Arts
Cost of Living at Hampstead Theatre isn’t a bad show – and it contains a star in the making
Hampstead has become quite a hit-factory since Ed Hall took over. His foreign policy is admirably simple. He scours New…
Watch Paxo set a new PB for lip-curling: Paxman On The Queen’s Children reviewed
You might well expect a royal documentary on Channel 5 to be unashamedly gossipy. You might also expect it to…
All is not very true in All Is True – and all is not very interesting either
All Is True is Kenneth Branagh’s biopic of Shakespeare’s last years and All Is Not Very True, apparently, which we…
The exceptional romantic cityscapes of Cyril Mann
The little-known painter Cyril Mann (1911-80) saw a lot from his council-flat window. Beyond the parks and trees and red-brick…
One of the greatest operatic experiences of my life: Royal Opera’s Katya Kabanova reviewed
Janacek’s upsetting opera Katya Kabanova, which hasn’t been seen in the UK for some time, turned up in two different…
However irritating they are, the Dandy Warhols can write songs
Grade: A– I’m here to make you feel old. It’s now nearly 20 years since the pleasing, laconic, Stones pastiche…
Paul Dyer
In 1721, Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) made a rather grand job application to Christian Ludwig, the Margrave of Brandenburg. He…
Dau is the strangest and most unsettling piece of art to come out of Russia in years
Dau is not so much a film as a document of a mass human experiment. The result is dark, brilliant…
Only adults struggle with The Magic Flute. Kids get it
Spoiler alert: it’s all a dream. At least, I think that’s what we’re meant to take away from the business…
The attempt to bring back topicality to Ambridge has been far too effective
It’s becoming clear that the travails afflicting all the major players in The Archers, Radio 4’s flagship drama, are intended…
Why Gomorrah could never have been made by the BBC
Boy often likes to rebuke me for having impossibly high standards when it comes to TV. ‘Why can’t you just…
Terry Hall on depression, punch-ups and falling out of love with the Labour party
It was summer 1981, and the towns and cities of Britain were alight. There had been riots in Brixton, south…
Rivetingly moving: Can You Ever Forgive Me? reviewed
Can You Ever Forgive Me? is a true story based on the 2008 memoir of Lee Israel, the writer who…
The odd couple: Bill Viola / Michelangelo at the RA reviewed
The joint exhibition of Michelangelo Buonarroti and Bill Viola at the Royal Academy is, at first glance, an extremely improbable…
Not quite scary or clever enough for legendary status: Resident Evil 2 reviewed
Grade: B Resident Evil 2 takes the original zombie shooter, which has become a cult classic and, to many, the…
A winning hoax: When We Have Sufficiently Tortured Each Other reviewed
The NT’s new play is an update of Pamela, a sexploitation novel by Samuel Richardson. It opens with Stephen Dillane…
Best production The Harp in the South
We are in the middle of the awards season for the entertainment industry. There have been the Golden Globes and…
All About Eve was all about bitching – off-screen as well as on
In 1950, Bette Davis had a string of recent flops behind her. She was 41, married to an embarrassing twerp…
A facile indulgence: Pinter Six reviewed
The cast of Party Time includes John Simm, Celia Imrie, Ron Cook, Gary Kemp and other celebrities. They play a…
Why the BBC International Playwriting Competition really matters
We don’t know whether ‘Aziz H’ listened to radio plays as he grew up in Yemen. In fact we don’t…
Boy, does Nicole Kidman look terrible: Destroyer reviewed
Destroyer is an LA noir starring Nicole Kidman ‘as you have never seen her before’. Her hair is terrible. Her…
Was Pierre Bonnard any good?
An attendant at an art gallery in France once apprehended a little old vandal, or so the story goes. He…
The brutish brilliance of Rebecca Saunders
If you take awards seriously (which of course you shouldn’t) you could argue that Rebecca Saunders is now Britain’s most…
Danny Dyer’s Right Royal Family might well be the oddest TV show of recent times
Last year on Who Do You Think You Are?, Danny Dyer — EastEnders actor and very possibly Britain’s most cockney…
One nasty moment aside, the ENB’s Manon is superlative
If you like the BBC’s Les Misérables, you’ll love English National Ballet’s Manon. Manon, in Kenneth MacMillan’s telling, is The…
