theartsdesk com, first with arts reviews, news and interviews
Ellie Roberts
Thursday, 10 October 2024
With Warped Tour anniversary rumours in the air, Green Day and blink-182 touring the world, and 20 huge new tracks from Sum 41, The Offspring’s latest contribution to the thriving...
Markie Robson-Scott
Wednesday, 09 October 2024
“I like laws and rules,” Steph (Jeany Spark), a jaded primary school teacher, tells a pet-shop employee – she’s adopting a cat, though that venture is doomed to failure -...
Demetrios Matheou
Wednesday, 09 October 2024
Contemporary reworkings of Greek tragedy run a very particular risk, that out of context the heightened actions of the original plays – the woefully poor judgement, the copious...
Helen Hawkins
Wednesday, 09 October 2024
As hurricanes rip into the American Gulf states with increasing ferocity, Eastern Europe disappears underwater and even the gentle British rain becomes a deluge, the arrival of...
Sarah Kent
Wednesday, 09 October 2024
Like an angry teenager rejecting everything his parents stand for, American artist Mike Kelley embraced everything most despised by the art world – from popular culture to crafts...
French Toast, Riverside Studios review - Racine-inspired satire finds its laughs once up-and-running
Gary Naylor
Wednesday, 09 October 2024
It’s always fun jabbing at the permanently open wound that is Anglo-French relations, now with added snap post-Brexit, its fading, but still frothing, humourless defenders...
Joe Muggs
Wednesday, 09 October 2024
This record keeps you guessing. It starts off with “Hybrid Romance”, an ambient piece that’s very pretty but has swooping...
Helen Hawkins
Tuesday, 08 October 2024
The latest incarnation of David Mitchell, TV actor, looks at first sight much like the familar one from Peep Show and Back....
Veronica Lee
Tuesday, 08 October 2024
Hard to imagine it now, but just a few years ago Ellen DeGeneres was one of America’s biggest daytime TV stars; her chatshow...
Adam Sweeting
Tuesday, 08 October 2024
Set in Yorkshire in the 1890s, and based on the novels by CL Skelton, The Hardacres is the story of the titular family who,...
Heather Neill
Monday, 07 October 2024
"Captain" Jack Boyle is a fantasist, a mythmaker, a storyteller. He relishes an audience – usually his sidekick, Joxer....
Robert Beale
Monday, 07 October 2024
Two splendid pieces of orchestral virtuosity began and finished the second Saturday concert by the BBC Philharmonic under...
Aleks Sierz
Monday, 07 October 2024
Why should we not look back in anger? With the Oasis reunion tour in the news recently, the title of John Osborne’s seminal...
Bernard Hughes
Monday, 07 October 2024
Judith Weir’s Blond Eckbert, presented by English Touring Opera at the Hackney Empire, at the beginning of its tour (paired...
Mark Kidel
Monday, 07 October 2024
As the Middle East continues to fragment in hate and horror, a tragic unfolding of events with roots reaching back to the...
Mark Kidel
Monday, 07 October 2024
The Marriage of Figaro is undoubtedly one of the greatest operas ever written. Mozart’s masterpiece is a display of musical...
Kieron Tyler
Monday, 07 October 2024
While it does get very cold in the north of Norway, it’s likely that Permafrost’s chosen name reflects a fondness for Howard...
Nick Hasted
Sunday, 06 October 2024
Time-travel is a trap in debutante Michael Felker’s tender sf two-hander, whose title’s grim irony becomes gradually...
Kieron Tyler
Sunday, 06 October 2024
Just over two weeks before Christmas 1967, The Rolling Stones issued Their Satanic Majesties Request. The album’s title...
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tv
Ludwig, BBC One review - entertaining spin on the brainy detective formula
David Mitchell is a perfect fit for this super-sleuth
The Hardacres, Channel 5 review - a fishy tale of upward mobility
Will everyday saga of Yorkshire folk strike a popular note?
