This was an interview with the renowned US stand-up comedian for York arts magazine Aesthetica, which was picked up and reprinted by the Manchester Evening News prior to his UK tour dates.
Crowds at the forthcoming Manchester Comedy Festival will have a unique opportunity to catch one of the most challenging, audacious stand-ups in the world. American comic Doug Stanhope is the proverbial comedian’s comedian; celebrated by his contemporaries but often maligned by the media and marginalised in his own country.
He hilariously incorporates illicit anecdotes on porn and drugs with angry rants against American ideology. After playing the Edinburgh Festival to huge critical acclaim, his Manchester shows will be his first ever on English soil. Is he looking forward to airing his comedy in a fresh political climate?
“UK audiences tend to be more pale where American audiences are fatter. Also, UK audiences seem to be more generous with their narcotics although they seem to have less than the usual US crowd.”
It’s the type of candid, mischievous perspective that makes his comedy so effective. But do comedians have a duty to challenge people’s beliefs? “A comic doesn’t have to do shit – or as you might say – “f**k-all”. I prefer to do so but it isn’t my duty. There have been plenty of comics that I’ve loved that didn’t challenge a viewpoint in their entire lives and they would have sucked if they did. You do what comes naturally to you.“
So are you not a political comedian? “I wouldn’t say political as I don’t really know shit about politics. More socially relevant, yes. But still with plenty of smut.
“I have a mother that won’t die quickly enough from emphysema, a fantastic drinking problem with a large bag of mushrooms waiting in the freezer as well as bills and gigs and managers telling me I need to take this and that meeting while I merely want to fake my own death and disappear in Costa Rica. I guess I’m saying that I am not sitting quietly on the couch, scraping crud from under my toenails and daydreaming about what England must be like. I hope that didn’t come across as me being an asshole.”
Doug Stanhope. He might know f**k all about politics, but he’s a funny asshole.
J Everard Design 