Russell Brand

“Hello, I’m so sorry to keep you waiting. This is a deceptive sofa, which is not a quality you want from a sofa because they’re meant to bring comfort”. It is an unusual start to an interview but it is what is to be expected from Britain’s, arguably, fastest rising export and America’s new ‘discovery’. Is it this inclination to comment on things that are seemingly unnoticeable to everybody else that sets him apart from the rest? Is this what makes Russell Brand so unequivocally charming? Although, to be fair, the sofa he is now lying on is made up of unnecessarily oversized cushions and does actually look quite uncomfortable. The next object he directs a comment towards is me: “Yes dear, look at you all full of life”.

There are many that say that British humour is reserved for the few. Perhaps this sentiment arises from a sense of ownership one has over a certain programme or, in this case, person. So, does America ‘get’ Russell Brand? “Yeah, they properly get me
it’s unbelievable,” he says. “It’s different from here. I feel like, because I conform to a particular archetype, they’re totally ready for it because the way I dress has resonance with the cultural uniform and England’s exports of the 60s
” At this point, a cup of tea is placed in front of him “Oh thank you, my God I’m like Judy Garland. “My pills”
thank you” After an impression and a sip, he continues. “
Then, because of our literary history and relationship, the Dickensian manner of my vernacular is appealing and familiar to them. They don’t rub their eyes and go “Huhh?!” – they don’t react to me like Scooby Doo. They just think “oh right, I get it”. I met some hillbillies, proper slack-jaw, gap-tooth, “huh-huh”, cap-wearing hillbillies and they’re not like you think the American folk, well not like my preconceptions at least. They talked to me about Noam Chomsky and Federal Reserve and revolution
so, they’re up for it.”

In Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Brand plays Aldous Snow, the front man of rock-band Infant Sorrow. His performance has been critically acclaimed both in Britain and across the pond, but the film has already gained a high level of notoriety for the opening, fully-nude, break-up scene. Brand’s body was also on show in the film but not to the same extent as Jason Segal, whose role he wouldn’t have minded playing if it had been offered. “I tried to get a bit more fit but I’m more comfortable in clothing. I was quite happy to do it as the script did justify visible nipples. Would I have got my willy out? Yeah, happily. If people wanted to see it
there is a waiting list and the pursues and triumphs of herculean labourers but then, at the end, there is a pay-off” And, although Russell did marvel at the writer and actor’s confidence, he did reveal that a certain element of ‘fluffing’ took place. “Well, I happen to know there was a technique employed before the revelation,” he says. “Actually, I did that
it was a condition of doing the role but, to tell you the truth, I was more into the fluffing than the acting in the end.”

One of the few criticisms of Russell Brand is that the character he plays is very similar to his own persona. I ask him for his reaction to these comments. “Well, you know, it’s sort of like similar, in a way, to me because of things like “ooh, I’m an alcoholic” and “ooh, I like to have it off” but that’s just stuff you’re saying and you could be saying anything. You could say “Ah, I don’t like havin’ it off, I work at an abattoir in Huddersfield” – it’s still just saying things. But because you’ve got such a variety of choice when it comes to actors and actresses, there’s no point in getting a 7-foot chinaman to play the part of a little dutch girl. You tend to get people similar to the roles you want them to play.” It seems to be a question that he is asked a lot and one he is keen to set straight. “There are obvious similiaraties between me and the character like we have the same face and voice but there is also a clear distinction in his personality,” he continues. “He has a very different idea of attachment. Me, I’m a very jealous controlling person. I already consider all the women present in this hotel to be my personal possessions and envy the men for their proximity. Whereas, he doesn’t give a monkeys about nothing.”

