Stand-up to be counted

Mark Thomas is one of the last truly dissident stand-up comics. In an age when his chosen art-form is dominated by stupefyingly bland, establishment friendly “entertainers” and vacationing sitcom stars milking the audiences dry on endless “farewell” tours, Thomas’ unapologetically politicised, confrontational brand of humour stands out like a homeless interloper at a GOP fundraising dinner.

On his sometimes grating, sometimes exhilarating – though never less than enthralling – Channel 4 show, The Mark Thomas Comedy Product (in later years simply The Mark Thomas Product), the comedian acted as a kind of one-man assault team on the British political elite, exposing a system of government hopelessly entangled in absurd legislation, endless bureaucracy and downright corrupt practice. (Thomas cites his role in the prevention of the Ilisu Dam project – a mooted Turkish reservoir which threatened to displace up to 25,000 ethnic minority Kurds in the war-torn South East region of the country, all with the implicit support of the UK government – as his proudest professional achievement.)

With the Mark Thomas Product having been put on the back-burner for the time-being, the comedian is once again heading back out on the road to spread the revolutionary word. Given the rigours involved in putting together a TV show, does the return to the live arena feel like a liberating experience?

“The live shows are a fantastically freeing thing to do, because it changes every night,” Thomas agrees. “Although I loved doing the TV programme, it was a bit of a grind by comparison, because you’ve got to fit an argument into 23 minutes, you’ve got an ad-break interrupting the flow, in addition to which you’ve got to get in all the legal points and rights to reply. So the element of fun and mischief gets taken out of it to an extent, and that’s really, really annoying. Plus – given that we were on Channel 4 – the chances are that you probably had some fuckin’ documentary on gang-bangs or whatever shown beforehand. I was caught in the middle of all that flying jizz!”

Perhaps inevitably, the majority of Mark’s show focuses on the war in Iraq. Though there was a certain amount of self-satisfied back-slapping in Washington over the relative speed with which the conflict ended, Thomas’ concerns over the humanitarian fall-out – not to mention the almost inevitable heightening of tensions between the Christian and Islamic worlds – are probably congruent with most sane people’s views.

“Basically, my view is ‘victory’ my fucking arse,” Thomas spits. “It isn’t over yet. Two-and-a-half thousand civilians died, minimum. You’ve got 10,000 Iraqi conscripts – people forced to be soldiers, and there’s no difference between Iraqi conscripts and British soldiers in the First World War, as far as I can see. So already you’ve got a minimum of 12,500 dead, and that doesn’t include compound casualties, people who die of heart attacks, or people who die of stress, or people who commit suicide. Absolutely none of this gets taken into account when the war is discussed.

“Then there’s also the consideration that the whole thing was probably the biggest recruitment drive Al-Qaeda’s ever had. Osama Bin Laden’s reaction was probably something along the lines of, ‘Cancel the posters, fellas – they’re doing the work for us.’ I mean, the Bush administration is saving Al-Qaeda a fortune in expansionary costs. Bin Laden’s just thinking, ‘Fuckin’ hell, man, we should have got Direct Debit forms out, we’d be rolling in it!”

Whilst Thomas’ work generally attracts very favourable reviews in the press, some of his fellow comics have expressed disdain for his more childish pranks. Referring to Thomas’ inveterate tendency of door-stepping everyone from government ministers to multinational corporations, Chris Morris dismissed the comedian as “a man who goes around bullying receptionists”, whilst sometime Morris-collaborator, Armando Ianucci, even went as far as to include a parody of Thomas’ TV programme in his recent C4 political satire show, Gash. How does Thomas react to such criticism?

“I like Chris Morris’ work,” he replies, “but I think he should concentrate on trying to do something a bit weightier. I mean, getting Phil Collins to look like a cunt is always worth watching, but I honestly don’t think it’s the greatest satire in the history of the world. Although, by the same token, I would say that our supposed rivalry is a bit exaggerated – I wouldn’t say I dislike their stuff exactly, y’know? Overall, what Morris and Ianucci do is a lot different to what I do, so comparisons are probably a bit pointless.”

Ultimately, what is it about establishment politics that really bothers Thomas? Is it pomposity, hypocrisy, stupidity?

“It’s all of that,” groans Mark. “And the fact that I know I could do it all better! Also, I would be lying if I said there wasn’t a certain amount of arrogance involved – it’s just me showing off. Then there’s also that joyous thing of thinking, ‘I’m really going to fuck up this person’s day.’ You’re going to interview some incredibly important political figure, armed with the knowledge that no matter what happens, you will have succeeded in completely pissing them off. It’s not only about what we achieve politically, it’s also about who we fuck off. I think that’s just as important a consideration, really.”