Mark Thomas is an irritant to the powers-that-be, and sometimes to his audience. But despite some specious or self-congratulatory moments, the comic-cum-activist’s new show about his encounters with arms dealers is also loaded with a passion and a sense of purpose — and fun — that outguns its flaws.
It’s a condensed version of his recent book, As Used on the Famous Nelson Mandela. But there’s nothing bookish about the way Thomas holds the attention. For 90 minutes he uses his 20-odd years of stand-up experience to take us with charm and wit through his journey from being arrested outside an arms fair one year to attending it the next.
What he tells us about arms dealing is sobering. Despite supposedly rigorous regulations, you could drive a Stallion truck through the loopholes. Selling torture equipment is outlawed in Britain. So how did he see it being openly traded at the arms fair? And how was he able to order 20,000 electro-shock batons from a bloke in Brockley? His arguments would go deeper if he gave his enemies more credit. The idea that arms dealers, Tories and policemen are, y’know, decent people too is not as surprising as he thinks it is. And to rubbish the argument that arms dealing is good for the economy he hits on the cock-eyed comparison that so too is a car crash because of the work it generates.
But whenever the focus shifts from Thomas’s larky audacity to the facts, and to what he’s actually doing with all that audacity, his show really sings. He tells us about the dealer he gets to talk to a group of schoolkids — “he thinks he’s there as a careers advisor!” He guides us through his abortive Newsnight sting on the Hinduja brothers’ sale of Stallion trucks to Sudan. And Thomas learns that co-operating with the system doesn’t mean that you’ve sold out.
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Thomas admits he doesn’t know whether to call himself a comedian or an activist these days. Either way, though, he’s never dull.
For tour details: www.mtcp.co.uk