Russell Brand: Standing Up To Addiction

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Fresh Air
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Russell Brand: Standing Up To Addiction

TERRY GROSS, host:

This is FRESH AIR. I’m Terry Gross.

When I tell you that my guest today is a very funny British actor and
comic who sometimes goes too far and can be very offensive, but is
mostly very funny, a lot of you will be thinking Russell Brand. On the
other hand, a lot of you probably never heard of him.

Russell Brand is quite famous in England and quite controversial. He’s
been fired from MTV and resigned from the BBC last fall, over a huge
public outcry over a radio program he co-hosted.

Just last week, the BBC was fined 150,000 pounds over the incident. More
on that later.

Brand is starting to become known in the U.S. he played the self-
absorbed, over-sexed rock star in “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” and last
September hosted the “2008 MTV Video Music Awards,” during which he
acknowledged his relatively unknown status here.

(Soundbite of “2008 MTV Video Music Awards”)

Mr. RUSSELL BRAND (Author, “My Booky Wook: A Memoir of Sex, Drugs, and
Stand-up”): English people present will be able to testify that I’m
famous in England.

(Soundbite of applause)

Mr. BRAND: Admittedly, fame does lose a little of its cache when you
have to tell people that you have it.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. BRAND: And English people always say to me, ah, I bet you love it in
America, not being famous. It must be a relief. Do you love it? I
(censored) hate it.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. BRAND: My personality doesn’t work without fame. Without fame, this
haircut just looks like mental illness.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: That hairdo that Russell Brand described is long and ratted-up.
We’ll talk more about his look later, too. Brand has a memoir that was a
bestseller in England and is now a bestseller in the U.S. It’s called
“My Booky Wook,” and it’s about his difficult childhood, his sex and
drug addictions and his life in comedy.

Parents, you’ve probably gotten the point by now, that parts of this
conversation aren’t for young children.

Russell Brand, welcome to FRESH AIR. When you’re in the United States,
and you’re doing standup with a new audience, are you trying to take
advantage of that now and kind of in some ways trying to start from
scratch with people who don’t much know who you are, like not totally
recreating yourself but asking yourself if I was starting over again,
what would I do, maybe differently?

Mr. BRAND: I think it is a new opportunity to uh - it gives you the
reptilian opportunity to shed parts of your skin that you don’t like,
although a reptile would never do that. I think it’s a pretty wholesale
skin-shedding that they go in for, but it does allow me to be a bit
selective.

I do think yeah, I won’t highlight that aspect of my personality. What I
will highlight is, you know, this particularly quaint part of my English
eccentricity.

GROSS: Now in the clip we just heard, you referred to your hair as
something that would just be mentally ill if it wasn’t for the fact that
you were famous. Let’s talk about your look.

Now, you often wear really tight, hip-hugging leather pants, a shirt
that’s unbuttoned to your mid-chest, chains around your neck, mascara
under your eyes, and you have a moustache and beard and long, almost
like teased hair. And in some ways, you look like a pirate with a taste
for leather and chains and God knows what else. So how did this become
your look?

Mr. BRAND: The reason I feel that it is an ingenuous way for me to dress
is, it happened quite organically that – you know, like, that Smiths
lyric, I wear black on the outside because black is how I feel on the
inside – I dress sort of kinky because generally how I feel.

GROSS: So a lot of Americans know you for your role in “Forgetting Sarah
Marshall,” a really funny comedy written by and starring Jason Segel, in
which you play this very self-absorbed, completely narcissistic rock
star who’s very sex-obsessed and dresses kind of like exactly the way
you do.

And I’d like to play a scene from the movie before we talk about it, and
in this scene, like you’ve stolen away Jason Segel’s girlfriend, and so
you and that girlfriend have gone to a resort hotel in Hawaii on
vacation.

At the same time, he’s inadvertently gone to the same hotel to, like,
nurse his wounds, and he runs into you, and mayhem ensues, and it’s all
horrible, but then he finds another girlfriend.

So in this scene, you’re meeting in the lobby of the hotel. He’s had a
very good night with his new girlfriend, and you are in the process of
going back without your new girlfriend, his ex, going back to London.
And so here’s the scene.

(Soundbite of film, “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”)

(Soundbite of whistling)

Mr. BRAND: (As Aldous Snow) Hey, all right, mate.

Mr. JASON SEGEL (Actor): (As Peter Bretter) How are you today?

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) Yeah, I’m good, I’m good. Are you okay?

Mr. SEGEL: (As Bretter) Am I okay? I’m better than okay, my friend.

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) You seem sprightly.

Mr. SEGEL: (As Bretter) I had a great time last night.

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) Congratulations. Well done, well done.

Mr. SEGEL: (As Bretter) What about you? What’s with the bag?

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) Oh right, yeah. I’m off back to England, mate.

Mr. SEGEL: (As Bretter) Oh, you and Sarah are going to England?

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) No, no, no, I’m just going alone.

Mr. SEGEL: (As Bretter) Did you guys have a fight or something?

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) Yeah, it was really – how you served five years
under her, I don’t know. You deserve a medal or a holiday or at least a
cuddle from somebody.

Mr. SEGEL: (As Bretter) You were only here for a week.

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) Well, I don’t know. For me, that one week of it was
like – sort of like going on holiday with, I don’t know, I wouldn’t say
Hitler but certainly Goebbels. It was like a little holiday with Hitler.

