Tag: russell brand

Categories
Amusing TV

SNL British Gangster Movie Sketch

This Saturday Night Live spoof of British gangster movies starring Bill Hader, Russell Brand and Fred Armisen hits all the right notes.

A fake trailer for a film called Don’ You Go Rounin’ Roun to Re Ro it nails the gloomy cliches, thick dialects and general air of naffness that surrounds the genre.

Compare it to the actual trailers of recent crap like Bonded by Blood (2010) and Rise of the Footsoldier (2007) and you’ll get an idea of how spot on it is: warehouse shootings, cockney aggression and overblown acting are all par for the course.

> Saturday Night Live
> Possibly the worst British gangster film ever

Categories
Competitions DVD & Blu-ray

Competition: Russell Brand’s Ponderland on DVD

We have 1 copy of Russell Brand’s Ponderland new DVD to give away.

In it Brand tackles random topics including: nostalgia, childhood, science, sport, love and holidays in his usual colourful way.

The DVD contains nearly an hour of unseen live stand up recorded at pre-Ponderland warm up gigs.

Also, Russell wants his fans to come forward and prove to him that they can be as funny or maybe even funnier than him.

All they have to do is visit www.russellbrandsponderlanddvd.co.uk, watch the clips and then make their own re-enactment of the video and then upload their video.

To stand a chance of winning, just answer the following question:

Which football team does Russell Brand support?

Send your answers to: [email protected]

The competition is open for two weeks and make sure to include your address and contact details. 

Russell Brand’s Ponderland is released today on DVD by Universal Pictures UK

Categories
News

Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross call Andrew Sachs

In case you have been on holiday over the last few days (like BBC chief Mark Thomspon) you might have missed the incredible media storm over a phone call Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross made to Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs.

It actually went out on Brand’s Radio 2 show on Saturday 18th October (after being pre-recorded on Thursday 16th), but after the Mail on Sunday put the story on their front page all hell has broken loose with both of them getting suspended with even the Prime Minister condemning them (!).

The BBC aren’t rebroadcasting it, so if you missed it then here it is in 2 parts:

Here is their ‘viddycast’ after the show in which the commented on the call:

Although the whole thing has got out of hand, the main reason it spiralled out of control is the combination of the BBC not responding soon enough, shock amongst an older generation of licence fee payers that this kind of comedy goes on (even though it originally went out at after 10pm on a Saturday night) and a media feeding frenzy because this story has so many juicy elements that editors and hacks love (celebrity, outrage, the licence fee and even a classic TV show to boot).

Whatever you think about the original calls and reaction to them, one has to wonder why the BBC were so slow to react to a story like this.

Last night on Newsnight (the flagship current affairs show on BBC2) host Gavin Esler was in the surreal position of having a debate without a senior BBC figure. (David Elstein and comedian Nick Doody were left to discuss it – the segment appears at 26 mins into the programme, which you can watch on iPlayer)

After the trauma of the Hutton Report, the Blue Peter cat fiasco, Crowngate, not to mention the amount of time and money spent on retraining BBC journalists and producers about guidelines, you do have to ask how this pre-recorded show went out and why BBC management collectively passed the buck for 2 days whilst the story exploded in their face.

UPDATE 29/10/08: Russell Brand has now resigned and issued a statement.

> Download an MP3 of the call
> Find out more about Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross at Wikipedia
> BBC News report on the story and also have a timeline of events
> Maggie Brown of The Guardian on the affair