Marcus Brigstocke: God Collar

With even The Guardian complaining about the tediousness of Marcus Brigstocke’s dogmatically simplistic leftism, it comes as some surprise to find in God Collar more than a hint of nuance. It turns out, quite contrary to expectations, that Brigstocke doesn’t believe all people of faith are uniformly idiots who can be patronised into submission; in fact, Brigstocke is a little jealous of them.

But this wouldn’t be a Brigstocke show if it didn't contain a good dollop of political naivety. Far from simply acknowledging the right of the religious to exist, God Collar develops into a rather weak attack on atheism. It's all rather ill-conceived: he has a tiresome tendency to dress up this defence of wishy-washy godliness in the garb of Richard Dawkins bashing; and worse still is a piss-weak argument that Dawkins’ and Christopher Hitchens’ arguments against religion can be blown apart if you replace the word “God” with the word “alcohol.” Put simply, they can’t.

Yet Brigstocke becomes much more entertaining and sympathetic when he moves on to his family life. His material about playing interminably long games of snakes and ladders with his daughter and the inexhaustible energy of his son are both funny and, more importantly, genuine. This material is captivatingly warm and utterly devoid of his usual alienating smugness. The real highlight of the set comes with his affectionate, funny yet slightly melancholic discussion of losing his best friend. Here is an illustration of humanity which, mercifully, transcends both politics and religion.

Read Edward Whelan's review of Marcus Brigstocke: God Collar