Arts
David Tress: an artist of independent spirit
Like all artists of independent spirit, David Tress (born 1955) resists categorisation. He has been called a Romantic and a…
Hysteria is a pile-up of unmotivated absurdities
Terry Johnson’s acclaimed farce Hysteria opens in Sigmund Freud’s Hampstead home in 1938. The godfather of psychobabble is ambushed by…
Mark Ravenhill’s take on Voltaire’s Candide
Ah yes, Candide, the adventures of an innocent abroad in ‘the best of all possible worlds’, as philosophers of the…
Turandot is a disgusting opera that is beyond redemption
It’s a cynical start to the Royal Opera’s season to have this 1984 production of Puccini’s last opera Turandot. Not…
No rest for Diana - the biopic of the late princess is so inept it's not even hagiography
Someone who knows their Dianaology will have to fill me in – did this actually happen? The late Princess Di…
James Delingpole: As a Brummie, I am aggrieved with Peaky Blinders
You wait a whole lifetime for a lavishly shot, starrily cast, mega-budget gangster drama set in Birmingham to come along.…
Blitz Requiem première in St Paul’s
Of all folk memories the Blitz remains one of the most enduring. In the autumn of 1940 the Luftwaffe strafed…
The pity of war
Of all folk memories the Blitz remains one of the most enduring. In the autumn of 1940 the Luftwaffe strafed…
The pity of war
Of all folk memories the Blitz remains one of the most enduring. In the autumn of 1940 the Luftwaffe strafed…
Gregory Doran interview: 'I wanted some big hitters,' says the RSC's new supremo
Robert Gore-Langton meets Gregory Doran, new artistic director at the RSC
Pop: You'd love Love and Money, too - if only you'd heard of them
How and when do you become ‘a fan’, exactly? You can usually spot pop stars who are losing touch with…
Theatre review: Fleabag's scandalous success
Suddenly they’re all at it. Actors, that is, writing plays. David Haig, Rory Kinnear and Simon Paisley Day are all…
Under the Greenwood Tree - an exhibition worth travelling for
A mixed exhibition of paintings, drawings and prints devoted to the subject of the tree might sound an unexciting event,…
Did the Proms' Billy Budd turn a mystery into a mess?
The many opera performances at the Proms this year have all been so successful, especially the Wagner series, that I…
White House Down is Roland Emmerich’s Hedda Gabler
Just do it, quoth the Nike advert — and these men just did it. Grass, asphalt, fear, pain, doubt and…
The Wipers Times - 100 years on, this newspaper still lives
Funny what rises from the rubble. In 1916 British army officer Captain Fred Roberts was searching the bombed-out remains of…
Immigrant songs: Radio 2's My Country, My Music
Five women, five very different stories of arriving in the UK, often unwillingly and always alone. How did they cope…
Another Self-Portrait isn't just for the Bobsessives
So, there’s this guy called Bob Dylan and, across just seven years in the 1960s, he’d released nine albums that…
Yet another side of Bob Dylan
So, there’s this guy called Bob Dylan and, across just seven years in the 1960s, he’d released nine albums that…
Yet another side of Bob Dylan
So, there’s this guy called Bob Dylan and, across just seven years in the 1960s, he’d released nine albums that…
A world-class orchestra in the heart of São Paulo’s Crackland
Damian Thompson visits Brazil to hear Marin Alsop whip São Paulo’s orchestra into shape
Do I wish I’d gone to see Peter Grimes on the beach at Aldeburgh? No
With a tidal wave of Peter Grimeses about to engulf us — performances in London, Birmingham and Leeds in September…
Laura Knight was an artist skilled in the ways of the world
The popular conception of Dame Laura Knight is of an energetic woman piling on the paint in the back of…
Blue Stockings defames women in order to defame men; Thark succeeds thanks to a trio of great perfomances
More un-Shakespearean drama at London’s leading Shakespeare venue. The Globe has pushed the Bard off stage to make way for…
About Time review: If Richard Curtis is brilliant at anything, it’s Upper Middle Class Lifestyle Porn
The easiest thing would be to sneer at Richard Curtis’s new film About Time, and so I will a little,…