Mr. SEGEL: (As Bretter) Jesus.

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) Oh well you know, hey listen. At least it’s clear
now for you two to reconnect.

Mr. SEGEL: (As Bretter) Oh no, no. No, you know what? I have a good
thing going on with Rachel, and I want to see that through.

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) Or maybe, you know, you could have both of them,
Rachel and Sarah. They got on all right, didn’t they, at dinner? So
maybe.

Mr. SEGEL: (As Bretter) You know what? First of all, I’m not that kind
of guy, and even if I was, I don’t think that I have the sexual
competency to really pull that off.

Mr. BRAND: (As Snow) Yeah, this is a gift. Okay, well I think my ride’s
here. So I’m going to skedaddle, then, before anything else happens to
me, before life gets any more daft. Is someone gonna take that? Listen,
don’t let them grind you down. Take it easy, eh? Hey, look at my driver.
I’m gonna have sex with her.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: That’s my guest, Russell Brand, with Jason Segel in a scene from
“Forgetting Sarah Marshall,” which is now out on DVD. Did you feel like
you were playing a satirical version of yourself?

Mr. BRAND: Yes, I was because the process of me getting that part, it
came about thusly. I went for an audition to play the part of Aldous
Snow, if that was indeed the character’s name at that time, who was
originally intended to be a nebbish, bookish, you know, Poindexter-type
individual, like an English Hugh Grant, bespectacled character.

I went in there, did the audition. Jason and Nick Stoller, the director,
and everyone, they really liked it, and said but this man is clearly not
a bookworm. We’ll just rewrite the part and make it exactly how he is.
And so in a way, it’s very flattering because it means they like me. In
another way, it means they think I can’t act.

GROSS: Well, funny you should mention that. When Jason Segel was on the
show, he told his version of the story of how he ended up rewriting the
part for you. So let’s hear that clip, and then I want to ask you about
it. So listen to this.

You wrote a character that’s played by Russell Brand in your film, who’s
a pop star, who’s deeply in love with himself and has also stolen your
girlfriend.

Mr. SEGEL: Yes. Do you want to hear an amazing story about casting
Russell Brand?

GROSS: Yes.

Mr. SEGEL: That part was originally written to be a young, British
author. Like, I picture like a Hugh Grant type. And so we’re holding the
auditions, and people are coming in and doing these terrible, fake
British accents and wearing suits, you know, three-piece tweed suits and
everything.

And so about halfway through the day, we’re just exhausted, and we feel
like we’re never going to find somebody, and then in walks Russell Brand
in his full regalia.

He’s wearing leather pants. He’s wearing a shirt unbuttoned to his navel
and just, like, it must have been three pounds of necklaces and his all
teased. He’s wearing eyeliner, I mean just totally wrong for the part.

And he walks in, and he has the nerve to look at me, the writer, and he
says you have to forgive me, mate. I’ve only had a chance to take a
cursory glance of your little script. Perhaps you should tell me what it
is you require.

And I literally went home that night and rewrote the movie for Russell
Brand to be a British rock star. I couldn’t imagine anyone to be more
jealous of or intimidated by if they were dating your new girlfriend
than Russell Brand.

GROSS: That’s Jason Segel, telling the story of how he cast my guest,
Russell Brand, in the film “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.”

So Russell Brand, had you really not read the script when you showed up
for the audition?

Mr. BRAND: Yeah, but they’d only just given it to me. It’s not like I’d
had it ages. I’d had it about – someone gave it to me about an hour
before, and so like I didn’t have a proper chance to read it. I wasn’t
trying to be deliberately truculent. It was just, like, that was the
truth of the situation.

And it’s lovely to hear someone talking about me in that fashion. It’s
proper good for egotism, but like you know what, Terry? What happened
was that when Jason told me that story of like, Russell, when you came
in, you said I’ve only had a chance to have a cursory glance at your
script.

He told me that. I said I would not have said that. That is really,
really rude, and I would never say anything like that. I’m an
Englishman. I’m a gentlemen. That’s unforgivable. I’d never say it.

And of course, it’s all been filmed because it’s an audition. They
showed me it, and I did say that. I can’t believe it.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: Makes you wonder about the rest of your life, doesn’t it, what
you think you’re doing, and what you’ve really done?

Mr. BRAND: To tell you the truth, I’m an unreliable witness of my own
existence. So perhaps my autobiography should be dramatically re-edited
by people who were actually there.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: So more on the subject of Jason Segel, there’s another clip I
want to play for you from Jason Segel, and this is talking about his
current film, and that’s the film, “I Love You, Man,” in which he plays
this kind of, you know, a bachelor who, like, doesn’t want to get
married.

He wants a series of flings. He doesn’t want a committed relationship,
and he lives in this apartment that he set up just with like videogames
and instruments and things just for guys, just for his, like…

Mr. BRAND: Committed man-child type character.

GROSS: Precisely, precisely. So here’s Jason Segel, talking about how
you figured into his interpretation of that character.

Mr. SEGEL: Sydney was a late bloomer, and so he’s kind of terrified of
monogamy, and you know, he’s a bit of a womanizer and really values his

guy friends.

He’s a little bit mysterious. I don’t want to give too much away, but
he, you know, he’s got this attitude that I don’t possess in life, which
is this is who I am, take it or leave it, which is what really drew me
to playing that part.

It sort of reminded me of my friend Russell Brand, who I did Sarah
Marshall with.

