First with arts reviews, news & interviews
Falstaff, Royal Opera House
Wednesday, 16 May 2012
I didn't know whether to sigh or to yawn. Another opera. Another 50s set. At least it started well. In an obsessively wood-panelled hunting lodge, fat Falstaff (Ambrogio Maestri)...
Read more...Detroit, National Theatre
Wednesday, 16 May 2012
The competition for best dramatic use of a coffee table is won hands down by the wagon-wheel one that prompts a major argument in When Harry Met Sally. Runner-up is the one that...
Read more...Silk, Series Two, BBC One
Wednesday, 16 May 2012
How delightful to welcome the return of Peter Moffat's skilful legal series. Yes alright, sceptics may contend that the law firm drama has already been road-tested to destruction...
Read more...Interview: 10 Questions for Spoek Mathambo
Wednesday, 16 May 2012
Spoek Mathambo is one the year's brightest new hopes. From Johannesburg but based in Sweden, Spoek (real name Nthato Mokgata) plays with genres like few others. He makes radical,...
Read more...The Dictator
Wednesday, 16 May 2012
Is this a sophisticated satire or a dumb, laugh-out-loud, nothing-is-sacred comedy? That is the question which pings around your head Sacha Baron Cohen's latest. The title is...
Read more...Cannes 2012: Heavyweights on La Croisette
Wednesday, 16 May 2012
The 65th edition of the Festival de Cannes opens today, with Wes Anderson’s latest slice of leftfield whimsy, Moonrise Kingdom, and continues for almost two weeks of frantic film-...
Read more...56 Up, ITV1
Tuesday, 15 May 2012
For most of us, life is what happens to you when you’re looking the other way. For the participants in 7 Up it’s what...
The Raid
Tuesday, 15 May 2012
If action speaks louder than words, then The Raid is positively deafening. The third feature from Welshman Gareth Evans is...
Q&A Special: Matthew Bourne and the making of Swan Lake 3D
Tuesday, 15 May 2012
A boy alone in his vast white bedroom has a recurrent haunting dream, frightening yet somehow comforting - a swan invades...
Jean Vigo: Celebrating the father of French New Wave
Tuesday, 15 May 2012
The release of Jean Vigo’s wonderful L’Atalante on DVD is cause enough to celebrate, but the arrival of everything he...
Globe to Globe: Henry VI, Parts 1, 2 and 3, Shakespeare's Globe
Monday, 14 May 2012
There was always going to be one Borat moment in this festival. And it came courtesy of the Albanians, who, for comic effect...
Writing Britain: Wastelands to Wonderlands, British Library
Monday, 14 May 2012
Wordsworth would not be happy. The bard of Grasmere once wrote a poem deploring the new-fangled habit of tourists wandering...
George Harrison: Behind the Locked Door
Monday, 14 May 2012
My, what strange and wondrous treasures await the record producer given exclusive access to the private vaults of a Beatle....
Little Dogs, National Theatre Wales/Frantic Assembly
Monday, 14 May 2012
Ever since the Polish photographer Maciej Dakowicz documented the debauchery of South Wales nightlife in a series called...
Brighton Festival 2012: Interiors, Motor Show, Land's End
Sunday, 13 May 2012
From theatre viewed through peepholes and camera obscuras to a dance piece you watch across a wasteland while wearing...
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Jansons, Barbican Hall
Sunday, 13 May 2012
I half expected to hear someone on the platform call out “Is there a doctor in the house?” For Mariss Jansons, principal...
Brigham Young University Singers, St John's Smith Square
Sunday, 13 May 2012
Brigham Young University in Utah is the largest private university in America, and is probably best known for its...
Exposed: The Late Flowering of Ana Tzarev
Sunday, 13 May 2012
“It was a beautiful sunny day and we were just doing our work. All of a sudden the double doors opened of this gorgeous...
News
globe to globe
Globe to Globe: Henry VI, Parts 1, 2 and 3, Shakespeare's Globe
A slick Serb Part 1, an effective Macedonian Part 3 and a very very Albanian Albanian Part 2
Globe to Globe: The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Shakespeare's Globe
Two Zimbabweans people Shakespeare's Italy with a few props and a lot of comedic skill
Globe to Globe: Macbeth, Shakespeare's Globe
A druggy punk Polish version of the Scottish Play with transvestite witches wows the Globe
tv
Episodes, Series 2, BBC Two
Matt LeBlanc, Stephen Mangan and Tamsin Greig return in Golden Globe winning culture-swap comedy
film
Cannes 2012: Heavyweights on La Croisette
The doors open for the 65th edition of the world's greatest film festival
classical
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Jansons, Barbican Hall
The conductor looked exhausted, but his Amsterdam orchestra still make beautiful music
Brigham Young University Singers, St John's Smith Square
American choral classics brought to life by an all-American ensemble
opera
Madam Butterfly, English National Opera
Minghella's classic production makes a stylish return to ENO
new music
Interview: 10 Questions for Spoek Mathambo
The Afro-Futurist star on going from a sexed-up rap prince to post-genre bandleader
George Harrison: Behind the Locked Door
Producer Giles Martin on scouring the late Beatle's private tape vaults
theatre
Detroit, National Theatre
Lisa D'Amour's lament for community set in American suburbia crackles then preaches
Little Dogs, National Theatre Wales/Frantic Assembly
Warts-and-all snapshot of Swansea nightlife is a feast of the senses lacking a beefy script
Brighton Festival 2012: Interiors, Motor Show, Land's End
Vanessa Redgrave tells the story of an Arab woman. Elsewhere it's all about voyeurism
visual arts
Writing Britain: Wastelands to Wonderlands, British Library
A splendid national narrative moves from Anglo-Saxon latitudes to platform 9 and three quarters
Exposed: The Late Flowering of Ana Tzarev
Introducing a 75-year-old artist as she holds her first show in London
Edmund de Waal, Waddesdon Manor
These dozen installations in a stately home are witty and beautiful, elegant and affecting
dance
Q&A Special: Matthew Bourne and the making of Swan Lake 3D
Exclusive discussion with the choreographer and film-makers about a vital new film technology
Einstein on the Beach, Barbican Theatre
Technical cock ups can't obscure the genius of this Glass-Wilson-Childs collaboration
Win tickets for Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake 3D premiere, plus live Q&A
Four free tickets to exclusive premiere screening and live session in Soho
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no,,apparently there's no conflict of interest...
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