Arts
If you liked Triumph of the Will, you’ll love Our Planet
If you liked Triumph of the Will, you’ll love this latest masterpiece of the genre: Our Planet. The Netflix nature…
Electrifying: English National Ballet’s She Persisted reviewed
‘Where was the Kahlo brow?’ asked my guest in the first interval of English National Ballet’s She Persisted, a triple…
Jessie Buckley’s performance burns a hole in the screen: Wild Rose reviewed
Jessie Buckley is the actress who, you may remember, was ‘phenomenal’ in Beast — I am quoting myself here so…
The man who changed the sound of radio
He is said to ‘have changed the sound of speech radio’, not just by giving voice to those who until…
Thick 12-year-olds listen to Ariana Granda, smart ones to Billie Eilish
Grade: A– If your 12-year-old daughter’s a bit thick, she probably likes Ariana Grande. Come on, dads — you’ve got…
Jonathan Biggins as Paul Keating
This is a show for the nostalgic and the masochistic. The Gospel According to Paul is a one man show…
Why were the Victorians so obsessed with the moon?
In Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a group of slightly ramshackle workmen decide to put on a play. The play…
Is now a good time to talk about Jews and money?
Is now a good time to talk about Jews and money? The Jewish Museum in London thinks so, and perhaps…
Art is often best experienced on the radio
At its best audio can be a much more visual medium than the screen. Making Art with Frances Morris (produced…
ENO’s Jack the Ripper needs to decide if it wants to be a gore-fest or social history
Is it possible to write a feminist opera about Jack the Ripper? Composer Iain Bell thinks it is, and his…
The mob is right about Line of Duty – it remains unmissably exciting
On Sunday a drama began with ED905 being stolen by an OCG who’d faked an RTC that required IR, little…
Aurora Orchestra’s Brexit concert nearly turned me into a Leaver
Back when the UK was assumed to be leaving the European Union on 29 March, the Aurora Orchestra was invited…
A masterclass of menace and magnificence: Romeo and Juliet reviewed
Two households, both alike in dignity. Capulets in red tights, Montagues in green. Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet opens in…
An exceptional dystopia that’s made for TV: The Phlebotomist reviewed
The Phlebotomist by Ella Road explores the future of genetics. Suppose a simple blood test were able to tell us…
Intriguing and beguiling but God know what it adds up to: Happy as Lazzaro reviewed
Alice Rohrwacher’s Happy as Lazzaro sets out as a neorealist tale of exploited sharecroppers, but midway through the story it…
Self portrait 1934 Nora Heysen
In his new biography of Winston Churchill, Andrew Roberts notes that ‘it was said of Emperor Napoleon III that he…
My ringside seat on the Mary Quant revolution
I think I probably qualify as the oldest fashion editor in the world, because in spite of my advanced age…
Listening to plays in a foreign language is a weirdly engaging experience
As the ravens circle around Broadcasting House in London’s West End, presaging difficult times ahead for BBC Radio, with less…
Has Bruce Norris bitten off more than he can chew?
Bruce Norris is a firefighter among dramatists. He runs towards danger while others sprint in the other direction. His Pulitzer-winning…
The joy of George Shaw’s miserable paintings of a Coventry council estate
All good narrative painting contains an element of allegory, but most artists don’t go looking for it on a Coventry…
The most glorious singing anyone born after 1970 will ever have heard: La forza del destino reviewed
To stage Verdi’s Il Trovatore, they say, is easy: you just need the four greatest singers in the world. The…
The greatest Beatle? Pete Best
Which of the Beatles would you most like to have been? Not either of the dead ones, presumably. Nor the…
Powerful elegy for a world that is slipping away: Tate Britain’s The Asset Strippers reviewed
There was a moment more than 20 years ago when Bankside Power Station was derelict but its transformation into Tate…
Clumsy, long and lacking circus thrills: Tim Burton’s Dumbo reviewed
Dumbo is an elephant we can’t forget. More than 70 years since Disney’s 1941 film, the big-eared baby is still…
Fernando Guimarães
The closing chapters of Homer’s Odyssey were the source for the opera regarded as the crowning achievement of composer Claudio…