GROSS: Oh, he’s terrific in your film, yeah.

Mr. SEGEL: Oh thank you. Well, he has that quality in real life, as
well, of this is who I am, you know, accept it. And I’ve never had that.
I’m the kind of guy who, like, stays up until midnight thinking I wish I
hadn’t said that thing to that guy. I hope I didn’t hurt his feelings.
And then I’ll call the next day and apologize, and they’ll have no idea
what I’m talking about. That’s sort of how I’m bent, and it was nice to
sort of play the opposite.

GROSS: So that’s Jason Segel, talking about my guest, Russell Brand, and
by the way, Russell Brand has a new memoir, and it’s called “My Booky
Wook.”

So Russell Brand, do you see yourself the way Jason Segel does, as
someone who really doesn’t care what anyone thinks?

Mr. BRAND: No. I think of myself as being utterly tortured by
introspection and self-analysis, burning the midnight oil, reflecting
endlessly on traumas, what the French would call L’esprit de l’escalier,
the thing you should have said but only remember on the stairs after
you’ve left the room. I’m forever thinking of things that were funny to
say just a little too late.

But you know what? It’s so lovely to hear how Jason – this is a good
format for a radio show. I wish you would just interview everyone that’s
ever met me and get them to say nice things about me, and I’ll just
sagely nod along, yes I am great.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. BRAND: Plus I heard you say something nice about me, that you think
I’m fantastic in that film. That gave me a little twitch, if you don’t
mind me saying so, Terry.

So in spite of being deeply flattered by the idea that I could be
perceived as a living-in-the-moment, hedonistic, bacchanalian warrior
for truth and beauty, I’m as neurotic as the next man, and the next man
in this case is Jason Segel.

GROSS: But in some ways, comedically, it seems like you don’t really
care what other people think, that you will do daring things without
worrying about the consequences, and there’s been lots of consequences.
You’ve been fired from, like, so many broadcasting positions in England.

Mr. BRAND: Yeah, well that’s true, Terry. I mean, as a performer, I’m
very, very confident in what I do. As a person, that is, I suppose,
where I’m a little more doubtful, introspective and analytical.

But as a performer, I’m very confident in my work because I feel like
I’m in alignment with something. That’s what I feel. I feel that when
we’re doing something well - whether it be cooking, making love or
performing - I feel that when it’s done well, you get out of the way of
nature. You allow nature’s rhythms and frequencies to move you.

What I feel is that the stuff about me that works is not really me at
all. It’s just getting out of the way of a kind of frequency that’s
everywhere.

GROSS: My guest is Russell Brand. More after a break. This is FRESH AIR.

(Soundbite of music)

GROSS: My guest is Russell Brand, and he has a new memoir called “My
Booky Wook,” and he is a British comic and actor who’s recently started
to really make his mark in America through movies like “Forgetting Sarah
Marshall” and through hosting the “MTV Video Music Awards” ceremony.

Let’s take – let’s talk about one or two of the really like risky things
that you’ve done that have been really controversial and that ended up
getting you fired, because I’m interested in what you were thinking
comedically when you did it. Let’s start with dressing as Osama bin
Laden on your TV show the day after September 11th. This was September
12th, 2001. Tell us what you said on your broadcast in this bin Laden
costume.

Mr. BRAND: What happened, Terry, that one recalls the horror of that
time and how obviously deeply moved the whole world was by that dramatic
trauma of, you know, the most horrifying act of terrorism in history.

And what was so – like me, at that time, I was a crack addict. It was on
heroin. I was out of my mind. So to see something so genuinely dramatic
and awful happening in the world, it kind of, it really, really moved
me, and I didn’t really know how to deal with it.

I didn’t have the facility to write a poem or to, you know, think about
the real effects of an event like that on the victims. All I thought was
my God, what is happening in the world?

And I remember I was hanging out with my drug dealer that day,
Gritty(ph), and we were smoking a lot of crack and heroin. I’d been
aware of al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden for a while. So I felt, you know,
and this is what was really crazy of me.

I felt a little bit – you know, like, if you really like a band or a
writer, and then that band becomes the biggest band in the world. I kind
of wanted to go hey, I knew about this for ages, you know. I’ve known
about this for a long time.

So I had to almost re-pledge my commitment in a ridiculous, drug-
induced, you know, tribute by dressing up that day. That’s all – you
know, it was an insane thing to do and not something I would ever try to
justify and never would repeat without, you know, drug and alcohol.

But I don’t know if you’ve ever taken crack, Terry. It makes you do some
very, very eccentric things, you know. So my point was really, I
suppose, just trying to align myself somehow with all of that chaos, but
you know, in retrospect, it was a very disrespectful and foolish thing
to have done.

GROSS: Now you quote in your book something that you actually said that
day, dressed as bin Laden. Do you want me to quote it, or do you want to
say it?

Mr. BRAND: Yes, please do. Yeah, please tell me.

GROSS: I hate it when I do other people’s routines. This is always so
awful.

Mr. BRAND: Come on, Terry. You can’t do any worse that I did.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: So what you said was come on, guys. Get over it. It was
yesterday. We’ve got to move on now. We can’t grieve forever. And in a
way, like years later, you can look back at that and say that’s really
kind of funny because it’s taking that kind of advice of, like, you
know, you must get over it, you must move on, and using it in such an
incredibly inappropriate way.

Mr. BRAND: Precisely, yes.