The dialogue he uses in the film is particularly similar to his own linguistic style and it’s quite evident that he played a key part in scripting his own role. “One of the best things about working on Judd Apatow’s films is that they encourage spontaneity and ad-libbing, give you as much need as you need to improvise and I loved it, I had a fabulous time,” says Brand. “Many of the lines I was most proud of when I finally saw the film were only ever said once. Like the bit where Sarah is having a go at me, saying my music is rubbish and all that stuff and I went “Yeah, well I fucked the housekeeper” was only ever done once. When Jonah Hill says “Did you get a chance to listen to my CD?”, I went “Oh, well I was going to do that but then I just carried on living my life”, I said that once. Every time we did it, I did a different line to keep myself interested
not in a Robert Downey Jr. way though.” This improvisation is perhaps best exemplified by comments he makes about Noel Gallagher in the film. “Exactly! I did that as a little dig. I couldn’t do that in every take. I mentioned some others
Morissey, for example.” I ask if Matt Morgan, the co-presenter of his Radio 2 show, was ever included. “I tried to get Matt Morgan into it but blessedly he is still unknown outside of really our radio show and family,” he laughs. “I met one of his cousins once and they didn’t know who he was!”

Russell Brand first became famous as an MTV presenter but was dismissed after turning up to work dressed up as Osama Bin Laden the day after 9/11. He then went on to make other shows, notably Re:brand, before overcoming his drug addiction and landing a job on Efourum, later renamed Big Brother’s Big Mouth. This sparked the start of the Russell Brand phenomenon. From the start of his career, and through everything, Brand has regularly done stand-up and this helped him find his feet in this particular role. “It means you’re more confident with spontaneity,” he says. “When I do stand-up shows, I tend to improvise for the first hour so I’m very comfortable in a situation where I have to improvise. Stand-up for me
it’s the core of what I do and I’ll always be very grateful to have something that is not contingent on other people, particularly when I was unemployable because with stand-up you can do it above a pub. You don’t need anyone else to be complicit.”

Acting is not just a lucky break for Brand, it is the career he had originally trained for. He auditioned for many things through his drug addiction and was surprised to recently discover he came close to playing Super Hans in Peep Show while he was still a drug addict. He finally got a foothold on the silver screen with roles in Penelope and St. Trinians but was recently beaten by Andy Serkis (King Kong) for a role in upcoming movie, Inkheart. “What can you do in that situation?,” he muses. “Even the Empire State Building struggled!”

Learning the methods of Stanislavski and training for three years at the same school as Pierce Brosnan, Paul Bettany and Colin Firth, Brand’s career has finally got him where he wanted to be. Now his stock is rising fast and Brand couldn’t be happier. “I always wanted to do what I’m doing now and what I will hopefully continue to do is be in films and do stand-up – like Richard Pryor. That’s the next stage of my career touch wood all being well and good.”

Now with a successful US film career in his immediate future, I ask Brand whether it helps not having the pressure of being well-known in America. “Well, they didn’t know me at all,” he replies. “So, when I came into the audition dressed preposterously, they thought a mentally ill person had kicked the door down. They were like “Oh, my God, why are you here?” In terms of acting it’s a tremendous relief not to have the baggage but personally it’s a fucking hindrance.”

With many films on the horizon and more being offered, Brand has a sure-fire technique for knowing which roles to take on. “You just take the ones where you think “I’ll come across sexy in that””.

In his next film, Bedtime Stories, Brand works with Adam Sandler, someone he seemingly has a lot of respect for. “He’s clever, man, he’s smart. This would be my theory,” says Brand. “
you must understand celebrity and iconography in a way that a nation sees itself. If you think of how America perceived itself at the time when Arnold Schwarzenegger was the biggest movie star in the world. It was a belligerent, totalitarian, cultural force colonizing the world and now America, post-the gulf war disaster, is keen to portray itself as a kind of well-intentioned, strong but somehow bumbling, guy and I think that Adam personifies that.”

Whilst Brand’s outrageous and extroverted persona is inexplicably compelling, there is a genuine intelligence and literary knowledge behind many of his words. I ask if he thinks that, in the same way as Sandler personifies America, he epitomizes British values. “Yes, I do and I think that’s what will be helpful to me in the next few years. Me going over there all dressed up like Mick Jagger as a bondage scarecrow and talking in the manner that I do, I think it epitomizes certain values. I think it resonates with them which is convenient because I’m being myself or, at least, an extension of that.”

