbyn,

he didn't want to go outside so what he did, little Jeremy Corbyn,

is he went down in the cellar, which is where...

LAUGHTER

What kind of fucking shit comedian laughs at his own jokes?

Fucking shit.

"Ah-ha-ha-ha! I've made up something about a cat. Ah-ha!"

Will pick it up from here.

It would go down in the cellar, Jeremy Corbyn, and it would just...

Because...

I hope this doesn't get recommissioned, to be honest.

Look, I've lost it. I'm fucking useless now.

The...

But because he went... He wanted to use his litter tray from when he

was a little kitten, Jeremy Corbyn.

And you know, I remember the first time that Jeremy Corbyn

used his litter tray.

Do you know, he looked so pleased with himself.

A bit like when he thought of asking the public's

questions in Parliament.

LAUGHTER

HE SIGHS

See, I knew that was coming, that's what I was laughing at.

I was laughing at how I knew that was coming, it was making me laugh,

the idea of doing that.

The idea of being paid to do that.

So...

But cos there wasn't any...

It was nine years since he'd used the litter tray.

There was no cat litter in it.

I hadn't got any cat litter and it was too late to go out and get any.

But he was sitting there and he was going, "Miaow-miaow!"

And that's what he wanted to do and you love them, don't you?

And I thought, "What can I line the litter tray with?"

So I was looking around in the cellar...

..and I thought, "Well, there are all those England flags there."

OK, right, I didn't do...

What you have to understand is I didn't do this with any enthusiasm.

I didn't go, "Ah, England flags."

I just thought I've got 36 of them, right, no-one's going to see.

I know it's an important symbol but it's in a cellar

and there was no-one to see it so it's, by definition,

it's not offensive if it's not offending anyone, is it?

So I got the England flag

and I started putting in the cat litter tray

and it was... As I was doing that, to be honest, I thought,

"This doesn't feel right. There's something...

"It means a lot to different people, this symbol." And, you know?

So what I did, I just folded it up

really, really neatly and respectfully.

A bit like when we left Hong Kong, remember?

And the flag was on a lovely cushion, wasn't it?

All folded up on a yacht and Chris Patten was there

with a big old feather in his hat, remember?

It was like that.

So I got the England flag

and I folded it all up in the cat litter tray and then Jeremy Corbyn

sort of squatted over it and he was going, "Eghh!

"Aghh! Eghh!" And then...

HE BLOWS A RASPBERRY

And that's when I thought, "This is absolutely unacceptable."

I hadn't really...

I hadn't really thought what it would feel like.

It was completely wrong.

But the problem is it'd started now, it was too late to sort of stop.

And I thought, "How can I make this all right?"

So what I did, I went like that.

LAUGHTER

And I sang...

# God save our... #

And he's going... HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

# ..gracious Queen

# Long...

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

# ..live our noble...

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

# ..the Queen

# Send... #

HE BLOWS A RASPBERRY

Are you all right, Jeremy?

# ..her vic... #

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

It's nasty, isn't it?

# ..rious, hap... #

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

Get all the poison out, Jeremy.

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

# Long... #

I know, be soon be over.

# God save... #

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

I suppose it's not fair to say the difference between you

and a five-year-old is that you've got 42 years worth

of sort of pretentious explanation for going, "Ploopf!"

People will go, "Oh, he just went 'Ploopf,' for three minutes."

But you couldn't just do that. No-one would tolerate that.

It's actually... It's about the very fine variations.

And again, I hesitate to...

-It's self-aggrandising.

-I know what you're saying.

-It's like a jazz thing, right.

-I knew you were going to say that.

I know, I know. And people go, "He says it's like jazz, right?"

But on this occasion, it is.

I mean, if you listen to someone like Miles Davis...

I'm not saying I'm the same as Miles Davis but I am in that if Miles...

If someone had said he Miles Davis, "Do a cat's diarrhoea,"

he wouldn't just have gone, "Ploopf," like that.

You couldn't do that. You can't even do that just then.

-What you just did then, you couldn't do.

-No.

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

# Her vic...

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

# Confound their... #

Come on, it's only the second verse!

Don't you know all the...?

HE BLOWS A RASPBERRY

# ..politics Frustrate...

HE BLOWS A RASPBERRY

# ..their knavish tricks

HE BLOWS A RASPBERRY

# On the...

HE BLOWS A RASPBERRY

# God...

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

# ..save...

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

# ..the...

HE BLOWS PROLONGED RASPBERRY

# ..Queen. #

HE BLOWS LOUD RASPBERRY

I thought, "Oh, thank God it's finished,"

cos it was absolutely one of the most awful things I've ever seen.

