TV
The grotesque unevenness of Mozart’s Requiem
It is amazing what fine performances you can get beamed to your computer these days. Slightly less amazing is the…
I could have directed it better: Steve McQueen's Small Axe reviewed
Unlike with every other BBC period drama series these days, I didn’t have to sit through Small Axe: Mangrove grumbling…
Like much jazz, it might have benefited from being less solemn: BBC4's Ronnie's reviewed
Ronnie’s: Ronnie Scott and His World-Famous Jazz Club was like the TV equivalent of an authorised biography: impressively thorough, often…
Did any of this actually happen? The Crown, season four, reviewed
‘We have to stop it now!’ says Princess Margaret (Helena Bonham Carter), smoking another cigarette, obviously. She’s talking about the…
Is The Undoing properly great or just a run-of-mill thriller with a brilliant casting director?
There must be some people somewhere who vaguely know their own spouses — but if so, they don’t tend to…
Has Spitting Image ever been funny?
Thank you, Spitting Image, for the nostalgia trip! Your new series on BritBox has rekindled with almost Proustian fidelity those…
Enough plotlines to power several seasons of The West Wing: BBC1's Roadkill reviewed
Like many a political thriller before it, BBC1’s Roadkill began with a politician emerging into the daylight to face a…
Is AppleTV's Tehran the new Fauda?
If you love Fauda — and of course you do — you’re in for a long wait for season four,…
Funny, tender and properly horrible: Channel 4’s Adult Material reviewed
A woman is eating a pie in her car as it gets an automatic wash. Careful to keep the pie…
Sick, puerile, inappropriate and delicious: Amazon Prime's The Boys reviewed
There’s a delicious scene in the new season of Amazon’s superheroes-gone-bad series The Boys. The chief superhero Homelander (Antony Starr)…
How on earth did Harold Pinter and Danny Dyer become such good friends?
Collectors of TV titles that sound as if they were thought of by Alan Partridge will presumably have spotted Danny…
The TV we feared they’d never dare make any more: The Singapore Grip reviewed
‘Art is dead,’ declared Mark Steyn recently. He was referring to the new rules — copied from the Baftas —…
What on earth has happened to Simon Schama: The Romantics and Us reviewed
‘You may think our modern world was born yesterday,’ said Simon Schama at the beginning of The Romantics and Us.…
A sadistic delight: World’s Toughest Race – Eco-Challenge Fiji reviewed
Few things better capture the crazed cognitive dissonance of our age than this: that while we cower behind masks for…
Ludicrous – and the makers know it: Sky One's Prodigal Son reviewed
‘By the way, my name is Max. I take care of them, which ain’t easy, because their hobby is murder.’…
Takes us deep into an unknown world: Channel 4’s Inside Missguided reviewed
If it’s a test of a good documentary series that it takes us deep into an unknown, even unimaginable world,…
The only things left worth watching on the BBC are foreign buy-ins like The Last Wave
Soon, very soon now — even sooner than I imagined, if A Suitable Boy turns out to be as lacklustre…
Sumptuous and very promising: A Suitable Boy reviewed
Nobody could argue that Andrew Davies isn’t up for a challenge. He’d also surely be a shoo-in for Monty Python’s…
The real Rupert Murdoch, by Kelvin MacKenzie
The BBC documentary on Rupert Murdoch is pure one-sided bile, says Kelvin MacKenzie
James Graham's small new drama is exquisite: BBC Four's Unprecedented reviewed
Let’s face it. Theatre via the internet is barely theatre. It takes a huge amount of creativity and inventiveness to…
Michaela Coel's dazzling finale reminds me of Philip Roth: I May Destroy You reviewed
It might seem a bit of a stretch to see deep similarities between Michaela Coel (young, female, black and currently…
A documentary about the M25 that will make your heart soar
When a 90-minute documentary is introduced with the words ‘This is the M25’, you’d be within your rights not to…
Dysfunctional music for dysfunctional people: The Public Image is Rotten reviewed
A star is born, but instead of emerging into the world beaming for the cameras, he spits and snarls and…
The festivalisation of TV
Televising Glastonbury has changed the festival, and in turn transformed television, says Graeme Thomson
Sensual and silky: the Royal Ballet returns to Covent Garden
Wayne McGregor’s Morgen! and Frederick Ashton’s Dance of the Blessed Spirits are the first pieces of live dance — streamed…
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