Newsletter

Receive regular updates about forthcoming events and other news from Intelligence Squared

Thanks

You have been added to our mailing list and will now be among the first to hear about events.

Live On Stage
Tuesday May 13 2025, 7pm BST

Tricks, Trolls, and LOLs: Comedy’s Crash Course in Spotting Lies

This event is part of Critical Conversations, a new series on the age of misinformation by Intelligence Squared and Sage & Jester, hosted by Sophia Smith Galer. To see other events in this series, click here.

Sometimes the best way to expose a lie is to laugh at it. Satire is a force to be reckoned with in any democracy and artists are essential in shedding light on the truth. Comedy has long been a way to bring difficult conversations to the fore, and to challenge narratives.  

At Tricks, Trolls and LOLs, find out how humour and creative expression can serve as a counterbalance to misinformation; how satire can dismantle it, why authoritarian regimes fear comedians, and how art can be a powerful antidote to propaganda.

On May 13, join the conversation live at the Pleasance Theatre with host Sophia Smith Galer and comedian Rachel Parris.

Event Name

Tricks, Trolls, and LOLs: Comedy’s Crash Course in Spotting Lies

ATTEND IN PERSON

WATCH THE LIVESTREAM

Speaker

  • Rachel Parris

    BAFTA-nominated comedian

Host

  • Sophia Smith Galer

    Award-winning Journalist, Writer, and Host of Critical Conversations

Speakers are subject to change.

Location
  • The Pleasance Theatre
  • North Road
  • London
  • N7 9EF
Time
  • Tuesday 13 May 2025
  • 7pm to 8:30pm BST

Speakers

Speaker

Rachel Parris

BAFTA-nominated comedian

Award-winning musical comedian, actor, improviser and presenter. She was nominated for a BAFTA for Best Entertainment Performance and beat Tiffany Haddish, Ellen DeGeneres and Amy Schumer to become Female First’s Comedian of the Year. She is best known for both her viral satirical segments on The Mash Report and Late Night Mash which have had over 100 million views, and as one of the founding cast members of the award-winning improv group Austentatious. She has also appeared on Live At The Apollo, Would I Lie To You, Mock the Week, and Q.I and is a regular on radio shows I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue and The Now Show.
Host

Sophia Smith Galer

Award-winning Journalist, Writer, and Host of Critical Conversations

Award-winning journalist, writer, speaker, and content creator, credited for pioneering astute, engaging journalism on TikTok. She began her career reporting across the BBC World Service, BBC Radio 4 and BBC World News and building Webby-winning BBC social media channels before joining VICE News as a senior reporter until February 2024.  She produces and presents content on a range of topics including linguicide, innovation and disruption, health and technology, generational communication, gender equality, how to navigate mis-and-dis information, and the state of influencer culture and its ethics. She was the first journalist to report the misuse of political ads on TikTok during the 2020 US election, which was broadcast in her first television documentary The TikTok Election. She was awarded a British Journalism award for 'Innovation of the Year' in 2021, and in 2023 she became a Visiting Fellow for Brown University’s Information Futures Lab where she has developed resources for combating misinformation and misogyny in British schools. In 2024, she was named the winner of the Georgina Henry Award at the Women In Journalism awards for Digital Innovation. As part of the International Center for Journalists’ Disarming Disinformation Solutions Challenge, she developed Sophina, her AI tool that helps experts and journalists write video scripts and amplify their work online.

Speakers are subject to change.