Arts
Almeida’s new Doll’s House is all wrong
A Doll’s House has been reconstructed at the Almeida with a new script by Anya Reiss. Torvald Helmer is an…
Brooklyn’s answer to Nathan Barley has struck gold
I was on the way to Cecily Brown’s exhibition at the Serpentine last week when I heard that Kensington Gardens…
How good are the Rolling Stones’ alter egos, the Cockroaches?
Would you pay a tenner on the door to see the Cockroaches, the Fireman, Patchwork, the Network and Bingo Hand…
Terrifically atmospheric: Rose of Nevada reviewed
Rose of Nevada is the third film in Mark Jenkin’s Cornish trilogy and if you have seen the first two…
The artistic collapse of Welsh National Opera
On the first night of Welsh National Opera’s new Flying Dutchman, the company’s co-directors walked on stage to salute their…
The perfect game for any thwarted sadist
Grade: B+ Some of us lost a lot of our early twenties to a god-game called Dungeon Keeper, in which…
AI could never replace me
There are two main schools of thought on AI in the Delingpole household. I, as the resident batshit-crazy reactionary tinfoil-hat…
Like him or loathe him
It’s cheering to hear very promising reports of Barrie Kosky’s production of Siegfried at Covent Garden suggesting that the Melbourne-born…
Excruciating tedium from Pina Bausch
You’re never too old to dance we are told nowadays. This encouraging injunction has been taken up by everyone from…
The first woman to climb Mt Blanc took 18 bottles of wine and 24 roast chickens
The dark side of the Moon, a broken loo and a floating jar of Nutella: such was Artemis II. When…
Big Mistakes is hysterical – but not in a good way
When following up a successful sitcom, should a writer head off into new territory or not? That was the question…
The joy of Belle and Sebastian
Do Belle and Sebastian have the most polite audience in pop? Normally when a pop singer leaves the stage to…
Glenrothan is painfully bad
Glenrothan is Brian Cox’s directorial debut and I wish there were a nicer way of putting it but, Brian: please,…
Heart-melting loveliness from John Rutter
Anyone for a spot of acoustic science? Apparently the distinctive colour of a musical note is concentrated almost wholly in…
Tracey Emin at her most operatic
I feared this summing-up of Tracey Emin’s career might be self-congratulatory – biennale here, damehood there. But it’s Emin at…
The torture of Michael Frayn’s Copenhagen
Copenhagen by Michael Frayn is a problem play. It debuted at the National in 1998 and ran for two years…
In defence of museum charges
It occurs to me only now that I might have spent far too much time in France. Indeed, so familiar…
Cruelties of popular culture
Ethan Hawke is an extraordinary figure. He has made straightforward Hollywood classics like Training Day but he also comes out…
A Tate show with dreamy, elusive power
One of the miracles of art history is how painting, so often written off, keeps on coming back. Right now…
HBO Max isn’t worth subscribing to
HBO Max is the latest streaming channel trying to lure you into yet another of those £10 a month subscription…
Don’t blame Kanye for his abject idiocy
Grade: C– Kanye? No, I can’t, quite. I will always quietly overlook the idiotic political sensibilities of the conformist millennial…
The National Theatre needs help
In The Print is a docudrama about the bitter war between Rupert Murdoch and the unions in the mid-1980s. Murdoch…
Unrelentingly entertaining: Basement Jaxx reviewed
How would you like your nostalgia served, sir (and it is usually ‘sir’): in mist-shrouded monochrome or crazed lysergic Technicolor?…
An outstanding Turn of the Screw
Never let it be said that The Spectator fails to follow up an arts story. Long-term readers will recall that…
A hypnotic new adaptation of The Stranger
François Ozon’s The Stranger is an adaptation of Albert Camus’ 1942 novel about a clerk who – spoiler alert* –…
