Rick Molland & Sully O'Sullivan: Comedy Spotlight

Freedom Of Speech Won't Feed My Children was a track on the Manic Street Preachers' regrettable 2001 bilgefest Know Your Enemy. Who's the biggest enemy of free speech that you go for in your show? 



Sully O'Sullivan: Stalin, Thatcher, Trump are all in for one hell of a beating; also my girlfriend's mother, as she undermines the right to freedom of speech for all of us. Rick also has something against Sesame Street's Bert & Ernie.

Rick Molland: Sully O'Sullivan is the biggest threat to our right to freedom of speech that I know of.

Your show involves a death match between opposing viewpoints, with all blows allowed and encouraged. How does this differ from just scrolling through Twitter for an hour?

SO: This isn't a 140-character name-calling session between anonymous Twitter handles. This is two stand-up comics, who know each other and their viewpoints inside out, and get to go back after every show and make their takedowns even more unstoppable than before.

RM: What makes this different to Twitter? Well you can get bet your arse that Keith Chegwin won't be plagiarising this show. #ClassicCheggers

Barack Obama said to uphold freedom of speech because in the end lies and misinformation are "no match for the truth." While I'm all about dat freedom, I'm not sure it's realistic. What's the most comforting lie you were ever told? 



SO: The most comforting lies are the ones you don't tell. For instance, I didn't tell my girlfriend that I referenced her mother in this interview. I'm just going to let her find out by reading it.

Rick Molland: #BlackLivesMatter

Richard Pryor once complained that you couldn't talk about sex in America, but it was fine to talk about killing someone. Now that sex is essentially the lettuce in the relentless media sandwich of life, what do you think our sacred cows are?



SO: I'm a vegetarian, I believe all cows are sacred.

RM: There are none; where someone else sees a sacred cow, I see bullshit. In comedy no topic should be off the table, bovine or otherwise. Add a bit of salad and blue cheese, maybe some bacon, and Medium Rare Scared Cow makes for a tasty tasty burger.

There's long been argument over the notion of free speech, including the right to shout 'FIRE!' in a crowded theatre. The thing is though, clearly just because you can be a gobshite, doesn't mean it's a good idea. Why do you think so many apparent advocates of free speech fail to understand this distinction?



SO: Good point, this is precisely what Rick Molland fails to understand!


RM: FIRE!

A lot of commentators in the defence of free speech suggest that if you don't like something, you ignore it and move on. Is that always what you would do or do you feel some things just need to be challenged? How do you address that in your work?



Both: We challenge everything. All of it. In fact the aim of this show is to get the entire audience, on both sides of the argument, to reconsider their views. Convincing a Syrian Human Rights Lawyer to vote against Freedom of Speech was our biggest success to date, and also our biggest failure. So come down, laugh, and have your views challenged.

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Molland & Sullivan: Freestyle Comedy, The State Bar, Saturday 19 March 7:30, £5.
Molland vs Sullivan, The State Bar, Saturday 19 March, 10:30pm, £5.