Arts
Fine but forgettable
Catherine Called Birdy is written and directed by Lena Dunham and it’s a medieval comedy about a 14-year-old girl resisting…
Force of nature
Few forms of music have colonised the world like metal and hip-hop. Wherever you go you will find these two…
The sound of silence
Look at this line. ‘I’m 80 years old. I find that unforgivable.’ Could an actor get a laugh on ‘unforgivable’?…
Bang goes nothing
Crossfire was a three-part drama in more ways than one. Running every night from Tuesday to Thursday, it brought together…
A god of fury and destruction
David Hare is the most eminent British dramatist of the generation that includes the man we have to learn to…
Redemption songs
Rehab: The Musical opens with a boyband star, Kid Pop, getting busted for possession of cocaine. The judge sentences him…
What a ride
Moonage Daydream is a music documentary like no other, which is fitting as the subject is David Bowie. If it’s…
The art of the monarchy
Michael Hall on how the Queen made her mark on the Royal Collection
When Picasso met Lee Miller
During the liberation of Paris in August 1944, the photographer Lee Miller made her way to Picasso’s studio on rue…
So much better than talking
In all the tributes to Her late Majesty’s constancy, dignity, wisdom and devotion to duty, not enough has been said…
A dose of sanity
Listening to BBC Radios 3 and 4 over the past week has been like meeting an old friend who, after…
Just yesterday
The death of Mikhail Gorbachev last week transcended politics because it was a reminder of how the culture of the…
Gore-fest meets snooze-fest
You always have to brace yourself for the latest David Cronenberg film, but with Crimes of the Future it’s not…
Missionary position
Alexander Chula on the uncomfortable lessons of the new Fourth Plinth statues
Sorted for Es and wizz
Let me introduce you to the two poles in pop and rock. One is marked by authenticity, musicianship, a certain…
Dieu de la danse
I was never Rudolf Nureyev’s greatest fan. I must have seen him dance 30 or 40 times, starting with a…
In all seriousness
Amazon’s much-heralded Tolkien prequel The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power began by answering a question that has…
A fine romance
One swallow might not make a summer, but it certainly helps rounds the season off. ‘Perhaps, like the swallow, you…
Rhapsodic banalities
‘Trans people are sacred. We are divine.’ The first line of I, Joan at the Globe establishes the tone of…
Factory setting
When Maurice Broomfield left school at the age of 15, he took a job at the Rolls-Royce factory, bending copper…
Pod wars
The competition between news-led podcasts is nearing boiling point. If you tuned in to The Media Show on Radio 4…
Where art and pleasure collide
The morality of art always seems like such a simple thing. The Greeks want back the so-called Elgin Marbles pilfered…
Cell division
The Angel of Prisons dramatises the life of the penal reformer Elizabeth Fry, who lived near Canning Town. She married…
Hail, César!
In the Rodgers and Hart musical On Your Toes, a Broadway hoofer is forced to work at a community college,…
Vintage whine
The American Whine is one of the key vocal registers in rock and roll. You can trace that thin disaffected…
