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Russell Brand's Ponderland

Russell Brand
  • Posted at 3:21pm
  • 18 October 2007
  • by AlisonGraham-RT
  • 3 comments

First I must declare a slight, and maybe even a bit of a tragic personal interest – I’ve liked Russell Brand ever since he very politely held the door open for me, a total stranger, in our local newsagent’s. I told you it was tragic. But come on, well-mannered young men are hard to find these days.

He’s a curious, polarising figure. There are those who think he’s a preening, prancing, bejewelled, nest-haired twerp or others who see him as a quixotic, unpredictable and treasureable comic talent. Brand’s cause hasn’t been helped by the fact that television hasn’t served him particularly well. Both Russell Brand’s Got Issues and The Russell Brand Show were by turns chaotic and limp. And of course you had to really like Big Brother to get anything out of Big Brother’s Big Mouth.

But Brand has at last found a proper TV home, doing what he does best: talking. Russell Brand’s Ponderland – six episodes that run on Channel 4 from Monday 22 October to Sunday 28 October - are wildly funny, discursive, outrageously filthy and frequently scatological “ponderings” by Brand on everything from holidays to crime.

Aided by bits of hilariously arch archive footage, Brand roams wherever his mind (and presumably a good script which he co-wrote) takes him, from the new social etiquette involved in entering your pin number into a chip and pin machine, to staggeringly inappropriate holiday-camp lifeguards.

You might, however, retain a mental image of his description of a novel and revolting use for Cadbury’s Mini Eggs for far longer than is actually healthy or desirable.

Californication/30 Rock

As the nights draw in and the central heating comes on, it’s good to snuggle up with some damn fine telly. Thanks to Five, Thursdays have become slippers, shortbread and cocoa nights with its brilliant double bill Californication and 30 Rock.

Californication, starring David Duchovny as a washed-up novelist who’s sold his soul to the Hollywood film industry and can never buy it back, is an outrageously black comedy whose treatment of sex is breathtakingly, bracingly and briskly straightforward.

In 30 Rock, the best and funniest of the torrent of recent “inside TV” shows, Alec Baldwin finds the role of a lifetime as domineering television station manager Jack Donaghy. The comic lines zing and the whole thing is just so much, much better than the damp and tiresomely up-itself Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.

**

Alison Graham is TV editor of Radio Times.

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  • Posted on 28 October 2007
  • at 8:03am
  • by AndyA

I read a biog of Russell Brand. Sort of liked him. Then I heard his Radio 2 programme, co-presented with someone who has probably, unfairly, gone right down in my estimation by his association with the boring Brand. Sorry, I gave it a go, then another a week or two later, and found it the most puerile prattle I had ever heard: unfunny, uninteresting, indulgent. They were two giggling schoolgirls (sorry, girls, not meant to be sexist, but you do have higher voices than we chaps have - and sweeter, too!), saying whatever came to their mind, and it was offensively tedious, tiresome, wearysome, windy, wordy and verbose. Spontaneity is great, but it has to be witty spontaneity. Result: Brand may well do some decent stuff, but I can't bring myself to give him another try. Sorry, Russ.

  • Posted on 25 October 2007
  • at 12:56pm
  • by HelenHackworthy-RT

There's a debate raging in our forums over whether Russell Brand's Ponderland is funny or not, you might want to check it out:

http://talk.radiotimes.com/thread.jspa?threadID=400000530&#msg400002197

Helen RadioTimes.com

  • Posted on 18 October 2007
  • at 5:58pm
  • by radio-j

"...you had to really like Big Brother to get anything out of Big Brother’s Big Mouth."

I disagree. That was the best thing Russell B ever did. Mostly because he had an audience to interact with (physically as well as verbally) and he is at his best when having to think on his feet and come up with insant repartee.

But also his observations on the BB contestants were brilliant.I can't think of a single one (observation or contestant) because BB is - like sex or panic - of the moment but I remember all the regular stuff - "...pulled down my trousers and pants...", the japes about "Walliams and Beppe" and the other celebrity womaniziers, the use of an eclectic knowledge of history/science/religion/culture to pepper jokes. Iconoclasm:Princess Diana "Our Queen of Hearts." Just the sheer mania of an ex-junkie who's brain is still tripping a milliion miles an hour.

You only have to watch the same show with different presenters to see the difference. Well you do. I didn't watch any of the last series.

Hari Krishna

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