The Trawl Meets Stewart Lee
The Trawl
Jemma Forte & Marina Purkiss
4.7 • 867 Ratings
🗓️ 30 January 2026
⏱️ 57 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
For many, comedian and writer, Stewart Lee, is the GOAT so Jemma and Marina were thrilled to sit down with him to chat about the state of the world, how to deal with mad relatives, Brexit, Trump, how he fills his spare time and everything in between.
Lee is described on Wikipedia as having an onstage persona that alternates between 'that of an outspoken left-wing hero and that of a depressed failure and champagne socialist who criticises his audience for not being intelligent enough to understand his jokes.' This is all like catnip to The Trawl so Marina and Jemma knew their meeting with the comedy legend would not disappoint. Spoiler, it didn't.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | It was also kind of easy to write comedy about because it was so blatantly absurd. |
| 0:04.0 | The problem you've got now is we've kind of gone beyond that to the point where it. I'm Gemma Forte. |
| 0:29.3 | And I'm Marina Perkis. And on the trawl meets, Gemma and I get to chat with someone we admire and find interesting. |
| 0:36.2 | We discuss political topics they're passionate about, |
| 0:38.9 | find out what makes them tick and what level of despair they have or haven't reached |
| 0:43.7 | in these times of bat shittery. |
| 0:47.1 | And today, the trawl meets someone who the Times referred to back in 2009 as the comedian's comedian and for good reason. And it is as a stand-up that he's |
| 0:57.3 | best known. He's performed his brilliant brand of comedy all over the world, but he's also a |
| 1:01.8 | writer having written for TV in magazines and he's even penned a musical, Jerry Springer the |
| 1:07.4 | musical, to be precise. But maybe this paragraph, which I actually found on |
| 1:12.4 | Wikipedia, best illustrates why he's always been someone who Marina and I have had at the top |
| 1:17.9 | of our list in terms of who we want to get on the troll meets. So, Lee's on-stage persona frequently |
| 1:25.3 | alternates between that of an outspoken left-wing hero and that of a depressed failure and champagne socialist. |
| 1:31.3 | In an ironic manner, he often criticises the audience for not being intelligent enough to understand his jokes, |
| 1:37.9 | saying they'd prefer more simplistic material or enjoy the work of more mainstream arena comedians, |
| 1:43.9 | such as Michael McIntyre or Lou Mac. |
| 1:46.7 | It's like being dead having this. |
| 1:48.9 | This is your life. |
| 1:50.7 | Let's go through the more. |
| 1:52.9 | Before we get chatting, let's have a listen to the man himself in action. |
| 1:57.5 | Here he is using humour perfectly to demonstrate precisely why some people are a bit dim |
| 2:03.5 | when it comes to the issue of immigration and why blaming everything. Or immigration isn't exactly |
... |
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