GROSS: When no one could possibly have gotten over it yet. So you’re
taking this kind of self-help bromide and really making it seem just
absolutely ludicrous, but it could also be very offensive to people
because everything was – the wound was just…

Mr. BRAND: Absolutely, of course. And I was always – like, I was sort of
obsessed with being original at that time and not a lot else, and I
think one has the privilege of that perspective when you’ve not been
personally affected by an incident.

Obviously, had I not been on drugs and had stopped to think about the
reality of that situation, and you know, the people that died that day
and the effects it has had and continues to have on people that lost
loved ones because of that terrible event, then that – you know, I would
have had a very, very different perspective.

But through the haze and crack and heroin, all I saw was an incredible
new spectacle, and look at the way it was presented to us, the
iconography of it and difficult to say sensationalized when it is
clearly such a sensational event.

But subsequent events proved that it kind of, you know, sort of was used
as a mandate for some, you know, terribly destructive foreign policy,
and I suppose that kind of hysteria is what I tuned into.

GROSS: You know, you make it really clear in your memoir, where your
fans and the people who don’t like your work already know, which is
that, you know, you – as you said, you’ve been a heroin addict, a crack
addict. You appear to have a very addictive personality. But I’m
wondering, like as a comic, as somebody whose world is centered around
being funny, how is that affected by heroin and crack? I mean, does
being funny matter on a heroin high?

Mr. BRAND: It doesn’t seem as important because nothing seems as
important when you’ve got heroin. One of the key components of opiates
is that it diminishes the significance of all else.

You know, if you’ve got heroin, nothing else really matters. Everything
comes in second. In fact, I’ve often thought that opiate addiction,
opium addiction particularly, is like the materialization of the
abstract idea of need.

Most of us have an idea that we’re missing something from our lives.
Some of us think of it as God. Some of us think of it as a new pair of
shoes or the success of a football team that we follow or the craving of
the embrace of an absent lover.

But with heroin, once you’re addicted to it, those needs, those abstract
needs, that hole that I feel is within all of us, doesn’t seem to be
nameless, some unknowable entity, but the clearly, material, definable,
accessible drug of heroin.

You don’t think oh God, what is it, I wish I had a new girlfriend or a
new car. You think I’ve got to get heroin. Once you align that physical
addiction with that kind of psychological need, your life just has a
very clear linearity. I want heroin. I want heroin. I want heroin. It’s
just a tiny, cyclical loop of futile desires.

You know, and in a way, in the rest of my life and in other people’s
lives, it seems we pursue similarly futile endeavors, but just you know,
there is just a bigger carousel. You don’t notice it as much. You know,
the futility of consumerism is less obvious than the futility of heroin
addiction but still the same paradigm.

GROSS: So writing comedy when you’re doing heroin, is that hard to do? I
mean, do jokes come to you? Does humor matter? Do you care? Are you any
more or less funny?

Mr. BRAND: Terry, at the time, when I was on crack and heroin, I was a
lot, lot less funny, you know, because I was a self-indulgent maniac up
on the stage.

You know, I’d be up using heroin on the stage in front of an audience. I
used to go into butcher shops and buy loads of animal entrails and
skulls and offal and smash up skulls and batter them all up with a
hammer and kick them into the audience.

I was much like – you know like GG Allin…

GROSS: May I just interrupt you and say ick?

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. BRAND: Yeah, no, it was crazy days, Terry.

GROSS: That sounds horrible.

Mr. BRAND: It was pretty awful. But I was just interested in the
spectacle of self-destruction. You know, it was so – heroin addiction
was so centrifugal to my life as it with all drug addicts that it
overwhelms all of your being, really.

So to answer your question about humor, I mean, I was occasionally funny
by accident when I was a heroin addict, never knowingly. You know, I
mean, it was – it consumes you to such a degree, it’s difficult really
to write a well-constructed joke or to let the part of you that’s
beautiful and amusing flourish because, really, you just become a vessel
for that addiction.

GROSS: Russell Brand will be back in the second half of the show. His
memoir is called “My Booky Wook.” I am Terry Gross, and this is FRESH
AIR.

(Soundbite of music)

GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. I’m Terry Gross, back with British comic and
actor Russell Brand. He’s best known in the U.S. for his role in last
year’s film comedy, “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” as the self-absorbed,
sex-obsessed rock star. And he’s known for hosting the MTV Video Music
Awards last September. His memoir, “My Booky Wook” is now an American
bestseller. He’s more famous in England than here, and his broadcasting
controversies have added to the fame.

I want to get to, like, something else you did that was really
controversial that you resigned over.

And the person who is in this bit with you ended up being suspended for
several months, and it’s a prank that was very famous in England, semi-
famous in the United States. And this is when you called Andrew Sachs,
who is an actor now in his 70s, who is best known in America as one of
the co-stars of “Fawlty Towers”…

Mr. BRAND: Yeah.

GROSS: …the British comedy series. And so he didn’t show up for an
appearance on your radio show.

Mr. BRAND: It was actually a phone interview, but he didn’t answer the
phone and…

GROSS: Okay.

Mr. BRAND: …just to give the situation a little more context…

GROSS: Thank you.

Mr. BRAND: Yeah. I loved “Fawlty Towers” growing up, thought it was like
the best comedy. I loved Monty Python. I loved John Cleese. I loved
“Fawlty Towers” so much. I grew up listening to the audio cassettes of
that show. Now Andrew Sachs was due to come on our show as a phone-in
guest, booked by our producers because the previous week, an anecdote,
during which it was revealed I’d had relations with one of his
granddaughters who was a member of the Satanic Sluts burlesque dance
group had come out on my show.

