Podcast: Russell Brand – Confidence man

What the hell happened to Russell Brand? Ten years ago, the comedian and actor was the loudest voice on the British left as his florid calls for spiritual and political revolution won him the support of politicians and journalists. Now he is a full-time conspiracy theorist and disgraced exile from mainstream culture, conducting prayer meetings with Jordan Peterson and flirting with Donald Trump. The fall of a celebrity is not usually Origin Story material but Brand’s transformation epitomises the political chaos of the last decade: how populism and paranoia scramble conventional notions of right and left to create a volatile third category.

In the first episode of season six, Dorian and Ian reassess Brand’s extraordinary rise to fame in the 2000s in light of recent allegations of sexual misconduct and explore how British culture gave him a free pass. In 2013 Brand swapped sex and fame for a new compulsion, reinventing himself as a flamboyant agitator to great acclaim. In the void between Occupy and Corbynism, his verbose mishmash of self-help and socialism briefly made him a lion of the left. During the pandemic Brand embraced a darker shade of politics, promoting conspiracy theories about Covid-19, Ukraine and much more besides. After the allegations broke last year he went full crank, aligning himself with Robert F Kennedy Jr, Tucker Carlson and Alex Jones in the paranoid space.

What does Brand’s journey to the fringes tell us about the shifting political landscape? Did he really switch sides or were the red flags flying all along? What can the left learn from its haste to turn a motormouth comedian into a radical icon? Is Brand’s latest incarnation sincere or opportunistic, and does it really matter? And which of his tomes makes for the most painful reading today: Revolution or My Booky Wook?

This is a bizarre story of celebrity and conspiracy, addiction and attention, which says a great deal about where we are now.