It was absolutely devastating.

And I hadn't anticipated how awful it would be because you'd think,

wouldn't you, that a flag or an anthem would have entirely

fixed meaning unaffected by context or intent,

but it was as if it sort of had somehow been changed.

I thought, "I hope no-one sees this. It's absolutely awful."

So what I did, I got the England flag.

I thought, "I'll put this in the washing machine,"

but there's a problem, isn't there?

I don't know if you've seen a cat's diarrhoea, I hope you haven't.

The problem is, is it a stain or is it a solid, right?

Now, it's mainly a stain...

..but there's just enough solid that

if you put it in the washing machine, it would all disintegrate

and it would be really horrible.

So I thought, "What I need to do, I need to let this dry out, this flag

"and then sort of scrape the sort of crust off it

"and then put it in the washing machine."

So I got the England flag and I hung it outside the front of the house.

LAUGHTER

HE BREATHES INTO MICROPHONE

Now, where I live is a very multicultural area.

Over the road from me, there's an old Muslim guy in his 70s,

a Rasta bloke about 60.

My neighbours have been there a lot longer than me, you know,

and I see them everyday, "Hello."

And they came out and they saw this England flag flying outside the

front of the house and they looked worried, as well they might.

I know it's different now and the England flag's fine now.

A certain age, they can remember the '70s when England flags going up

in East London, that would have meant National Front on the march,

petrol bombs, whatever.

They looked worried, I didn't want them to look worried,

they're my neighbours.

So I went over the road. I said, "Don't worry,"

I said, "There's a perfectly reasonable explanation for that."

LAUGHTER

LAUGHTER

"What's happened here

"is Jeremy Corbyn...

"..has had terrible diarrhoea.

"And he's done it all on this England flag in a cat litter tray.

"But it's all right cos I sang the national anthem

"while he was doing it."

And they just sort of went... HE SCOFFS

and walked off. I thought, "Fine."

Now, next door to them, there's a journalist.

That's the kind of area it is, you know, coming up in the Wolds.

The journalist came out, he said,

"I'm sorry, I couldn't help overhearing.

"Did I hear you say

"that Jeremy Corbyn had done all diarrhoea on an England flag

"in a cat litter tray while you sang the national anthem?"

And I said, "I did say that, yes,

"but there's one very important detail,

"and that's that Jeremy Corbyn is the name of my cat.

"It wasn't the real Jeremy Corbyn that did that."

And the journalist said, "Well, I don't think we need to let

"a little detail like that stand in the way."

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Good afternoon. Sorry for the technical blip

but we've got plenty of breaking news to bring you.

News of an obscene act performed by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn

has led to spontaneous demonstrations.

Today, the headlines.

News of an obscene act performed by the Labour...

An obscure English comedian called Stewart Lee is thought to be

the source of the story. Although Stewart Lee is now in hiding...

It's claimed that the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn

defecated for a sustained period of time.

Fuckin' dirty bastard!

ACOUSTIC GUITAR PLAYS

# There's a man going round taking names... #

Disgusting!

# And he decides who to free and who to blame... #

According to eyewitness reports,

the flag appeared to be covered in excrement.

# Everybody won't be treated all the same... #

The government are appealing for calm tonight.

# There'll be a golden ladder reaching down... #

Dirty bastard!

# When the man comes around... #

Large numbers of MPs are calling for Corbyn's resignation tonight.

# The hairs on your arm will stand up... #

It was certainly diarrhoea...

# At the terror in each sip and in each sup... #

A year of community service for being a lunatic.

# For you partake of that last offered cup... #

I didn't have diarrhoea at the time of the alleged incident.

# Or disappear into the potter's ground... #

A disgrace! I think it's bloody disgusting.

# When the man comes around... #

That looks remarkably like you during rehearsals.

# Hear the trumpets hear the pipers... #

It's bad for Labour and bad for business.

# One hundred million angels singing... #

Sparking protests...

# Multitudes are marching to the big kettle drum... #

Stand shoulder to shoulder with the United Kingdom.

# Voices calling, voices crying... #

Strongest...

# Some are born and some are dying... #

Cannot and will not stand...

# It's Alpha and Omega's Kingdom come

# And the whirlwind is in the thorn tree. #

Though Stewart Lee - now in hiding -

claims the whole story started as a joke, nonetheless,

we are now on the brink of an unthinkable global war.

CAT PURRS

# Confound their politics

# Frustrate their knavish tricks

# On Thee our hopes we fix

# God save us all. #