Do we like Russell Brand?
Our score: 3 out of 10. A rape trial is under way, he has admitted conduct he calls exploitative, and the only good we could verify is thin.
Russell Brand grew up in Grays, Essex, got into the Italia Conti stage school, was later expelled, then left RADA to chase comedy. He was sacked from MTV after turning up as Osama bin Laden the day after 9/11, then became a tabloid favourite on E4's Big Brother's Big Mouth in 2004. He quit BBC Radio 2 after a row over messages he and Jonathan Ross left on a guest's answerphone, then took his act to Hollywood.
The big stoush is the criminal case. Prosecutors allege he raped a woman in a hotel room at a Labour Party conference, forced a TV worker into a sex act in a toilet, and groped a radio station worker. The charges involve six women and incidents between 1999 and 2009. He is on bail, and the jury has not decided anything yet.
It started in 2023, when a Sunday Times and Channel 4 investigation had five women accuse him of rape, sexual assaults and emotional abuse. He was charged in April 2025, with two more charges added that December. He has denied it all, writing in a social media post that he had never engaged in non-consensual activity.
On the harm test, we couldn't verify anything of his own saying trans people or women should be denied rights. What we did find is the company. After the charges, Tucker Carlson posted on X that Brand was being persecuted and urged followers to pray the Trump administration would come to his rescue. The Daily Beast also reported Brand joining a MAHA Action media Zoom from his bathroom to talk about US healthcare coverage. Other reporting says his show platforms conspiracy theories, but we couldn't open those pages, so call this a close one.
In April he went on the Megyn Kelly Show and admitted having sex with a 16-year-old when he was 30. He said the UK age of consent is 16, but called it exploitative given a famous man's power advantage, and said his past sexual conduct was selfish. That isn't a charge, and he didn't discuss the specific allegations, citing contempt rules. It's still his own account, and it's a long way from nice.
The good stuff is thin. His publisher Pan Macmillan sued him for around £220,000 over two self-help books he never wrote, after the deal ended following the accusations. It settled for an undisclosed sum earlier in 2026. We found no verified charity or kind act to set against the rest, and that's honestly the whole list.