It had been mentioned, oh, yeah, didn’t it - like, you know, another
guest on the show said, Russell, did you have sex with that – Andrew
Sachs’ granddaughter who happens to be in the burlesque dance group, the
Satanic Sluts? I said, yes. As a matter of fact, I did. Now one of the
producers subsequently booked Andrew Sachs to come on and guest the next
week. So there would be a kind of elephant-in-the-room interview in
which we would subtly allude, perhaps, to these ideas - not mention them
at all, but the listeners would know, thus providing a kind of a bit of
cheeky, naughty comedy.

But what actually happened is we, Jonathan Ross - who’s the best
broadcaster in our country - and I ended up leaving accidentally a kind
of ridiculous answer phone message, very much – and then very much in
the vain of the film “Swingers,” left subsequent answer phone messages
trying to retract to the original one, but actually hugely exacerbating
the situation.

GROSS: And in those messages, there were references to this relationship
that you had with his granddaughter, whose stage name, by the way, is
Voluptua.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. BRAND: Voluptua, no less. Yes.

GROSS: So, anyways, he was very offended. She was offended. Go ahead,
yeah.

Mr. BRAND: He was. Yes. It was accidental. You see the thing was that –
the distinction I always feel compelled to make is between a deliberate
prank with intention and sort of mad, giddy accident. It wasn’t like,
okay, let’s call up Andrew Sachs when and then – and only then - we
shall announce that I had sex with his granddaughter. The intention was
not to mention that at all. And then in a crazy moment - actually not
even myself, Jonathan, as I say, the best broadcaster in our country,
blurting out – he - I was on the phone leaving the message. Oh, hello,
Andrew Sachs. I respect you. I respect your lineage. You’re great actor
- all things I truly believe. Then in the background, Jonathan blurted
out: He f-ed your granddaughter, like, you know, in a sort of giddy
adolescent whirling moment of irresponsibility. And then we – oh, no.
Hang up. Hang up. Oh, no. What have we done? What have we done?

So it was already on the answer phone and everything. And I said, right,
okay. The only way we can make the situation better is by leaving
another answer phone message. And in the subsequent ones, all we did
with apologize, but, you know, in a kind of, I guess, frivolous way. And
thus – I suppose what happened is because, like, you know, if any - the
people that are aware of Andrew Sachs in your country will know him as
Manuel, the waiter from “Fawlty Towers.”

I loved that show so much. I only thought of it - I also thought, that’s
Manuel from “Fawlty Towers” I’m leaving a message for. And that in the
end, listening to that answer phone would just be Manuel from “Fawlty
Towers.” I didn’t think, oh yeah, that was 30 years ago. This is his
granddaughter. I just went, oh, it’s Manuel from “Fawlty Towers” and
just thought of the whole thing as kind of a frivolous jape, you know,
and - but really, it would have been upsetting for Andrew Sachs, which I
obviously apologized for. But what then ensued was media hysteria with a
privately-owned English media, used it as an opportunity to destroy the
publicly funded BBC, an ongoing campaign that continues to this day and
will continue until the BBC is destroyed. So I got caught up in a
massive storm.

GROSS: Well, let me say, according to what I read in The New York Times,
after the show – after your radio broadcast happened, there were two
complaints to the BBC. But then one of the tabloids wrote an article
about it, and as a result of that article, there were tens of thousands
of complaints.

Mr. BRAND: Yes. Because they…

GROSS: And that’s what you’re referring to.

Mr. BRAND: Precisely, The Daily Mail, the newspaper in question, this is
– this newspaper has a huge agenda to undermine the BBC and, in fact,
undermine any organization that it sees as liberal. Now I’m not
suggesting that the case of me and Jonathan Ross leaving that silly,
silly answer phone message is any great liberal cause. But what I am
saying is that The Daily Mail took that opportunity to attack a very
beautiful and brilliant institution, the BBC, and that they won’t – they
don’t care – The Daily Mail don’t care about morality. All they care
about is conformity, you know.

And I’ve got a career that’s somehow representative of kind libertine
values of sex. But the radio show that, you know, that I used to make
here at the BBC was always kind of anarchic and a little bit crazy. Now
we crossed the line in that particular incident, but the ensuing
publicity and furor was never about the incident itself. It’s more about
conformity and making sure people don’t have the kind of liberty to
express themselves, and that the BBC and publicly funded media and the
ethics implied within the nationalism are destroyed.

GROSS: Now, I want to talk to you a little bit about what it’s like to
get that level of anger directed at you, as well as the BBC. Now you
said after hosting the video music awards in the U.S. that you got death
threats because you said some things about the - you said that you made
fun of the Jonas Brothers with purity rings, and you called – I’m trying
to remember what you called President Bush.

Mr. BRAND: George W. Bush. I said - well, the joke was right, because
here’s how this it makes sense. I said, you know, I’d like to – hello,
on behalf of the rest of the world, I’d like to urge the people of
America to vote for Barack Obama. Now, I know a lot of people – racists,
I think they’re called - say America is not ready for a black president.
But I know America to be a free-thinking, forward-thinking, liberal
country. After all, you’ve had that retarded cowboy fellow in the White
House for eight years.

