fri 24/05/2013

Reviews

Lohengrin, Welsh National Opera, Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff

Stephen Walsh

What is one to make of Lohengrin, Wagner’s last “opera” (as opposed to music drama), in this day and age? Is it a medieval romance, like Weber’s Freischütz but with a deus ex machina at the beginning rather than the end; or is it a nineteenth-century domestic melodrama in disguise, with the hero revealed in the bedroom scene as a Papal Nuncio travelling incognito. Why mustn’t Elsa ask his name? Is it, as Lothar Koenigs hints in the WNO programme, some echo of Wagner’s doubts about his own (...

The Tudors Season, BBC Two

Jasper Rees

Is the BBC taking dictation from the Gradgrindian brain of Michael Gove? According to the education secretary’s latest wacky diktat, what the nation’s children want is facts facts facts. Plus, in the teaching of history, lots of stuff about England/Britain giving Johnny Foreigner a bloody conk. So let’s give it up one more time for the Tudors, who are essentially our very own Nazis. This is less for the dodgy human rights record than their permanent status as a small-screen visitor...

The Hangover Part III

Veronica Lee

You don't have to be a fan of The Hangover franchise to get most of the jokes in Part III, although it certainly helps. How else would you understand...

Metro: Last Light

Simon Munk

Man is, of course, the worst monster of all in this bleak, post-apocalyptic first-person shooter based on the best-selling "Metro" novels of Russian...

To Kill A Mockingbird, Regent’s Park Open Air...

Demetrios Matheou

Every May the townspeople of Monroeville, Alabama, the home of Harper Lee, perform Christopher Sergel’s theatrical adaptation of Lee’s acclaimed,...

Steve Earle, Royal Festival Hall

Tim Cumming

Passion and politics as country's great polymath tours a powerful new album with a powerful new band

Rob Newman, Little Angel Theatre

Veronica Lee

Not quite rock 'n' roll, but I like it

Disgraced, Bush Theatre

Aleks Sierz

Pulitzer Prize-winning drama examines cultural identity with insight and intelligence

Something in the Air

Jasper Rees

Olivier Assayas recalls his heady, heavy days as a soixante-huitard

The Kite Runner, Theatre Royal Brighton

Bella Todd

A story-centric stage adaption of Khaled Hosseini's sentimental best-seller

The King of Marvin Gardens

Graham Fuller

Melancholy meets irrational optimism in Bob Rafelson's New Hollywood classic

Relatively Speaking, Wyndham's Theatre

Matt Wolf

Early Ayckbourn play fizzes anew 46 years on

Sylvie Guillem, 6000 Miles Away, Sadler's Wells Theatre

Ismene Brown

Guillem weaves her game-changing magic in Forsythe and Ek

Limbo, Southbank Centre

Jasper Rees

London Wonderground's erotic circus bumps and grinds

Lubomyr Melnyk, Village Underground

Kieron Tyler

The pioneer of continuous music astonishes while Bon Iver’s preferred artist Gregory Euclide paints live, on stage

Helen Chadwick, Richard Saltoun

Sarah Kent

Her obsession with death and decay was leavened by a wicked sense of humour

Case Histories, BBC One

Veronica Lee

The brooding private detective is back

Falstaff, Glyndebourne Festival Opera

Kimon Daltas

Comedy is king in a Falstaff revival which is consistently enjoyable but could be a little less nice

The Man Who Shot Beautiful Women, BBC Four

Tom Birchenough

The welcome return of the legacy of photographer Erwin Blumenfeld

Ariadne auf Naxos, Glyndebourne Festival Opera

Edward Seckerson

Strauss's opera reluctantly enters the Battle of Britain courtesy of a young German director

Reissue CDs Weekly: Scott Walker

Kieron Tyler

Easy listening and continental European intellectualism combine on the early albums from pop’s wilful auteur

Say It With Flowers, Sherman Theatre, Cardiff

Gary Raymond

New play about tragic Welsh diva Dorothy Squires misses the real story

Mariele Neudecker, Regency Town House, Brighton

Fisun Güner

The German artist plays with notions of the Romantic sublime

CD: Jamie Cullum - Momentum

Peter Quinn

Stylistic mash-ups of album number six result in perfect pop

The Liability

Tom Birchenough

Brit crime caper hits new lows, despite strong cast

La donna del lago, Royal Opera

David Benedict

Joyce DiDonato, Juan Diego Flórez and Michael Spyres triumph over adversity

Rock ‘n’ Roll Britannia, BBC Four

Kieron Tyler

The entertaining tale of the protracted birth of a British rock scene which took America on at its own game

Bullet Catch, Spiegeltent, Brighton

Thomas H Green

The classic shock trick provides the core for a surprisingly philosophical show

Propaganda: Power and Persuasion, British Library

Fisun Güner

A thought-provoking exhibition looking at ways in which the state seeks to wield its influence

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