Arts
Stolen goods
Man Up is a British rom-com starring Simon Pegg as Jack and Lake Bell as Nancy. Nancy’s problem, at the…
This is England
At the Turner Prize dinner of 2003, as the winner, Grayson Perry, took a photo call with his family wearing…
Carmen v. Carmen
It’s been a busy operatic week, with a nearly great concert performance of Parsifal in Birmingham on Sunday (reviewed by…
Dr Johnson in Tahrir Square
Goodness knows what the Great Cham would have made of Radio 4 airing an adapted version of his philosophical fable,…
Living history
It has been a while since the BBC really pushed the boat out on the epic history documentary front. Perhaps…
Culture Buff
Forty years ago I predicted an imminent Mendelsshon revival; I’m still waiting. This month brought a false dawn; at the…
Stolen goods
Man Up is a British rom-com starring Simon Pegg as Jack and Lake Bell as Nancy. Nancy’s problem, at the…
Living history
It has been a while since the BBC really pushed the boat out on the epic history documentary front. Perhaps…
Restoration drama
Yes William Cook Rejoice! Rejoice! Fifty-four years after its destruction, Euston Arch has returned to Euston. Well, after a fashion.…
Eastern reflections
In his introductory remarks to the Afro–Eurasian Eclipse, one of his later suites for jazz orchestra, Duke Ellington remarked —…
Moving pictures
About six years ago the first section of the now celebrated High Line was opened in New York and made…
Dedicated follower of fascism?
The ‘revelations’, 50 years after he drowned, that Le Corbusier was a ‘fascist’ and an anti-Semite are neither fresh nor…
Two batons better
The morning after the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra failed to elect a music director, I took a call from Bild-Zeitung, Berlin’s…
Yank bait
Here come the Yanks. As the summer jumbos disgorge their cargoes of wealthy, courteous, culture-hungry Americans, the West End prepares…
Sexed-up pacifism
Big-screen documentaries never change the world. Blackfish has not shortened the queues to see maltreated killer whales leap through hoops…
Lost boys
In Beryl Bainbridge’s novel An Awfully Big Adventure the producer Meredith Potter issues a doughty injunction on the subject of…
Woolf haul
People have been saying that Wayne McGregor’s new Woolf Works has reinvented the three-act ballet, but not so. William Forsythe…
Strange ways
BBC One’s 2015 choice of Sunday-night drama series is beginning to resemble the career of the kind of Hollywood actor…
Object lesson
The idea of using objects — salt, cod, nutmeg, silk — to turn history lessons into something popular and accessible…
Culture Buff
The Laird’s House at Skara Brae on Orkney overlooks the Neolithic settlement, uncovered in a huge storm in 1850. Predating…
Dedicated follower of fascism?
The ‘revelations’, 50 years after he drowned, that Le Corbusier was a ‘fascist’ and an anti-Semite are neither fresh nor…
Sexed-up pacifism
Big-screen documentaries never change the world. Blackfish has not shortened the queues to see maltreated killer whales leap through hoops…
Woolf haul
People have been saying that Wayne McGregor’s new Woolf Works has reinvented the three-act ballet, but not so. William Forsythe…
Moving pictures
About six years ago the first section of the now celebrated High Line was opened in New York and made…
Moving pictures
About six years ago the first section of the now celebrated High Line was opened in New York and made…
