Cruel and Unusual – Comedy versus the Death Penalty
CRUEL AND UNUSUAL – COMEDY VERSUS THE DEATH PENALTY
“Keith Farnan: Cruel And Unusual manages to be genuinely informative about death row, genuinely realistic about the possibility of change, and genuinely funny enough to receive several rounds of applause.” – Three Weeks
“Spellbinding!” –Chortle
“The Show you should try to see this festival!”-The List
Cruel and Unusual Punishment is prohibited under the 8th amendment of the U.S. Constitution. But the Death Penalty is still legal.
Which means that you can hang someone, shoot them, electrocute them and poison them – but under no circumstances should you have someone executed by dropping a giant jelly bean on their head, by a dwarf, in a penguin suit.
Because that’d be cruel… and unusual.
Cruel and Unusual is a Stand-up show telling the story of former Solicitor and now Comedian Keith Farnan’s journey from law school in Ireland to the Innocence Project in New York city; meeting with Sr.Helen Prejean of Dead Man Walking fame, and on to his summer in a Public Defenders Office in Georgia – where he wonders whether the Irish might just be the only people in the world who can stop the death penalty in America…
Cruel and Unusual makes a laughing stock of the stocks by ridiculing the system as seen through the eyes of an Irish comedian. Showing the Death Penalty in its true light – a barbaric, racist, politically motivated act of revenge that doesn’t achieve any of its so called aims, including deterring violent crime. And it’s just plain stupid.
This Show has already toured Colleges and Festivals including the Royal Festival Hall in London, in conjunction with Amnesty International and Reprieve and continues to tour throughout Ireland and the UK.
Links:
TIME OUT LONDON – INTERVIEW –
http://www.timeout.com/london/comedy/features/6862/Comedian_Keith_Farnan_on_the_death_penalty.html
YOUTUBE LINK: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HfvAt0wu6w&p=FF41C458D8BEAABA&playnext=1&index=4