Science boomed in popularity only after TV producers stopped treating the public “like idiots”, comedian Robin Ince has claimed.
Together with TV scientist Brian Cox, Ince has helped bring science to a wider audience through their Radio 4 science-cum-comedy show The Infinite Monkey Cage.
They are at the Hammersmith Apollo this week for their seasonal variety show of music, comedy and astrophysics, called Brian And Robin’s Christmas Compendium.
“If you don’t make the presumption that people are idiots and that you have to dumb down everything, then people rise to that,” Ince told the Standard. “People don’t just want colour and tat and no depth. We need not to look down on people and go for the lowest common denominator. People are much smarter than those in charge believed.”
The pair’s show, which runs today and tomorrow, also features music veterans The Cure, comics Josie Long and Milton Jones, and Nasa’s Carolyn Porco.
Ince said: “The idea that science is the new rock ’n’ roll comes from Brian’s passion. It’s about new ways of presenting things to people, not just documentaries. Making these live shows is another way of engaging with people.
“There’s this idea that Radio 4 is just listened to by a certain group of the middle class. But we get letters from truck drivers loving the fact that at 11 at night they can hear all these discussions about bizarre behaviour of particles”.
The Ince and Cox variety performance, in its seventh year, has had guests such as Jarvis Cocker and Brian Blessed, while Ince’s friend Ricky Gervais has hosted. Of his “bizarre” friendship with Office star Gervais, Ince said: “In the old days he could just grab me and make stupid noises, whereas now people would go, ‘He’s over there! Oi mate, do the dance’.”