We all think that’s very liberal over in Europe, because in my country,
he wouldn’t be trusted with a pair of scissors. Right? So a frivolous,
daft little joke about it. But, you know, some people – supporters of
George Bush and people of that political persuasion, did send death
threats. But for me, you know, a death threat, you know, I’m aware that
I’m not immortal. Death is going to come regardless of the death
threats.

GROSS: So what’s the difference between the American way of expressing
anger at you and the British way of expressing anger? Like, did you
death threats in England? You know, like, when you become a public
target like what - would you make a comparison for us?

Mr. BRAND: Yes, I would. I mean, in England I think any actual death
threats – I think because of our English system of politeness, I think a
death threat would be considered rude. But some people did roll their
eyes.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: A death threat would be considered rude, I like that.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: That’s my guest Russell Brand and his new memoir is called “My
Booky Wook: A Memoir of Sex, Drugs, and Stand-up.” You write in your
book that your father use to listen to self help tapes in the car, and
the message you took away… TEXT: Mr. BRAND: Yeah, Anthony Robbins and
all that.

GROSS: So, the message you took away from of all this was, you can do
anything you want. Can you talk a little bit more about the impact of
growing up with self help tapes?

Mr. BRAND: Well, yeah, (unintelligible)…

GROSS: This is a very self help country. Yeah.

Mr. BRAND: (Unintelligible) is the Mecca, right, of self help. I mean
like, you know, so self help as in Scott M. Peck and Anthony Robbins and
those kinds of guys. Yeah, he was always – my dad was involved in
(unintelligible) weekends and stuff, and from time to time he was very
much into success and self improvement, like an entrepreneurial child of
Thatcher’s Britain. And he would listen to these tapes – they were all
about yeah, you can do it. You want – you can achieve what you want,
don’t take no for an answer type stuff, you know. And I was used to
always hearing that from probably when I was five years old - that in
“Fawlty Towers” cassettes ironically. So like, it made me sort of feel
like, you know… My dad also had this belief, which is a curious way to
view the world - he said it in this way, not so articulately, perhaps,
as this, not so unnecessarily loquacious and verbose, but the message
was the same. This is what my dad believed.

The world and existence itself is a malevolent force that wants to
destroy you. Everyday, you’re gonna be attacked undermined and antipathy
will shroud you and the world’s going to bring you down and destroy you.
Only if you fight from your core, with every ounce of your being, to
succeed, would life stand back and go, right, well this one’s serious,
let him through. The only way you can be successful is by waging war
against being. And that’s kind of the opposite of Buddhism, but in a
way, it does show you that you can, you know, you can achieve stuff with
fervor.

GROSS: Boy, are you fighting that influence now, to see the world as
this antagonistic thing that you’re in constant opposition to?

Mr. BRAND: I do try to, I mean, because sometimes there seems evidence
that the world is, you know, oppositional and antagonistic. But yeah, I
don’t want to see the world like that. I want to see the world as
beautiful.

GROSS: My guest is Russell Brand. His autobiography is called “My Booky
Wook.” More after a break, this is FRESH AIR.

(Soundbite of music)

GROSS: My guest is Russell Brand and he has a new memoir called “My
Booky Wook.” As we record this, the G-20 is still meeting in London. You
participated in the G-20 protests. You weren’t there like, breaking
windows of banks or anything, but you were out there protesting what?

Mr. BRAND: The protest was aimed towards change in ecological and
economic policy. I don’t think there’s a strong contra-argument for
what’s happening economically. There were not many people saying, well,
this was working well or the bankers are doing a fine job. So I was just
there, as I’ve often been, in public protests, because kind of - I enjoy
the energy and I like to believe in change and I believe in people’s
right to protest and voice their opinions. It’s kind of different for me
now that I’m, you know, famous in this country, it’s difficult to become
part of a crowd so effortlessly.

GROSS: At an earlier protest, in 1997, you got arrested for pulling down
your pants in public. What was the point?

Mr. BRAND: Oh, showing off really. I mean, I was just a proper little
show off when I was growing up and I was on drugs, so those two things
together - I just meant like, you know. I - again it was a documented
protest. It was anti-capitalistic, people smashing stuff up, there was
loads of craziness, if you will - which I always found kind of exciting.
And I would just like to get involved with them, be a part of it. And I
think the stripping was – I just didn’t have any better ideas. So, it
was really quite a unimaginative way to show off and, you know, some
awful photographers that recorded that incident.

It was around the Statue of Eros in the middle of Piccadilly Circus, one
of the busiest part of London and a focal point for the protest for that
day. I was surrounded by members of the metropolitan police force. I
stripped myself naked, and as I took off my final layer of clothing,
they folded in around me like (unintelligible), dragged me off. I
pretended to have an epileptic fit because, you know, I was told to do
that – it’s a good way, if you’re ever being harangued by the police,
and getting them to release you, is to say you’re epileptic, that you’ve
lost your bracelet, pretend to have a fit and, you know. As I did that
they released me. I sprung once more to my feet, only in time to be
cuffed and arrested.

GROSS: Do you think it was result as an exhibitionist?

Mr. BRAND: Yes, I do. I suppose, but at least now I’ve got some art(ph).

GROSS: Right, right. So is that a kind of thing you’d ever do again?
Like strip in public, I mean like…

Mr. BRAND: Never.

