thu 28/03/2024

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Lydia Higman
Thursday, 28 March 2024
I first read Anne Gunter’s story about five years ago, when I was in my first year of university at Oxford, little knowing it would over time lead to our play Gunter [seen first...
Adam Sweeting
Thursday, 28 March 2024
The screenwriting debut of actor Andrew Buchan, Passenger ends up resembling a bunch of ingredients looking for a cake. While characters come out with such meta-observations as “...
Markie Robson-Scott
Thursday, 28 March 2024
A young woman (Laure Calamy; Call my Agent!; Full Time; Her Way) is trying to pluck up the courage to call her father, who she’s tracked down and has never met. Her voice trembles...
Gary Naylor
Thursday, 28 March 2024
In a too brightly tiled Gentlemen’s public convenience (Nitin Parmar’s beautifully realised set is as much a character as any of the men we meet), a lad is shaving his head. He’s...
Joe Muggs
Thursday, 28 March 2024
What a time to be alive it is for fans of late Eighties, early Nineties indie – the proverbial 6 Music Dads – with so many of the best acts from the era on the form of their...
Ed Vulliamy
Wednesday, 27 March 2024
“Death doesn’t scare me at all,” said my friend Christopher Hitchens during our last telephone conversation. “After all, it’s the only certainty in life. Dying, however, scares me...
Kieron Tyler
Wednesday, 27 March 2024
“The name of this group is Mayan Space Station.” In spite of the billing as The William Parker Trio, their bassist – coolly...
Paul Grellong
Wednesday, 27 March 2024
I’m writing this in the lobby of the Menier Chocolate Factory a couple of hours before the first preview. I was last here in...
Ellie Roberts
Wednesday, 27 March 2024
Sum 41 honour their 27-year career with Heaven :x: Hell, a 20-track double album, due to be their final, without a single...
Adam Sweeting
Tuesday, 26 March 2024
From Game of Thrones producers David Benioff and DB Weiss, in cahoots with Alexander Woo, 3 Body Problem is Netflix’s daring...
Nick Hasted
Tuesday, 26 March 2024
Faith and damnation frequently collide in Abel Ferrara’s films, drawing fiery performances from often starry casts. The New...
Harry Thorfinn-George
Monday, 25 March 2024
In Late Night With the Devil, light entertainment rubs shoulders with demonic forces on a talk show. It isn't quite the...
David Nice
Monday, 25 March 2024
Was it worth taking a risk on a more humbly presented St John Passion in Dublin after the best St Matthew I’m ever likely to...
Tim Cumming
Monday, 25 March 2024
The British folk artist and singer songwriter Olivia Chaney released her third solo album this week, as we break out into...
Robert Beale
Monday, 25 March 2024
The overture to Rossini’s La scala di seta is a frequent and familiar concert piece – not so the opera itself.It’s a light...
Guy Oddy
Monday, 25 March 2024
During the mid to late 90s, Sheryl Crow and other grunge lite-friendly female artists like Alanis Morrisette were all over...
Nick Hasted
Sunday, 24 March 2024
Who you going to call? Five films into the Ghostbusters franchise, every persuadable survivor from the ’84 original, plus...
Kieron Tyler
Sunday, 24 March 2024
Winston Holness started his own record label in 1969. Missing a finger, he became known by many folks as Niney. Born 7...
Simon Thompson
Saturday, 23 March 2024
The annual St Matthew Passion from the Dunedin Consort is one the most reliably beautiful jewels in Edinburgh’s musical year...
 

★★ IMMACULATE Grisly convent horror is timely but flawed

★★★★ LA SCALA DI SETA, RNCM Rossini’s one-acter helps young performers find their talents

★★★ GHOSTBUSTERS: FROZEN EMPIRE A modest, well-meant return

★★★ 3 BODY PROBLEM, NETFLIX Life, the universe and everything (and a bit more)

★★ SHERYL CROW - EVOLUTION The song remains pretty much the same for US soft rocker

Q&A: DEE C LEE The vocalist discusses music, life, love, heartbreak and glorious Eighties times

NINEY THE OBSERVER PRESENTS LIGHTNING AND THUNDER! The start of the reggae polymath

★★★★★ DEATH IN VENICE, WELSH NATIONAL OPERA Breathtaking Britten

BACH PASSIONS, DUNEDIN CONSORT, MULROY/JEANNIN, EDINBURGH Twin peaks 

disc of the day

Album: Ride - Interplay

Oxford indie kings not only on form, but breaking new ground

tv

Passenger, ITV review - who are they trying to kid?

Andrew Buchan's screenwriting debut leads us nowhere

3 Body Problem, Netflix review - life, the universe and everything (and a bit more)

Mind-blowing adaptation of Liu Cixin's novel from the makers of 'Game of Thrones'

Manhunt, Apple TV+ review - all the President's men

Tobias Menzies and Anthony Boyle go head to head in historical crime drama

film

The Origin of Evil review - Laure Calamy stars in gripping French psychodrama

Sébastien Marnier directs an excellent cast in a story of shifting identities

DVD/Blu-ray: Padre Pio

Shia LaBeouf stars in Abel Ferrara's latest grungy spiritual quest, earthed by landscape and politics

Late Night With the Devil review - indie-horror punches above its weight

Controversy over AI-generated images aside, this is a wholly original film

new music

Album: Ride - Interplay

Oxford indie kings not only on form, but breaking new ground

Album: Sum 41 - Heaven :x: Hell

A bittersweet goodbye album from the Pop Punk legends

classical

Schubert Piano Sonatas 4, Paul Lewis, Wigmore Hall review - feverish and sometimes violent

Explosive new insights in the pianist's latest interpretations of the last three masterpieces

opera

La scala di seta, RNCM review - going heavy on the absinthe?

Rossini’s one-acter helps young performers find their talents to amuse

Death In Venice, Welsh National Opera review - breathtaking Britten

Sublime Olivia Fuchs production of a great operatic swansong

Salome, Irish National Opera review - imaginatively charted journey to the abyss

Sinéad Campbell Wallace's corrupted princess stuns in Bruno Ravella's production

theatre

First Person: author-turned-actor Lydia Higman on a play that foregrounds a slice of forgotten history
'Gunter' co-creator and historian connects a 1604 witch hit to the world today
First person: playwright Paul Grellong on keeping pace with American politics
The author of 'Power of Sail' sets the scene for his play's UK premiere

dance

WAKE, National Stadium, Dublin review - a rainbow river of dance, song, and so much else

THISISPOPBABY serves up a joyous tapestry of Ireland contemporary and traditional

Swan Lake, Royal Ballet review - grand, eloquent, superb

Liam Scarlett's fine refashioning returns for a third season, and looks better than ever

First Person: Ten Years On - Flamenco guitarist Paco Peña pays tribute to his friend, the late, great Paco de Lucía

On the 10th anniversary of his death, memories of the prodigious musician who broadened the reach of flamenco into jazz and beyond

Books

Tom Chatfield: Wise Animals review - on the changing world

A compelling account of how we use technology – and how it uses us

Sheila Heti: Alphabetical Diaries review - an A-Z of inner life

Heti goes far beyond a gimmick in this work of surprising and moving insight

visual arts

Jane Harris: Ellipse, Frac Nouvelle-Aquitaine MÉCA, Bordeaux review - ovals to the fore

Persistence and conviction in the works of the late English painter

Sargent and Fashion, Tate Britain review - portraiture as a performance

London’s elite posing dressed up to the nines

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