The 46-year-old Lee is obsessed with obscure musicians, outsider artists and forgotten writers and he brings some of their off-kilter spirit to standup comedy.
Robin Ince, comedian Well, that reminds me that success is not a meritocracy, that a degree of randomness is involved and that I'm lucky doing standup at a point where it became this thing that people were into.
The other thing is, if I was starting out in standup now, I probably wouldn't do it.
How brilliantly and thrillingly offensive would it be for today's teens to parade around in T-shirts bearing the smiling face of Gary Barlow, OBE? Stewart Lee is appearing free for charity at standup comedy benefits almost weekly for the rest of the year, as usual.
Too often, standup is reactionary, laddish and boorish.
Tracy Morgan, the talented 30 Rock comedian whose unpredictability once threatened to outshine his accomplishments, took questions on Reddit on Thursday as part of a tour to rehabilitate his image ahead of a new comedy special and standup tour.
For your local taxpayer-subsidised theatre, low-tech high-return junk such as standup comedy, discredited TV psychics and Abba tribute acts float more worthwhile artists with identifiable skills – dancers, actors, puppeteers and ex-members of the Stranglers doing acoustic tours.
Related: Russell Howard review – 'beige comedy with nothing to say' So where does this leave televised standup?
In his 20s he worked as both a musician (he has since released four albums) and a standup comedian on the Los Angeles club scene.
Have you ever thought of doing standup comedy?" She was opening a comedy club in Putney, south-west London, called Big Fish and told me to come.
With A Bic for Her, Christie has found a rich seam of comedy that mocks misogyny; her set – which comes to London's Soho theatre from mid-November – delivered a satisfying, cathartic and very funny hour of standup about her battles with everyday sexism, from sports reporters to lads' magazines.
