Arts
Who was the Isdal Woman? And how did she die?
‘Close your eyes and be absorbed by the storytelling,’ urged Jon Manel (the new head of podcasting at BBC World…
Rory Kinnear is less Macbeth, more a tetchy manager of an Amazon warehouse
The Best Man by Gore Vidal is set during a fictional American election in 1960. Two gifted candidates seek their…
Does Gerald Barry hate music?
Blue Gadoo is one of those cats whose face looks like it’s been bashed flat with a wok. He lives…
Original sin
This biopic of Mary Magdalene is a feminist retelling that may well be deserved but it’s so dreary and unremarkable…
Russell Crowe
The things we collect can say a great deal about us; so can the way we disperse a collection. The…
Peak Picasso: how the half-man half-monster reached his creative – and carnal – zenith
By 1930, Pablo Picasso, nearing 50, was as rich as Croesus. He was the occupant of a flat and studio…
Nils Frahm is clever with textures – but it’s the melodies which drag you in
Grade: A Here we are in that twilit zone where post-techno and post-ambient meets modern classical, a terrain that has…
I never expected to last the full hour: Carla Bruni’s C’est la Vie reviewed
You can’t move for women’s voices on the airwaves at the moment — Julie Walters on Classic FM leading off…
There’s much to adore about the Old Vic’s Fanny and Alexander
Fanny & Alexander opens like a Chekhov comedy and turns into an Ibsen tragedy. Ingmar Bergman’s movie script, adapted by…
A short history of French musical decadence
My two attempts to see Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites at the Guildhall School were frustrated by the weather. Forced back…
Magnificent paintings – oddly curated: All Too Human reviewed
In the mid-1940s, Frank Auerbach remarked, the arbiters of taste had decided what was going to happen in British art:…
Intriguing but also baffling: The Assassination of Gianni Versace reviewed
By common consent, including Bafta’s, The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story was one of the best TV dramas…
The former head of the RSC finds cause for optimism in the Arts Council cuts
He looks like an absent-minded watchmaker, or a homeless chess champion, or a stray physics genius trying to find his…
Hammer horror
You Were Never Really Here is a fourth feature from Lynne Ramsay (Ratcatcher, Morvern Callar, We Need to Talk About…
Artists of The Australian Ballet, Murphy
An entire dance program honouring the work of a single person is a rare honour. The Australian Ballet has graciously…
Louise Levene meets the tormented queen of flamenco, who bewitched Dali & Peter Sellers
A frail old woman sits alone on a chair on a darkened stage. There are flowers in her hair. She…
The strangely unique vision of Leonard Rosoman
Leonard Rosoman is not a well-known artist these days. Many of us will, however, be subliminally familiar with his mural…
I didn’t realise Petra was an ad for Merkel’s immigration policy: Civilisations reviewed
Most of the history I know and remember comes from my inspirational prep school teacher Mr Bradshaw. History was taught…
‘We’re using the same Aga and Belfast sink as Jill Archer’: how Radio 4 made Home Front
It feels like a long time since the launch of Home Front on Radio 4 back in June 2014, retracing…
Remembering one of the best – and bitchiest – pianists who ever lived
I’m unlucky with Beethoven’s Appassionata Sonata. Twice in the past year I’ve bolted for the exit as soon the pianist…
I, Tonya is not quite a gold-medal masterpiece
Films about the Winter Olympics don’t grow on conifers. Twenty-five years ago there was Cool Runnings about the Jamaican bobsleigh…
If I were a detective looking for serial killers I’d stake out Frozen
Frozen starts with a shrink having a panic attack. She hyperventilates into her hand-bag and then gets drunk on an…
My sole desire c1500 from The Lady and the Unicorn series Musée de Cluny
Almost a festival of Prosper Mérimée: at the Opera House we have performances of Carmen which is based on his…
The pioneering artist whose creations vanished before his eyes
The impermanence of works of art is a worry for curators though not usually for artists, especially not at the…
Worth a trip for the David Joneses alone: Journeys with ‘The Waste Land’ reviewed
To bleak, boarded-up Margate — and a salt-and-vinegar wind that leaves my face looking like Andy Warhol’s botched 1958 nose-peel…