Joan, ITV1 review - the roller-coaster career of a 1980s jewel thief
Brilliant performance by Sophie Turner as 'The Godmother'
film
Portraits of Dangerous Women review - quirky indie comedy
Pascal Bergamin's eccentric second feature explores unlikely friendships in the English countryside
Things Will Be Different review - lost in the past
Siblings' bank-robbing reunion goes awry in an eerie time-warp
Joker: Folie à Deux review - supervillainy laid low
Joaquin Phoenix’s clown crim faces a too-long stretch in the slammer
new music
Album: Ded Hyatt - Glossy
A genuinely boggling record mangles a world's worth of pop and avant-garde influences into... something
Songs We Carry, Ana Silvera and Saied Silbak, Kings Place review - harmony between Arab and Jew
Witnesses to the possibility of reconciliation and love
classical
Hardenberger, BBC Philharmonic, Storgårds, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - splendour and a trumpeter's voluntary
Individuality and discipline in Strauss, Stravinsky, Haydn… and more
First Person: conductor Robert Hollingworth on a four-choir rarity by Benevoli
I Fagiolini join with two other choirs for a spectacular in St Martin-in-the-Fields
BBC Singers, BBCSO, Jeannin, Barbican review - from stormy weather to blue skies
An uplifting centenary party for the great choral survivors
opera
Blond Eckbert, English Touring Opera review - dark deeds afoot in the woods
Judith Weir’s chamber opera explores Freudian themes through a modern lens
The Marrriage of Figaro, Opera Project, Tobacco Factory, Bristol review - small is beautiful indeed
Mozart opera in the round delivers intimacy and joy
Béatrice et Bénédict, Irish National Opera, National Concert Hall, Dublin review - sung and spoken triumph
Shakespeare from Fiona Shaw ballasts superbly performed Berlioz
theatre
The Other Place, National Theatre review - searing family tragedy
Emma D’Arcy and Tobias Menzies lock horns in twisted and triumphant take on ‘Antigone’
Bellringers, Hampstead Theatre review - mordant comedy about the end of the world
Daisy Hall's astonishing debut is both darkly funny and deadly serious
French Toast, Riverside Studios review - Racine-inspired satire finds its laughs once up-and-running
Comedy gains momentum when characters are rounded out
dance
National Ballet of Canada, Sadler's Wells review - see this, and know what dance can do
Yet again, Crystal Pite proves herself a ferocious creative force, alongside fellow Canadian exports James Kudelka and Emma Portner
Nobodaddy, Teaċ Daṁsa, Dublin Theatre Festival review - supernatural song and dance odyssey
Michael Keegan-Dolan’s genius guides us through death, separation and loss
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Royal Ballet review - big, bold and ultimately brash
It may be box-office gold, but Christopher Wheeldon's adaptation fails to find a beating heart down the rabbit hole
comedy
Ellen DeGeneres, Netflix Special review - no mea culpa and few jokes
Former chatshow host’s bizarre take on cancellation
Joe Rogan, Netflix Special review - US podcaster leaves the controversy - and the jokes - at home
Nothing edgy about this hour
Zoë Coombs Marr, Soho Theatre review - stock checks and spreadsheets
Australian comic's autobiographical show
Books
Stevie Smith: Not Waving But Drowning review - riding the wave
This slim and stylish new edition can't quite dispel some lurking doubts
Ellen McWilliams: Resting Places - On Wounds, War and the Irish Revolution review - finding art in the inarticulable
A violent history finds a home in this impressionistic blend of literary criticism and memoir
Claire Messud: This Strange Eventful History review - home is where the heart was
A brutally honest and epic narrative follows a family doomed to wander the earth
visual arts
Mike Kelley: Ghost and Spirit, Tate Modern review - adolescent angst indefinitely extended
The artist who refused to grow up
Monet and London, Courtauld Gallery review - utterly sublime smog
Never has pollution looked so compellingly beautiful
Michael Craig-Martin, Royal Academy review - from clever conceptual art to digital decor
A career in art that starts high and ends low
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