Last night there was a comedian on Question Time.
There's always some joker on it, of course, and usually it's Nigel Farage or one of his foot soldiers from the Squadron of Things You Don't Need To Worry About Just Because Nigel Does.
But this week Nigel was actually shunted up the QT food chain a notch by the presence of Russell Brand, a man whose principal talent is being able to use a thesaurus and impress everyone under 20.
There were a couple of politicians on it, and a journalist who treated them all with utter disdain as those of my trade always should, and even though there were three women for once (WOW!) and one of them talked about cocks in Parliament for a bet (HA HA OMG) they faded into the background of what was billed as a modern-day Rumble in the Jungle.
On the far right in the 'c*** chair', Nigel Farage, the man who is scared of immigrants and foreign languages and Europe but somehow married a German.
Somewhere on the middle left, cushioned kindly between two women who didn't show the least interest in sleeping with him, Russell Brand, a celebrity who has recently become renowned as an activist, polemicist, a millionaire who wants to be the voice of the downtrodden masses.
Who would win? What would happen in this great clash between the culture of the 1950s and the culture of OK! magazine? Two men who are, undeniably, good at TV, on a TV show everyone watches, arguing about politics which even those of us who can't be bothered to vote love to argue about.
And my word but it was rubbish.
If this was a fight for the title of Champion British Political Irritant (Lightweight Class) then Nigel barely got off his stool and Brand spent his time wandering aimlessly around the ring staring aghast at the audience.
Question Time is an intimidating show to be on - I know, I've done it twice and both times revised myself into a near-cardiac arrest with anxiety. And while Nigel has had practice at it Brand has not.
Brand is used to being cock of the walk, a stand-up on a stage in control of and physically above an audience who have paid money to hear him rant.
He is used to deciding what happens next, learning 40 minutes of material, and putting down hecklers.
He is used to interviews with journalists who suck up to him, and women who react to a glimpse of his toastrack chest by instantly dropping their knickers.
He is not used to David Dimbleby, who is twinkly but fiercely intelligent and frightening when he turns that Bullingdon-blue gaze on you and asks you to justify whatever throwaway comment you just made while fumbling for your point.
He is not used to having, at best, 90 seconds to say something pithy.
He is not used to an audience who might not like him.
He is certainly not used to having the object of his comments sitting next to him.
I found it particularly disconcerting and it made me more polite to the Tories, although as I am usually only polite when utterly furious it worked in my favour.
So Brand was flummoxed.
If you could see inside his head, it would have had a scrolling message reading: "Error 404: WTF?"
He managed to slap Nigel just once, calling him a "pound shop Enoch Powell" which is a nice line he must have revised because once he'd uttered it he had nothing left in the tank. He dried up like an old slice of cheese.
He was put in his place earl on by Mary Creagh for interrupting the women, after which he apologised and spent the remainder of the show sat on his hands.
And do you know what, I don't think he was paying the least bit of attention. He wrote in his blog this morning about the wooden QT desk, when it's clear Perspex.
The first question was about Punch-and-Judy politics and he was not able to say that verbal fisticuffs was the only reason he was invited on.
But that's because what Brand lacks is self-awareness. And when the devastating blow fell he didn't even see it coming.
He should have expected it - a man in the front row, telling him if he was that bothered he should stand as an MP. Something which must have been said to Brand by enough journalists and cabbies that he should have several responses up his ruffled sleeve.
Instead, he gawped. He whined how he'd "stand for Parliament but I'd be scared that I'd become one of them".
More likely he's scared he'd be humiliated at the ballot box. That unless you got all semi-literate 19-year-olds in the country drunk, deposited them in one consituency and threatened to take their car keys away if they didn't vote he'd have no chance.
Or scared of having his finances open to public scrutiny. Or scared of journalists asking him how much his house costs. Or scared of attention on his private life and people comparing his words and his actions to see if they match.
That's because he's not a politician - he's a celebrity, and that's all he is. Last night, Question Time did us the massive favour of proving it.
After that question Brand shrivelled like a used prophylactic tossed on the bathroom floor. The rest of the nation zipped itself back up, promised to call in the morning, then rolled over and went to sleep.
Nigel went home feeling smug, having not once been hauled up on his "free at the point of use" NHS claim which doesn't mean the same thing as preserving the current system, or his spin on grammar schools, immigration, or his own business career.
Every single person on the panel, Brand included, let Farage get away with saying there'd been a population explosion in the UK since when he's had four children since 1989, and they must be part of the reason for the strain on our schools and NHS.
Penny Mordaunt went home grateful there'd only been one mention of cock. Mary Creagh was probably glad anyone knew her name. And Camilla Cavendish, I hope, had a good wash to scrub it all away.
There's been a lot of talk about how QT dumbed down and chased ratings. But the producers did us a service.
They showed, firstly, the only person we think capable of putting Nigel Farage in his place is someone who is even more of a clown than he is.
And secondly they pricked Russell Brand's pomposity and self-invented man-of-the-people, I'm-serious-me shtick.
They showed his current self-appointed role is a time-killer, a space-filler, something he's arrived at after losing his TV presenting gigs, his radio shows, being consigned to acting in diabolical Adam Sandler films and being left with writing books for people who don't like thinking.
He pretends very hard to be serious but he's not much cop at it. He's a near-unemployable pranny with access to YouTube and that's about it.
Perhaps if they have him on again he'd do better next time, but let's hope they don't. It would be like reanimating a corpse.
Last night Russell Brand the political activist died a whimpering, withering death. Good riddance to him, and thank you David Dimbleby.
Now if only they'd let me on there with the Prime Minister...