Stewart Lee Stand-up Shows Season 1

"The cleverest, funniest, most cliché-free comedian on the circuit" Ricky Gervais After four years working on Richard Thomas' Jerry Springer - The Opera, Stewart Lee returns to stand-up in search of clarity, self-respect and immediate sensual and intellectual gratification. Captured here for Stewart's first ever live DVD release, Stand Up Comedian documents the strongest set of his career, culminating in a sell-out Spring 2005 tour. See "one of the top three or four living stand-ups" (Time Out) sweat his way through over an hour of smart and subtle bone-dry comedy. Stand-Up Comedian was recorded live in the notoriously comedy-hostile city of Glasgow, where a terrified Des O'Connor once sold advertising space on the soles of his shoes.

It's one of the scandals of our time that Joe Pasquale's Return of the Love Monkey is avaliable everywhere, but this masterclass in honest intelligent comedy is on sale only at a solitary website and its author's live gigs. The Pasquale comparison is relevant, as the squeaky unfunny man is one of Lee's most fruitful targets, alongside Robbie Williams, Dan Brown and the 60,000 born-again Christians who waged a hate campaign against Lee for directing Jerry Springer the Opera. Charges of blasphemy were dropped, "because it's not 1508", but Lee's life was turned upside down. With unflinching reflections on "a bit of a difficult year" allied to almost supernatural stagecraft, this set is high art in comparison with most stand-up. Especially Pasquale's.

In 2007, Stewart Lee was voted the 41st best stand-up of all time in an official Channel 4 poll, apparently better than Lenny Bruce but not as good as Jim Davidson. But what real difference does this accolade make? His TV pilot has been cancelled, his mother still thinks the 1970s game show host Tom O’Connor is funnier than him, and he’s been booked to perform stand-up for a conference of insect scientists for no money, while dressed as an aphid. Lucky for us, the more frustrating Stewart’s life becomes, the funnier he gets. Here’s Lee’s acclaimed show, 41st Best Stand-Up Ever, captured in extreme close-up at The Stand comedy club in Glasgow.

TV's Frankie Boyle has declared that no-one over 40 should do stand-up, as the old comedians lose their edge and their anger. Stewart Lee is 42 and Frankie's heartless Scottish words have made him wonder if it's worth carrying on. Undaunted, the furiously baffled comedian tries to win round the legendarily harsh Glasgow audience with a crowd-pleasing Mcintyre-style routine about coffee shops, but is distracted by scores of imaginary pirates; he tries to talk about every day middle aged men's concerns, but is drawn into a forty minute rant against Top Gear and all it stands for; he attempts to find some common ground with happy childhood memories that he and the audience can share, but is instead consumed with loathing and despair as a result of a Magners' Cider advertising campaign. He screams from the balconies, stumbles in the aisles, and ends with a country and western song.