Belching Out The Devil

3 months ago 06th Oct 11:41

Following the hugely successful As Used on the Famous Nelson Mandela, the UK’s foremost political comedian and best-known political activist now takes a journey to ‘Live on the Coke side of life’, and boy do they wish they could send him back.

In the style of Stupid White Men and Fast Food Nation, Belching out the Devil is a staggeringly entertaining look at one of the world’s most recognised and controversial brands. Coca-Cola and its logo are everywhere.

It is a company that sponsors the Olympics, has a $96 million museum in its honour and even re-brands Santa Claus. With 1.4 billion of its products drank daily, Coke is a worldwide phenomenon.

But place one energetic, outraged comedian on the trail and the corporate bubble soon loses its fizz. From Istanbul to Mexico City, Mark travels the globe investigating the stories and talking to the people that aren’t part of Coke’s iconic advertising campaigns: Turkish deliverymen who were sacked for joining a trade union - their wives and children subsequently attacked and gassed by a notorious branch of the Turkish police; Indian labourers working in unsafe conditions with toxic chemicals and no safety equipment and Colombian union leaders falsely accused of terrorism and jailed alongside the paramilitaries who want to kill them - as well as other similarly provocative stories all told with compelling clout.

With the frankness and thoroughness of an investigative journalist and the philosophy that pissing people off is the only way to make them listen, Mark’s journey is undertaken with the gusto of a bull dozer on steroids. He annoys all the right people, asks all the wrong questions and takes on every scientist Coca-Cola ad executives can muster. This is a truly unique adventure to deflate a brand sensation.

Mark Thomas has been a comedian and activist for over twenty years. His campaigning brand of comedy-spanning TV, stage and print-has been a thorn in the side of many politicians and corporations, and has resulted in him being awarded a UN Global Human rights Defender Award and a Kurdish National Congress Medal of Honour amongst other citations.

This is his second book, following the tremendous popularity of his first As Used on the Famous Nelson Mandela. Recently Mark won a Sony Comedy Award 2008 for a R4 programme `My Life in Seriously Organised Crime’.