Arts
Intensely engaging
The Australian National Academy of Music gala performance on Friday 21 March was dazzling with guest conductor Asher Fisch leading…
Dope Thief is a cut above your usual inner-city crime-drama porn
I really had no interest in watching Dope Thief. It’s another of those crime dramas set in a bleak-looking city…
I wish someone would kill or eat useless Totoro
My Neighbour Totoro is a hugely successful show based on a Japanese movie made in 1988. The setting is a…
What a joy to see some Merce Cunningham again
How salutary to encounter the cool cerebral elegance of Merce Cunningham’s choreography again. A figure at the heart of the…
Traditional music at its most graceful, ingenious and jaw-dropping
I was talking recently to a rock guitarist about the amount of music an audience hears during a typical concert…
Ridiculously fun: Assassin’s Creed – Shadows reviewed
Grade: A Sometimes you want to admire the pluck and inventiveness of an indie developer. At other times, you just…
Why we’re flocking to matinees
The Starland Vocal Band were on to something. In their 1976 hit ‘Afternoon Delight’ they sang, in gruesomely twee harmony:…
I genuinely feared The End would never end
Joshua Oppenheimer’s The End is a ‘post-apocalyptic musical’ starring Tilda Swinton and Michael Shannon that is being sold as a…
Splendid revival of an unsurpassed production: Royal Opera’s Turandot reviewed
Puccini’s Turandot is back at the Royal Opera in the 40-year old production by Andrei Serban and… well, guilty pleasure…
Theatre vultures will kill
Having a sportswriter father is no excuse. The young man was tall, long fair-haired with a hat. ‘What do you…
I just don’t get P.G. Wodehouse
I have a confession to make, which may upset many readers. Having only a passing acquaintance with his books, I’ve…
The death of touring
Touring’s not what it used to be. When I were a lad, even big bands would do 30 or 40…
Who wants a ‘girl boss’ Snow White?
Disney’s new Snow White is a live-action remake of the beloved 1937 classic that was cinema’s first full-length animated feature…
Irresistible: Clueless, at the Trafalgar Theatre, reviewed
Cher Horowitz, the central character in Clueless, is one of the most irritating heroines in the history of movies. She’s…
If ‘wokeness’ is over, can someone please tell the Fitzwilliam Museum?
Optimists believe that the tide of ‘wokeness’ is now ebbing. If so, the message has not yet reached Cambridge, whose…
Why was this fêted Mexican painter left out of the canon?
Think of a Mexican painting, and chances are you’ll conjure up an image of an eyebrow-knitted Frida Kahlo, or a…
Barbara Hannigan needs to stop conducting while singing
Last week, Barbara Hannigan conducted the London Symphony Orchestra in Haydn, Roussel, Ravel and Britten, though to be honest she…
Netflix’s Adolescence is seriously flawed
Bradley Walsh: Egypt’s Cosmic Code may sound like a pitch by Alan Partridge – but, impressively, the programme itself manages…
Never mind the cracks
If you wanted confirmation that the world can change dramatically you need only remember the Berlin Wall coming down in…
A treat for nostalgic wrinklies: Punk Off!, at the Dominion Theatre, reviewed
Punk rock, packaged, parcelled, and boxed up as a treat for nostalgic wrinklies. That’s the deal with Punk Off!, a…
I’m warming to Meghan Markle – only joking
You know that urge when you’ve got friends coming for the weekend and you just have to spend the previous…
Irresistible: Osipova/Linbury reviewed
One of the few indisputably great ballerinas of her generation, Natalia Osipova is a magnificent exemplar of the Russian school,…
The filthy side of Dame Myra Hess
The photograph on the cover of Jessica Duchen’s magnificent new biography of Dame Myra Hess shows a statuesque lady sitting…
The art of sexual innuendo
Paula Rego’s 2021 retrospective at Tate Britain demonstrated that, among art critics, ambiguity is still highly prized as a measure…
‘The possibilities of paint are never-ending’: Sir Frank Bowling interviewed
‘I’m full of excitement waiting for this to dry out,’ Sir Frank Bowling exclaims. We are sitting in his studio,…
