The Russell Brand Situation Explained
This celebrity is in some seriously hot water. Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’ll be looking at the developing story around Russell Brand and the allegations that have been made against him.
Transcript
00:00 Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we'll be looking at the developing story around Russell
00:10 Brand and the allegations that have been made against him.
00:20 On the 15th of September, 2023, following growing public speculation, British actor
00:26 and comedian Russell Brand posted a video online to try and get ahead of this brewing
00:32 scandal.
00:33 In it, he claims that he was the victim of a coordinated attack from the mainstream media
00:44 and profusely denied the allegations without going into detail about what they were.
00:50 At the time, Brand was also touring a new comedy show in the UK, Bipolarization, and
00:57 did end up performing on the 16th in London, mentioning briefly that there were "things
01:02 that he absolutely cannot talk about going on".
01:12 That very same day, a TV documentary and a newspaper exposé in a joint investigation
01:18 were published.
01:20 The documentary came from the show Dispatches on Channel 4, a highly regarded producer of
01:25 investigative journalism in the UK, while the exposé was published in The Times and
01:30 The Sunday Times, a very respected newspaper of record.
01:34 They both detailed allegations by four women of serious sexual assault and misconduct.
01:48 The earliest allegations brought up by investigators dated back to 2006, a few years into his successful
01:55 stand-up comedy career and television career.
01:58 He worked for MTV, and then eventually Channel 4, to present its Big Brother spin-off show
02:04 Big Brother's Big Mouth.
02:07 By 2006, Brand was working for BBC Radio.
02:16 The woman, dubbed Alice, claimed that when she was 16, she was in a relationship with
02:22 Brand for a few months after they had met in London, and she recognized him.
02:27 She said that the next time they met up, he made sure that she was telling the truth about
02:32 being 16.
02:34 It's worth mentioning that in Britain, 16 is the legal age of consent, as opposed to
02:39 18 in the US, meaning that this relationship was not technically against the law.
02:49 However, Alice said that, years later, she was able to recognize the star's behaviour
02:55 as "grooming".
03:06 She said that though her parents knew some of what was going on, she was so determined
03:10 to continue with Brand that they were powerless to stop her visiting him, and that he coached
03:16 her on what to say to her parents so that she could lie about her whereabouts.
03:29 And most disturbingly, Alice also said that Brand referred to her outright as "the child".
03:36 The relationship ended when he allegedly assaulted her.
03:40 Eight years later, she says she contacted Brand's literary agent to tell them what
03:45 kind of a person he was, but was quickly contacted by his lawyers who accused her of wanting
03:50 money, though she never asked for any money and only wanted an acknowledgement and apology.
03:57 But that literary agent, Tavistock Wood, has also now ended its relationship with Brand.
04:04 Another of Brand's accusers is a woman dubbed "Rachel" by the investigators, who worked
04:09 as a runner during Brand's time on Big Brother's Big Mouth.
04:25 She said she was the one the producers repeatedly sent to break bad news to Brand, and that
04:31 she once went into his dressing room where he exposed himself and asked her to perform
04:36 sexual acts.
04:46 According to Rachel, she refused, though she alleges they eventually did start a relationship
04:51 and he told her he had it written into his contract that he wasn't allowed to have relationships
04:57 with anybody else working on Big Brother.
05:07 This is a claim made publicly a few times in years past, including Brand referencing
05:13 it in his autobiography.
05:15 One of the women who spoke on the record to journalists was Helen Berger, who was Brand's
05:20 PA in the mid-2000s.
05:21 I sent my resume to one of those agencies that will place you places, and I was given
05:26 this interview to work with Russell.
05:28 Berger said that when she revealed to the higher-ups that she was gay, this was seen
05:32 as a positive to land her the job, because it lowered the chances of anything untoward
05:37 happening between her and Brand.
05:42 Berger also talked about Brand's habit of often wearing only his underwear and nothing
05:47 else.
05:48 I always only wore his underwear, his tighty-whities.
05:52 I don't think today I would accept a boss only being in his underwear around me.
