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The socio-political conditions that enable celebrities to migrate from the entertainment to the political field are specific to their national and historical contexts (Ribke 2015). A significant feature of contemporary politics in the UK is a decline in support for the established political parties (Keen 2015) alongside a pervasive sense of disillusion with parliamentary politicians (Jennings et al 2015). While the professional political class are seen as increasingly indistinguishable as they argue over the bureaucratic minutiae of managing the post-crash budget deficit, charismatic individuals have emerged aligned with new social movements and captured the popular imagination. We have chosen to focus our attention on one such figure, celebrity entertainer and comedian Russell Brand whose turn to political activism has attracted widespread media attention. He has been described in an influential current affairs magazine, as:'the spiritual leader of Britain's disaffected anti-capitalist youth…dismissed by his opponents as a clownish opportunist and even a hypocrite due to his own wealth, he is nevertheless the most charismatic figure on Britain's populist Left' (Prospect 2015). Our research aims to discover how Brand used and adapted his persona and performances to gain legitimacy in the political field while maintaining the authenticity and popularity of his celebrity brand. In order to demonstrate how this worked in practice, we have selected two contrasting performances to show how Brand used his cultural capital as a comedic performer to challenge the political status quo. Our textual analyses of his stand-up show which a celebrity first comes to prominence were found by Ribke (2015) to affect the degree to which media attention could be transformed into political power. We identify the particular challenges and opportunities arising from Brand's origins in stand-up comedy, such as the use of his comedic skills to counteract media hostility and his embracing of his outsider status in opposition to the political establishment to lay claim to be a spokesperson for 'the people'.

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