BY GAVIN MACKINTOSH
Controversial comedian, Russell Brand, has once again taken his eccentric proclivities to New Zealand, where he is promoting the Australian leg of his Trews world order comedy tour. The opinionated essex born character yesterday performed at the Vector arena in New Zealand after gatecrashing a newsroom uninvited where he somewhat imposed himself on a newsreporter by feeding her a cupcake much to her surprise. Brand had reportedly been jogging around Auckley city center when he walked off the street and offered the news team an interview. He said ”Ive got 21 mins, does anyone wnat to give me an interview”?
He then went on to lift a cupcake which he had in his hand to the face of their female reporter-Selina Hawkins. He is said to have offered rambled responses to some of their questions. Brand has always been an unusual human being with oddities about his person that only he can explain. His impulsive visit to the newsroom to offer an interview can be seen as either a desperate search for attention anywhere he goes, or a genuine yearning to have his voice heard about issues close to his heart. The problem is that it is a bit puzzling why some of the issues he holds close to his heart are issues at all.
At his show at the Vector arena, Brand took the opportunity to deliver a bashing at Fox News, Donald trump, The Sun newspaper, and the Royal family, as usual. The Royal family has always been the usual victim of his critical tirades as he clearly has some vendetta against them probably relating to correctness and a perceived unfair powwer and position they have. The Sun newspaper will hardly be pleased of his decision to have a crack at them, not that Brand cares one bit, though he may if they decide to have a real crack at him depending on how they crack him. But then Brand took a deeper step in touching on the subject of homosexuality, stating that Jesus was never concerned about it. It is natural to wonder why this topic bothers him, or could this just be part of his mission to ‘change the world’ by fighting the corner of those groups of people he feels are victimised? Or is there a close homosexual friend he is fighting for?
Brand himself has some effeminate mannerisms and some have suspected he may swing that way too, though Brand strikes me as a 100% ladies man. There are many straight men with effeminate mannerisms, and the ladies generally warm up to such men, as do gay men. However, the mind cannot help wonder why Brand is so opinionated and critical. His attacking tendencies may actually be the aftermath of his drug ridden past producing strange and peculiar combinations when blended with his curiously educated mind. Brand seemingly visits the dictionary regularly as evident in his sometimes overly strong use of the English language, compelling even the most educated of us to need the dictionary to understand what he tries to say sometimes.
A documentary about his life recently released in New york is known to have been strongly opposed by Brand even though he gave original consent and even footage to Ondil Timoner, the producer who made the documentary. The reason of his disapproval was because he was not able to dictate fully the contents of the documentary. We must then ask if it is all about Brands way or the high way. Clearly he wants to be portrayed in certain ways that are more positive than negative. Brand is not a bad guy, and is certainly hilarious in many ways. He sure knows how to grab attention, but whether it is the right kind of attention is a different matter. If he really wnats to change the world, he will have to start by changing himself a little bit. The man is funny, crazy, a bit much, really. He says things as he sees them, but the way he sees things is far from ideal. Even if he did have some legitimate issues to rant about the Royal family, constant slamming of them cannot be a smart move. Not for a man who claims he wants to change the world.
Is his attitude the remnant of some unspoken bullying he may have suffered in school? Is his eager use of intelligent language a ploy to hide some academic achievement earlier in school when he may have been distracted by drugs like many youths are in school? There are so many unanswered questions that may explain why Russell Brand is such a different breed of human being. In beating drugs, he matured as a human being, but there may yet be more maturing to do for him to really get to that place he is aiming for.
