mythology
The Mongol Khan, London Coliseum review - unique operatic spectacle utterly overwhelms flaws in pacing and storyWednesday, 22 November 2023
“But that’s what they’re paying for!” replied my son as we, a little shellshocked by the previous three hours, skirted Trafalgar Square on the way home. I had reservations about some key components of the alchemy that produces great theatre, but... Read more... |
Mami Wata review – a gorgeous, strange African fableSunday, 19 November 2023
Mami Wata is the female West African water god still worshipped in Iyi, a fragile, matriarchal village redoubt against modernity. Writer-director C.J. “Fiery” Obasi’s third film makes Iyi a battleground for African identity, in a glistening black-... Read more... |
The Ossianic Ballads, Edinburgh Quartet, Màiri MacMillan, National Library of Scotland review - good ingredients get lost in the mixMonday, 25 September 2023
To coincide with the National Library of Scotland’s first bi-lingual exhibition Sguel/Story, an exhibition in English and Scottish Gaelic which celebrates stories and storytelling, the library presented a performance of newly reinterpreted Gaelic... Read more... |
Album: Rachel Sermanni - Dreamer AwakeTuesday, 19 September 2023
It was more than a decade ago when I first saw Rachel Sermanni in concert, in the upstairs room at The Old Queen’s Head in Islington, London, for a Nest Collective night. She had yet to release her debut, 2012’s Under Mountains, but was already... Read more... |
Das Rheingold, Royal Opera - knotty, riveting route to destructionFriday, 15 September 2023
Let’s set aside, to begin with, the question of the concept, other than to praise it as consistent. Most vital about this brave new Rheingold is the vindication of director Barrie Kosky’s claim that “what makes a Ring production interesting is the... Read more... |
Edinburgh Fringe 2023 reviews: Stuntman / Beautiful Evil Things / What You See When Your Eyes Are Closed...Tuesday, 08 August 2023
Stuntman, Summerhall ★★★★★Masculinity and violence are hot subjects for theatrical examination – and dance theatre two-hander Stuntman from Scottish company Superfan is far from the only Fringe show that investigates them this year. What... Read more... |
Matthew Shindell: For the Love of Mars: A Human History of the Red Planet review - a world of possibilityFriday, 19 May 2023
Humans are unsettled by incomplete data, unanswered questions. Show us dots on paper, and we’ll join them to make a picture. Show us objects in the night sky, and we create worlds.So it has been with Mars, conspicuous to us Earthbound gazers as one... Read more... |
The Rhinegold, English National Opera review - tacky, edgy, brilliantMonday, 20 February 2023
All that glitters, titular treasure included, is dangerous childsplay in Richard Jones’s third UK staging of what Wagner called the “preliminary evening” to the three main operas of The Ring of the Nibelung. It’s nothing like the previous two, for... Read more... |
Ruination, Linbury Theatre review - Medea gets a makeoverWednesday, 07 December 2022
At a time when every other theatre is offering an alternative Christmas show, what to make of the Royal Opera House’s first collaboration with Lost Dog, aka director-choreographer Ben Duke, who has come up with the most un-merry topic imaginable?... Read more... |
Thor: Love and Thunder review - more like it from MarvelSaturday, 09 July 2022
Twenty-eight films and 19 proliferating TV series in, the Marvel Cinematic Universe was becoming wearisome, testing fans’ faith with grimly effortful new entries, and choking other sorts of film into the margins, like knotweed. But like the mid-20th... Read more... |
Album: Hercules & Love Affair - In AmberSaturday, 11 June 2022
A gothic aesthetic is very common in the left field of electronic/club music these days – but it tends to go with fairly extreme sounds: either industrial pummelling, or glitched-out “deconstructed club” as in artists like Ziúr.But Andy Butler... Read more... |
Girl on an Altar, Kiln Theatre review - machismo, murder and motherhood in mesmerising mythSaturday, 28 May 2022
Playwrights return to classical myths for two main reasons – to shine a light on how we live today and because they're bloody good yarns.Marina Carr's re-telling of Clytemnestra's story is boldly innovative in its conception and execution, but... Read more... |
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