There are many projects in the pipeline for Brand, who will play the lead, co-starring with Jonah Hill in Get Him To The Greek, another Judd Apatow project, as well as making a film based on his best-selling autobiography in which he will be playing himself. “Yeah me and Michael Winterbottom have already written a first draft of that, My Booky Wook
Filmy Wilm doesn’t work so well does it?,” ponders Brand. “Michael, also, is a genius and I don’t think he’ll allow me to give the film a stupid title so that’s the thing that’s a little bit difficult working with someone so talented in his medium, is that you can’t really boss him about because he obviously knows best in that situation. I just want to make sure that film’s funny, you know, because a lot of things from the book are a little bit sad.”

Russell Brand is a tabloid mainstay and his alleged exploits are printed on a daily basis. Does he mind this attention? “Come on!,” he exclaims. “It’s sort of odd you see. It means you have to have strata of your own identity and I think that one of the tricks as it were, at risk of revealing myself, is some of the stuff that seems intimate and personal to me is actually quite disposable because I’ve spent a lot of time in rehabilitation and done an awful lot of therapy and stuff. In the book, when people go “Oh my God, that’s really profound and personal”. I think “fuckin’ hell, you should’ve seen the stuff I left out””.

We move onto the topic of his personal life. “I’m currently a single gentleman,” he announces proudly. “It’s more in keeping with my lifestyle” – a situation that could perhaps be better measured in minutes and hours rather than days and weeks. “I’m currently single,” he laughs. “I had a wonderful girlfriend about five minutes ago. I don’t know where she is anymore. She doesn’t seem interested since I kicked her handbag out the window.”

Recent media coverage of Russell Brand suggested that he had been hanging out with David Beckham in LA. “I mean “hanging out” is a generous description,” he smiles. “I think “bumped into” is perhaps more fair. He was kind enough to invite me to join him and gave me his phone number and I sort of reacted like a 12 year-old, all nervous and I texted him updates every ten minutes – “I’ve left the club now David. Lovely to meet you. In a cab now
phew! Lol.””

Brand is keen to point out that as his fame continues to ascend in America, he has no intention of leaving Britain behind. “I’ll carry on doing the radio show because I deeply love it and it is the core of my creative relationship with Matthew [Morgan] so I’ll continue doing that and I love doing The Guardian column and I’m really a very English sort of a person,” he says. “You realise that more when you go away. While it is advantageous for me to be making films, I love this country and I love doing telly and radio and just doing stand-up here and hanging out here and my cat lives here and I don’t think he’d like to move, the cat. There’s no way of properly knowing but I sort of think that he’d rather he never saw me again if he was allowed to stay in the garden. When I go home he is nice to me but I don’t think he cares as much about me as he does the garden in truth.”

His commuting between Britain and America is a regular occurrence and perhaps best exemplifies the success he is achieving. However, as a former drug addict, he admits that he still has to be cautious going through immigration. “You must be careful, particularly if you actually don’t pack your own bags and never ever dress as Osama Bin Laden and make light of it. They frown on that enormously” he says. “I’m happy to navigate the minefield of my past with incredible dexterity. They have to run a beeping thing over you – “Ok sir, if this makes an anomalous beep then I will be feeling you but I’ll use the back of my hand” – and he’s running the back of his hand over your genitalia and I don’t know he’s not getting off on that, you know, people are always saying “I’ll give you the back of my hand”
Well, I’ve had it and it’s quite nice.”

While the future ahead is bright for him, his past is something that is consistently brought up and referred to. Is he tired of talking about it now? “It just continues, though, doesn’t it? Life continues. I’m not constrained to endlessly reiterating the past because stuff happens everyday. I’ve already had an interesting morning and there are already stories to tell from today that yesterday would’ve seemed impossible.”

As the interview concludes, Brand remarks “It’s quite a poetic ending in many ways.” Actor, presenter, dj, shagger-of-the-year, comedian and, now, poet, Russell Brand is a world apart
charming, unforgettable and unreservedly compelling.

Last edited: 24th May 2009