GROSS: …never because…

Mr. BRAND: No way, there’s no need for it. It’s ridiculous. I’m just,
you know, making another film with Judd Apatow at the moment, and the
director of that movie, Nick Stoller, who directed “Sarah Marshall”
called me the other day and asked if I would mind showing my bottom. And
I have to think twice about it. I mean, I think I’m going to asked to do
it. I think it’s necessary for the story, and also it’ll give people a
laugh. But it’s not, you know, stripping off naked (unintelligible)
makes me feel embarrassed.

GROSS: Embarrassed. Now there’s something that I wasn’t sure you’d feel.
Given…

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: …given all the things you’ve done in your life and career, I
wasn’t sure embarrassment was necessarily part of the repertoire.

Mr. BRAND: I think you have to feel embarrassment to vanquish it, you
know. I mean like, often my material is written by virtue of this
process. (Unintelligible). Like something embarrassing will happen to
me. Like I’ll, for example, give Dame Helen Mirren a pair of dirty
underpants. And then as I walk away from there, I think, Oh my god, what
you’ve just done? You’ve just given Dame Helen Mirren, your dirty
underpants as a finish - a wrap gift on “The Tempest,” that you’ve just
been making with Julie Tamor. Then only as I walk away, do I realize
that’s a really inappropriate and stupid present and I think right,
never tell anyone about that. You’ve done a very stupid thing, the less
people know about it, the better. If you can inhabit the number of folk
that know, the less people know how daft you truly are. And then the
next impulse is that means it’s funny, tell everyone.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: Right, like you just said why in the world did you give her a
pair, a gift-wrapped pair of your dirty underwear? Like what, what is
like remotely…

Mr. BRAND: They weren’t even wrapped.

GROSS: …funny about that, was it?

Mr. BRAND: I tell you, it wasn’t meant to be funny and they weren’t gift
wrapped. I was holding them in my hand as I was leaving the set, I was
rushing to get a plane. I’d been wearing these underpants all day long.
Thankfully as I left the set there was a clean pair of underpants in my
dressing room. I had to rush, rush, rush the get this plane. I took off
the dirty underpants I was wearing and I put in the clean, spic and span
ones, rushed out my dressing room, didn’t even have time to pack the
dirty underpants I’d been wearing, rushed in the corridor.

There was Dame Helen Mirren in all her substantial glory. Hello Russell,
you’re leaving us, she said, kissed me full on the lips as she always
does. Well, I shall miss you, you’ll wonderful to work with not as bad
as everyone said, ha, ha, ha. It’s been lovely working with you Dame
Helen Mirren. In your eyes I silently reflect, does the Oedipus Complex
seem bizarrely logical…

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. BRAND: …this powerful matriarch, this goddess, this reason to align
maternity with sexuality. And as I noticed I was holding the dirty
underpants at head height for some, you know… I had my hand like a close
line - where I was nervous. I was sort of – I guess, trying to hold them
far away from the conversation so that they didn’t intrude upon us. But,
you know, it made them more obvious. I saw, just as I was departing,
just as I’d got out of that situation without embarrassing myself, I
noticed, for a moment, her eyes flick towards the underpants. Then a
voice said - and I recognized that voice, for it was my own - oh, Dame
Helen would you like these underpants? And she looked terrified, but
then said oh, thank you, because she’s polite, because she is a dame …

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. BRAND: …because a dame has an obligation to be polite. You cannot
play the queen of England if you don’t have impeccable manners. She did
not have the option of throwing these underpants in my face. So she took
them and as far as I know, Terry, she has them to this day.

GROSS: I will ask you again, why in the world did you think she would
want them?

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. BRAND: I didn’t think, I panicked, I panicked. I the look on her and
I couldn’t think of anything to say. It’s not like I thought, oh, this
is a good idea. It’s like some other part of me took over. I saw her
look at the underpants, you know, there was like a voice of madness. You
know, someone you think is a little bit mad like, you know, wedding
ceremony you can always at the point that goes, do you think this two
people should get married, if not speak now or forever hold your peace.
Every person in the world always think that you should shout something
at that moment, you know, and sometimes I do.

GROSS: So did you talk to her about this after the fact?

Mr. BRAND: No, she gave me a copy of her book though. She sent a copy of
her book to my house and it said, to a genius, love from mere mortal -
signed Helen. But then I checked and she has meant to send it to Sacha
Baron Cohen.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: I want to ask you about the title of your book “My Booky Wook.”

Mr. BRAND: Yes.

GROSS: Don’t take this is the wrong way, there’s something so cutesy
pooh about the title, and it’s so, it’s so - like you’re not at all a
cutesy pooh person. So I keep trying to figure out why is it called “My
Booky Wook.”

Mr. BRAND: It’s paradoxical, right, because it is so much harrowing
material and darkly humorous material in the book, I thought if I call
it “My Booky Wook” somehow castrates the potency of some of the darkness
and why not do that. Also it’s a tribute to the brilliant writing of
Anthony Burgess specifically in “Clockwork Orange.” Alex is always
saying oh my gotty(ph) woks(ph) using made up words and mangled grammar.
And I think through this dissonance it makes you acknowledge that you
take on board a lot of information without questioning it. So a daft
word like “My Booky Wook” is a kind of registers in a way that my
struggle, or my life till now, doesn’t, you know? “My Booky Wook,” it
sounds funny to me.

And I like the capacity of language to interrupt the way we think, to
make us address, through poetry, how beautiful the mundane can be, and
how mundane that which seems slick and appealing actually is. So there
is a hugely intelligent argument for calling a book “My Booky Wook” that
is somehow menacing and dark, but also I just thought it was, to use
your phrase cutesy pooh.