05:57 Another accuser of serious crimes was a woman nicknamed Nadia, who met Brand while he was
06:02 living in Los Angeles in the early 2010s.
06:12 She said they slept together consensually a few times, but then one night, he violently
06:17 assaulted her.
06:26 Investigators were shown the text message exchanges between Brand and Nadia after the
06:30 fact, and also said they had verified with other people who knew Brand at the time that
06:35 the number he was texting from was, in fact, his phone number.
06:46 And the final accuser interviewed by the journalists was Phoebe, who met Brand through an Alcoholics
06:52 Anonymous meeting in LA in 2013.
07:00 She said Brand chased and attacked her in his home while she screamed for help.
07:05 Phoebe fled the house and has now told journalists that there were people outside who heard the
07:10 screaming, but that the witnesses later told her they were so scared of Brand, they didn't
07:16 intervene.
07:24 Many other stories and incidents were brought up by investigators that now appear far more
07:29 disturbing in hindsight.
07:32 In Britain, Brand is still notorious for the 2008 prank call scandal, in which he and fellow
07:38 comedian and TV presenter Jonathan Ross made an unpleasant prank call to Andrew Sachs on
07:44 BBC Radio 2.
07:46 Andrew Sachs is best known for starring as Manuel in the acclaimed sitcom Fawlty Towers,
07:52 and Brand boasted on Sachs' voicemail about a time he slept with Sachs' granddaughter.
08:01 This may sound like something of a non-troversy to outside ears, but in Britain, politicians
08:06 including the Prime Minister were expected to comment on it and condemn Brand, who lost
08:12 his job.
08:13 Even more disturbing, dispatches showed old footage of Brand on another radio show calling
08:19 up Jimmy Savile, the heinous sex offender whose crimes were revealed a year after his
08:25 death.
08:35 In the call, Brand offers his assistant to Savile, with Savile joking about how she ought
08:41 to be naked, and Brand saying his assistant was contractually obligated to do what he
08:46 says.
08:52 In the years since, Brand largely disappeared from mainstream media.
08:57 Following his high-profile divorce from Katy Perry, he remade himself as an online cultural
09:02 and political commentator.
09:04 This started in 2015, when Brand got involved in the UK's general election that year and
09:10 told his followers who to vote for, but this eventually evolved.
09:21 Using his experiences with addiction, he cultivated a "wellness" image, and is now married
09:26 to a fellow "wellness" influencer.
09:29 However, his commentary got more and more extreme during the pandemic, leading to many
09:34 reports to YouTube that his channel was actively spreading misinformation and conspiracy theories.
09:41 He now has tens of millions of followers behind his "movement" and posts on a variety of
09:47 platforms including Rumble.
09:50 As a result of this online presence, he has many vocal fans who have come to his defense
09:55 following the allegations, pointing out that the personality and behavior he was once celebrated
10:00 for are now called out as problematic.
10:04 The fans urged detractors to remember the old adage "innocent until proven guilty",
10:09 and also pointed to what they called the suspicious timing of the accusations, at a time when
10:15 Brand became an outspoken critic of Big Pharma, the industrial-military complex, and the concentrated
10:21 ownership of media in the hands of a few groups.
10:25 It felt like we were essentially taking lands into slaughter.
10:30 We are basically acting like pimps to Russell Brand's needs.
10:35 British broadcasters who employed Brand over the years, including the BBC and Channel 4,
10:40 have so far said that they have no record of anybody raising complaints against Brand
10:46 at the time, though many allege that complaints were made.
10:51 They are, however, opening investigations to try and determine exactly what happened,
10:56 as is the London Metropolitan Police.
10:59 He pushed me up against the wall.
11:02 I'm like, "What are you doing?"
11:05 YouTube has also blocked Brand's channel from monetization.
11:09 And finally, investigators say they have now been contacted by many more women who also
11:14 want to come forward.
11:16 The initial investigation was a year in the making, and journalists are fact-checking
11:21 the latest claims before anything more is published.
11:25 Let us know what you think of Russell Brand and these shocking allegations against him.
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