Doug Stanhope, Academy, Glasgow, review: An expectation-defying masterpiece

His show is dark and uncompromising, but its heart is exposed

Doug Stanhope plays the part of an aimless, drink-guzzling barfly sage well

It takes less than 15 minutes for a fight to break out in the front rows, and Doug Stanhope is thrilled. “It’s been 25 years and nothin' really throws you anymore,” he says, in reference to his own career. “The sad thing is we'll never find out what that was about.” He plays the part of an aimless, drink-guzzling barfly sage well, but those 25 years have taught Stanhope much. His new show, dragged kicking into concert halls around the nation, is an expectation-defying masterpiece.

Or rather, it begins by conforming to expectations we may foolishly fear we have about the Arizona-based, golf punk-styled Stanhope. Even before the fight he’s dropped the word “retard”, and the audience is split; some guffaw, some smirk uncomfortably. He plays it out for a bit, demanding “cultural tolerance”, and then flips the potential debacle with a stunning volley of bait-and-switches. First, he breaks down the etymology of that word and now-innocuous predecessors like “imbecile” to highlight the self-absorbed transience of communal offense, then unfeasibly paints the shooting of congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords as a blow for mental health treatment.

The breaking down of mental health stigma is a big point here, but Stanhope also takes a bow for saving a young man from suicide the night before and boasts of his truly cult-like following (ISIS, he says, are more his competitors than Michael McIntyre). His show is dark and uncompromising, but its heart is exposed.