GROSS: Well, Russell Brand, it’s been great to talk with you. Thank you
very much.

Mr. BRAND: Thank you very much Terry. It’s been a joy to be on this
show. I would appreciate it. Particularly like it when you play
complements that has been paid to me by colleagues.

GROSS: We’ll collect some more and have you back.

(Soundbite of laughter)

Mr. BRAND: Thank you, thank you very much. It’s been lovely.

(Soundbite of laughter)

GROSS: Russell Brand’s auto biography “My Booky Wook” is now on American
bestseller lists. This is FRESH AIR.
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Prince’s New Triple-Play

TERRY GROSS, host:

Prince has always been a pop star who prides himself on doing the
unexpected. And his latest unexpected move is to release a triple-album
set called “Lotusflow3r” with little advance notice. It consists of two
albums of Prince Music, plus another disc of Prince Songs sung by a
protege - singer Bria Valente. Rock critic Ken Tucker has a review of
this sudden avalanche of Prince.

(Soundbite of song, “Feel Good, Feel Better”)

PRINCE (Singer, Musician): (Singing) Feel better, Feel good, Feel
Wonderful, Feel better, Feel good, Feel Wonderful, Hey I could tell by
the color of your energy field, You thought this game was over chemical
peel, You try to do me like my good brother Steve, But I got another
funky trick up my sleeve, Expecting me to freak on you a little bit
more, But you get nothing but well-wishers and flowers galore, I mean no
harm, I still got your back, You can come and drink my wine, as a matter
of fact. Feel better, Feel good, Feel wonderful.

KEN TUCKER: I have got another funky trick up my sleeve Prince sings on
last songs, one of 21 new tunes plus another 10 created for the singer
Bria Valente. All of them are gathered together in an abruptly generous
three disc set. That’s almost three hours of new music with songs that
range from a raucous full band jams, to precise pop songs such as this
one called “Forever.”

(Soundbite of song, “Forever”)

PRINCE: (Singing) If I never get to hold your hand, If I never get to be
your man, That’s ok, cause I’ve got other plans, Right now, right now,.
If I never get to kiss your lips, If I never get to feel your hips,
Close to me, That’s ok, I ain’t gonna trip, Not now, no how, Cause I’ve
got 4ever (forever), 4ever (forever), Eternity is just one kiss away, So
they say…

TUCKER: The third disc in this collection, singer Bria Valente’s album
called “Elixir,” is a collection of smooth jams that will sound familiar
to anyone who likes the easy listening radio format. As Prince told the
Los Angeles Times – I got sick of waiting for Sade to make a new album.
And so, using the thin voice of Valente, he made a slick album that
doesn’t leave much of a residue.

(Soundbite of song, “2Nite”)

Ms. BRIA VALENTE (singer): (Singing) 2Nite in the shadow of darken room,
and faith(ph) lit under the glow of the moon. Fingers winding circles in
my hair. Hold me in penetrating stares, I ain’t going nowhere…

TUCKER: The business aspect of this release is a contrast of Prince’s
portrayal of himself here as a trippy party loving guy. He’s selling
“Lotusflow3r” at only one retail outlet, target stores, and on his Web
site. Prince is still ambivalent about record companies, trying whenever
possible to operate as an independent agent, making his money largely
from concerts and Web site music sales.

(Soundbite of song)

PRINCE: (Singing) Still I come to believe that life imitates music,
(unintelligible) turning for you, he can’t hang with you.
(Unintelligible) want to be rock stars, you do what they do. There’s no
future for you. That’s the live of a fool. No more candy, no more candy
for you. It’s too funky, you can’t handle the groove.

TUCKER: For this triple album, Prince wasn’t taking any chances. He
chose to showcase his new material by doing a three night stint on one
of TV most mass audience middle American outlet’s “The Tonight Show”
with Jay Leno. This is the family friendly Prince who also opted to keep
his profile high in 2007 by playing the Super bowl halftime concert with
no resulting scandal. He is even into covering oldies for the nostalgia
crowd as with this fine cover of Tommy James and the Shonedells old hit
“Crimson and Clover.”

(Soundbite of song “Crimson and Clover”)

Mr. PRINCE (Singer): (Singing) I don’t hardly know her, but I think I
could love her, I hope she walks over, I’ve been waiting to show her.
Crimson and Clover, over and over.

TUCKER: Through out this collection, the author offers some his usual
vaguely hippyish, easily ignored peace and love philosophy on tracks
such as “Colonized Mind” and “Dreamer”. Since becoming a Jehovah ’s
Witness in 2001, he’s dialed back the vulgar language and sexual
imagery. He’s still mixing James Brown, Jimi Hendrix and George
Clinton’s P-funk with smooth falsetto ballads. The result is Prince
Music that will either leave you feeling he’s still hitting high points,
or that you’d rather dust off your copies of “Dirty Mind” and “Purple
Rain.” You can certainly debate his ambition at this point. Me, I like
the old but I’m also really glad I‘d bought the new stuff.

GROSS: Ken Tucker is editor at large for Entertainment Weekly. He
reviewed “Lotusflow3r” the new triple album set by Prince. You can
download Podcasts of our show on our Web site freshair.npr.org.
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Transcripts are created on a rush deadline, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of Fresh Air interviews and reviews are the audio recordings of each segment.