Shakespeare
One of the finest productions I’ve seen at the Globe – a triumph of crony casting: Macbeth reviewed
Michelle Terry, chatelaine of the Globe, wants to put an end to penis-led Shakespeare by casting women in roles intended…
Women should boycott David Hare’s slanderous new play: I’m Not Running reviewed
Sir David Hare’s weird new play sets out to chronicle the history of the Labour movement from 1996 to the…
After 1980 Pinter began to write like a student troll: Pinter at the Pinter reviewed
The drop-curtain resembles a granite slab on which the genius’s name has been carved for all time. The festival of…
Impeccably – and intriguingly – unclear: BBC1’s The Cry reviewed
It’s a radical thought I know, but I sometimes wonder what it would be like if a new TV thriller…
The gentle side of Bruckner: Rotterdam Philharmonic’s Prom reviewed
It’s intelligent, enjoyable, beautiful to look at and funny in unexpected places, yet Othello at the Globe didn’t quite meet…
If we offer Ian McKellan a peerage, will he promise not to inflict his King Lear on us again?
Gandalf, also known as Ian McKellen, has awarded himself another lap of honour by bringing King Lear back to London.…
Contains at least 15 laugh-out-loud moments: Genesis Inc. reviewed
Listen to the crowd. I often delay passing judgment on a show until the audience delivers its verdict. This is…
Sher genius: Antony Sher’s account of playing King Lear
Why are rehearsal diaries so compelling? One approaches them with cynicism and then ends up reading with racing heart through…
Understated and heartbreaking: BBC2’s King Lear reviewed
I recently came across a theory of the American poet Delmore Schwartz’s that Hamlet only makes sense if you assume…
No one but Michelle Terry would have hired Michelle Terry to play Hamlet
Regime change at the Globe. The new boss, Michelle Terry, wants a 50/50 ratio of males to females in each…
Can fiction really cure cancer?
If you write a book, even a novel, about Shakespeare you must at least consider the theory that Will of…
Give me Shakespeare’s Macbeth over Jo Nesbo’s any day
It must have seemed a good idea to someone: commissioning a range of well-known novelists to ‘reimagine Shakespeare’s plays for…
Bold, in its way, but Ben Whishaw is ill-suited to Shakespeare: Julius Caesar reviewed
Nicholas Hytner’s new show is a modern-dress Julius Caesar, heavily cut and played in the round. It runs for two…
It’s impossible to muff the role of Scrooge – yet Rhys Ifans manages: A Christmas Carol reviewed
Maximum Victoriana at the Old Vic for Matthew Warchus’s A Christmas Carol. Even before we reach our seats we’re accosted…
The English countryside on two wheels is like the best kind of poem
No seat belts. No airbags. Just air, and coming at you as fast as you like. Motorcycling shouldn’t be allowed,…
The Spectator’s notes
Sir David Norgrove, the chairman of the UK Statistics Authority (UKSA), is an honourable man. When he publicly rebuked Boris…
Keeping it in the family
A new orthodoxy governs the casting process in Hollywood. An actor’s ethnicity must match the character’s. If you extend this…
Moor and more
In 1824 an ambitious teenage actor fled to England from his native New York where he had been beaten up…
A bad taste in the mouth
Here is the opening sentence of Karl Ove Knausgaard’s meditation on beds.: With its four legs and its flat, soft…
Whatever happened to Alice?
In 1987, the art of opera changed decisively. John Adams’s opera Nixon in China was so unlike the usual run…
BBC1’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream seems deliberately designed to flush out purists
Spoiler alerts aren’t normally required for reviews of Shakespeare — but perhaps I’d better issue one before saying that in…
Sneers and jeers over Lears
In the 18th century, as Shakespeare began to take on classic status, editors began to notice differences between the texts…
Verdi’s works are more entertainment than art
Verdi has a peculiar if not unique place in the pantheon of great composers. If you love classical music at…
What an extraordinary debut for Emma Rice: Globe's Midsummer Night's Dream reviewed
The Globe’s new chatelaine, Emma Rice, has certainly shaken the old place up. It’s almost unrecognisable. Huge white plastic orbs…
James Delingpole is loving Ben Elton's new Shakespeare sitcom
There’s no way of saying this without shredding the last vestiges of my critical credibility, but this new Ben Elton…
