Arts
Pure feelgood: ENO’s Cinderella reviewed
‘Goodness Triumphant’ is the alternative title of Rossini’s La Cenerentola, and you’d better believe he meant it. Possibly my reaction…
Propulsive, funny – and what a car chase: One Battle After Another reviewed
Is Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest as good as everyone is saying? That it has a run time of nearly three…
Like Gabor Mate set to club beats: Lady Gaga, at the O2, reviewed
Lady Gaga’s show was to begin at 7.30 prompt, we were told. No opening act. And at 7.30 something did…
High artistry and hilarity
It’s bizarre the level of sheer wastage in Ian Michael’s production of Troy. Yes, there’s a bit of hieratic glamour…
Was Serbia the real birthplace of the Renaissance?
Where did the Renaissance begin? There has been an official answer to that question since 1550, the date that Giorgio…
Emma Thompson is surprisingly convincing as the star of this action thriller
Dead of Winter is an action thriller starring Emma Thompson and you have to hand it to her. Has such…
Magnificent: V&A’s Marie Antoinette Style reviewed
This exhibition will be busy. You’ll shuffle behind fellow pilgrims. But it’ll be worthwhile. It’s a tour de force that…
Uplift from an odd couple: James Yorkston & Nina Persson reviewed
Let’s hear it for the odd couples of popular music: Bowie and Bing. Shaggy and Sting. Metallica and Lou Reed.…
An amazing piece of entertainment: Reunion, at the Kiln Theatre, reviewed
What a coincidence. Two plays running in London have the same storyline: an obsessed lover bursts into a family gathering…
Mr Bates this isn’t: The Hack reviewed
As we know, when terrestrial television has a big new hit these days, its response – once it’s got over…
Michael Keegan-Dolan’s How to be a Dancer is worthy of Flann O’Brien
Michael Keegan-Dolan’s show doesn’t even pretend to live up to the arresting proposition in its title – anyone hoping to…
Kate Moss’s new Bowie podcast is far too safe
In January, it will be ten years since David Bowie died. I remember Bowie songs playing out of every London…
Northern Ireland Opera have a hit: Follies reviewed
Never judge a musical by its score alone. Even more than with opera, the music is only ever half the…
Dazzling reverse-mirror farce
It was good to see that Vivien Gaston was lecturing about portraiture in the context of the travelling Archibald Prize…
No, Big Thief’s Double Infinity is not the greatest folk album ever
Grade: B- ‘I feel within myself a constant dialogue between my masculinity, my femininity and the part of me that…
R.S. Thomas – terrific poet, terrible husband
Love’s Moment is one of those quiet radio programmes you’re unlikely to have read about. It aired without fanfare at…
Sondheim understood Seurat better than the National Gallery
In Sunday in the Park with George, Stephen Sondheim catches something of what makes Georges Seurat so brilliant – not…
Suede turn their fine new record to mush at the Southbank
I think a lot about Wishbone Ash. A disproportionate amount. Partly because I have had to listen to them for…
A Big Bold Beautiful Journey is anything but
A Big Bold Beautiful Journey is, I have to tell you, anything but. I should have trusted the trailer. When…
Anna Netrebko’s still got it
In the opera world, you’re never far from a Tosca and last week we had two of them, both brand…
Is Grey Gardens the greatest documentary ever made?
A middle-aged woman wearing what looks like Princess Diana’s infamous ‘revenge dress’ and a balaclava from an IRA funeral approaches…
The makers of Doc don’t seem to trust the show
The drama series Doc began with the most literal of bangs. While the screen remained black, the sound-effects team knocked…
When Freud met Hitler
A new play by Lawrence Marks and Maurice Gran, the writers of Birds of a Feather, feels like a major…
Turning your brain to mush
The appointment of Dean Bryant as head of the Malthouse Theatre took some of us by surprise. He had just…
Lower your expectations for Spinal Tap II
This Is Spinal Tap is now such a deserved comedy behemoth that it’s easy to forget how gradual its ascent…
